NRCGSH@RITVAX.BITNET (Norman Coombs) (03/30/88)
The Digest has been running a prolonged discussion of the relative merits of paper and the computer monitor. It seems clear that at least some part of this is a matter of personal preference. Others suggest that the views are entirely culturally determined. I suspect that the latter is partially true, but we will only be able to know after the passage of more time. Many years ago I began introducing a lot of video into my history class. Students were to watch it on their own in the library using video players. About a third of the class objected in evaluations that this method was impersonal. However, within half a dozen years this objection vanished totally. I noticed that my own children who were coming up through the school system at the same time were being expected to use audios and videos on their own for independent study. It seems that those students who grew up accustomed to working with that technology no longer found it alienating. (Unless they had become so alienated that they did not know the difference.) In another 10 years, we will have a new group of young adults who grew up reading from the CRT. This will tend to weed out the factor of cultural conditioning. Whatever preferences are left will be more likely to reflect personal rather than social factors. You might guess that I am a historian and am just passing the buck of decision-making to "father time". Well, you are right. Norman Coombs
ruffwork@orstcs.cs.orst.edu (Ritchey Ruff) (04/04/88)
I don't have the paper here in front of me, but a study was done on why paper "seems" to be the prefered media for proof reading, etc. They found that when there were errors in text on a monochrome display with letters that were not anti-aliased, the number of errors found was around 50%, with paper it was 99%, and with anti-aliased letters on monochrome it was around 95% (the exact numbers might be off some, but are in the right ballpark). Of course the big question is why? Is it because our vision system works better with "smooth" lettering (no jaggies), or because our vision system is used to smooth letters (it's we've trained our eyes to see, so they work best with smoothed lettering)? Ritchey Ruff
inc@tc.FLUKE.COM (Gary Benson) (04/07/88)
The question asking why people seem to prefer editing on paper rather than on a terminal screen has been kicking around a long time. One of the best theories I've heard states that the editing task in and of itself requires the editor to establish a feel for context. By presenting information a screenful at a time, it is difficult to get a good feel for where you are in a document. In addition, the establishment of context aids the editor who must sometimes cross-check, for example, if I'm at page 75 in a 200 page manual and I notice an error, I may want to go back to see if there are other occurrences. It's easy with paper, less so on a screen. Or I may want to put my finger on a page for ready reference because I know that I'll need to refer to a particular piece of information later on, and rather than searching, I'll just leave my finger there. Even very clever interfaces cannot match the simplicity of laying a finger between two pieces of paper! At one time I was a strong proponent of the "paperless" office, but arguments like these and my own experience have shown me that such a thing is probably unrealistic. In fact, I predict that computer screens will always be second choice over paper for many users besides editors. For example, technicians will probably always prefer the paper service manual, cooks their cookbooks and engineers their CRC Standard Math Tables. Gary Benson
beckenba@csvax.caltech.edu (Joe Beckenbach) (04/10/88)
Gary Benson writes: > In fact, I predict that computer screens will always be second choice > over paper for many users besides editors. For example, technicians > will probably always prefer the paper service manual, cooks their > cookbooks and engineers their CRC Standard Math Tables. Probably the first in a flurry of replies.... (oops, paper metaphor :-) While doing math homework I didn't want to have to bother firing up the computer to find an essential concept. While writing long algorithms in pseudocode I need the context AND a few helpful arrows in different colors to remind me where I need to do more work. For a lot of things which aren't currently computer-based it is much wiser to keep from forcing it onto the computer medium. Anyway, a recipe is easier to carry around on a card than on a disk, and is less affected by kitchen spills. :-) Joe Beckenbach
seven@nuchat.UUCP (David Paulsen) (04/12/88)
Gary Benson writes: > ... Even a very clever interfaces cannot match the simplicity of laying > a finger between two pieces of paper! Excellent point. > At one time I was a strong proponent of the "paperless" office, but > arguments like these and my own experience have shown me that such a > thing is probably unrealistic. In fact, I predict that computer screens > will always be second choice over paper for many users besides editors. I agree with you for the time being. BUT, technology marches ever onward. How about a compromise? Specifically, I'm thinking of a different sort of display peripheral entirely... imagine this: Flat-screen LCD displays have improved 1000% in just the last two years. Think forward a few years, when incredibly thin, flat, FLEXIBLE liquid crystal displays become available. (In your local Toys'R'Us, xmas 1989! :-) You could take fifty or a hundred of these electronic "pages", bind them somehow into a book format, and then display information on each page, just like a book... a user could flip through the constantly-updated screens like leafing thru a magazine. The 50-100 page limitation is arbitrary; it's the same as buffer size on your editor. If you want to "read" a 400 page manual with your 50 page LCD magazine, you'd access 50 page hunks at a time. Text, graphics, animation could all be generated within user control... real-time reports (inventories, accounting) could be updated on the fly. How about touch-sensitive page numbers? Press the right-hand page number and you'd "turn a page", without actually doing so mechanically. Hold it down, and do a rip-sort, the same way I frantically fan thru a manual trying to find something in a hurry... of course, there's always the infinitley user-friendly constantly-updated index/glossary/help-files in the back. :-) One LCD magazine would be all you'd need to access all the books in your library. If you're like me, and have four or five books always open at a time, then you'd have four of these magazine thingees. Naturally, this being the future, they're incredibly cheap: smaller, single page versions are used for advertising leaflets, business cards, greeting cards... all animated of course with brilliant colors and constantly shifting text. I know, I know... Buck Rogers. But hey, think how far LCD technology has progressed -- we're a coupla years away from flat TVs you can hang on your wall; what'll be available in 1999? Now, if I can only figure out a way to get rid of that huge ugly fiber-optic bundle trailing out of my _BYTE_... David Paulsen
EDB85007@NOBIVM.BITNET (Espen Andersen) (04/27/88)
David Paulsen outlined a cross between a CRT (or, rather, a flexible flatscreen) and a book in the Digest, Volume 3 No. 14. I have always dreamt of a cross between an office desk and a CRT. Imagine the Macintosh user interface expanded up to 6 feet by 3 and put flat out in front of you like the normal desktop surface - with a touch-sensitive screen or a ligthpen instead of a mouse. With an operating system resembling the MultiFinder you could write memos, spreadsheets and books directly "on the desk". The telephone would be on the screen as well - with a loudspeaker. The paper basket (it would have to be a basket - Apple "owns" the bin :-) would be on the screen. In fact - the only thing "physical" would be the coffee mug.... Of course the resolution would have to be fantastic, the colour choices unlimited and the harddisk enormous. Not to mention the UPS system - imagine somebody pulling the cord and erasing your entire office... Espen