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Software Expectations

I recently got an HP 3055 fax/scanner/copier/printer for my home office. Unlike my previous printer, this one was supported on the Mac without jumping through hoops, and even the scan functionality was supported. So, you know, cool. The install was relatively straightforward -- the only weird part was that it wanted the printer connected for the install. OK, fine.

The machine it is attached to also has Boot Camp installed, so I decided to install the printer drivers on both sides, so that printer sharing wouldn't be busted if I was using the Windows side. What surprised me was how much more irritating the install process was on the Windows side -- even though HP created both installers.

While the Mac install required my attention a couple times at the start, the Windows install was like a needy child, seeking my attention at intermittent intervals. Now, I don't object to answering questions, but the issue here was that it didn't ask all the questions up front. Instead, it would ask a question, then start a progress bar -- universal code for "you can ignore me now while I copy some files." So I'd turn my attention way, only to discover a few minutes later that it had made about 10 seconds of progress before demanding some new information.

So... why the big difference? I propose that Mac users have an expectation of straightforwardness -- Windows users are resigned to over-complication. The different teams writing the two different installers proceeded from the assumptions of their user experience expectations.

On a side note, I went to grab the latest DirectX using Firefox. I was faced with an insistence that I install the "Windows Genuine Advantage" update before it would let me proceed -- and that I actually had to get a special Firefox plugin to even do that. So -- in order to make the computer function properly -- I had to install an update whose only purpose is to make it easier for Microsoft to disable my machine if they decide I am not in compliance with their intellectual property agenda.

All I want to do is is swing a lightsaber :(. Is that so wrong?

Comments

with only anecdotal evidence, i'm going to suggest that mac users and apple, uh, people, have been correcting towards each other better than win users and windows people. it seemeth to me that it is easier to do something predictable (to mac users, anyways) for/on a mac, it is harder to do something unexpected. installers as a case in point, there really aren't that many things that an end user has or even gets to choose about installers on the mac, so there's no reason to keep bothering them. over on the windows side, it seems you can get bogged down in more details of the turing machine simulator and it's layers, modules and devices interelating easier. this is as much user experience details as technical details, i think.

i find firefox proper on the mac jarring, as it's got things that aren't very mac like (for good cross-platform consistency reasons, to be sure...), but they had to go to the effort to get that all to work.

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