On Fri, 2007-01-05 at 13:26 -0600, Les Mikesell wrote: snip > Software is often designed to be attractive to first-time users and > perhaps has to be, but once you have learned it's tricks and it has > learned your preferences it should adapt to stay more out of the way. Hi, Les, I have written some adaptive software. It is very difficult, and not rewarding, because however it adapts, the users will say "But that is not what I wanted!", and you can even have the history to prove that their actions were that way each and every time that they used the software, yet it missed expectations. That is the very definition of misset expectations and customer disillusionment. I suggest that you write a piece of user adaptive software, and check out how it is done, then let us all know your results. My personal results were very disappointing, and frustrating on both my self and the user forced to work with me to attempt to rectify the situation. The solution in the end was to provide a system of defaults and default selections controlled by a script file which neither of us was totally happy with, but both of us agreed that it met the requirements of meeting expectations, being adaptable to use and simple to change behaviours. YMMV. Regards, Les H
