这个问题来自于对过去50年左右计算领域各种进展的评论。

其他一些与会者请我把这个问题作为一个问题向整个论坛提出。

这里的基本思想不是抨击事物的现状,而是试图理解提出基本新思想和原则的过程。

我认为我们在大多数计算领域都需要真正的新想法,我想知道最近已经完成的任何重要而有力的想法。如果我们真的找不到他们,那么我们应该问“为什么?”和“我们应该做什么?”


当前回答

更好的用户界面。

今天的用户界面仍然很糟糕。我指的不是小的方面,而是大的、基本的方面。我不禁注意到,即使是最好的程序也仍然有一些接口,这些接口要么极其复杂,要么需要以其他方式进行大量的抽象思考,而且无法达到传统的非软件工具的易用性。

诚然,这是由于软件可以比传统工具做更多的事情。但这不是接受现状的理由。此外,大多数软件都做得不好。

In general, applications still lack a certain “just works” feeling are too much oriented by what can be done, rather than what should be done. One point that has been raised time and again, and that is still not solved, is the point of saving. Applications crash, destroying hours of work. I have the habit of pressing Ctrl+S every few seconds (of course, this no longer works in web applications). Why do I have to do this? It's mind-numbingly stupid. This is clearly a task for automation. Of course, the application also has to save a diff for every modification I make (basically an infinite undo list) in case I make an error.

解决这个问题其实并不难。在每个应用程序中都很难实现它,因为没有好的API可以做到这一点。编程工具和库必须显著改进,才能在所有平台和程序上轻松实现这些工作,适用于所有具有任意备份存储且不需要用户交互的文件格式。但在我们最终开始编写“好的”应用程序而不仅仅是足够的应用程序之前,这是必要的一步。

I believe that Apple currently approximates the “just works” feeling best in some regards. Take for example their newest version of iPhoto which features a face recognition that automatically groups photos by people appearing in them. That is a classical task that the user does not want to do manually and doesn't understand why the computer doesn't do it automatically. And even iPhoto is still a very long way from a good UI, since said feature still requires ultimate confirmation by the user (for each photo!), since the face recognition engine isn't perfect.

其他回答

Paxos协议。很难描述它在互联网时代的价值。

更好的用户界面。

今天的用户界面仍然很糟糕。我指的不是小的方面,而是大的、基本的方面。我不禁注意到,即使是最好的程序也仍然有一些接口,这些接口要么极其复杂,要么需要以其他方式进行大量的抽象思考,而且无法达到传统的非软件工具的易用性。

诚然,这是由于软件可以比传统工具做更多的事情。但这不是接受现状的理由。此外,大多数软件都做得不好。

In general, applications still lack a certain “just works” feeling are too much oriented by what can be done, rather than what should be done. One point that has been raised time and again, and that is still not solved, is the point of saving. Applications crash, destroying hours of work. I have the habit of pressing Ctrl+S every few seconds (of course, this no longer works in web applications). Why do I have to do this? It's mind-numbingly stupid. This is clearly a task for automation. Of course, the application also has to save a diff for every modification I make (basically an infinite undo list) in case I make an error.

解决这个问题其实并不难。在每个应用程序中都很难实现它,因为没有好的API可以做到这一点。编程工具和库必须显著改进,才能在所有平台和程序上轻松实现这些工作,适用于所有具有任意备份存储且不需要用户交互的文件格式。但在我们最终开始编写“好的”应用程序而不仅仅是足够的应用程序之前,这是必要的一步。

I believe that Apple currently approximates the “just works” feeling best in some regards. Take for example their newest version of iPhoto which features a face recognition that automatically groups photos by people appearing in them. That is a classical task that the user does not want to do manually and doesn't understand why the computer doesn't do it automatically. And even iPhoto is still a very long way from a good UI, since said feature still requires ultimate confirmation by the user (for each photo!), since the face recognition engine isn't perfect.

互联网本身早于1980年,但由蒂姆·伯纳斯-李提出并实现的万维网(“通过简单机制分布式超文本”)始于1989/90年。

虽然超文本的概念以前就存在(Nelson的Xanadu曾尝试实现分布式方案),但WWW是实现分布式超文本系统的一种新方法。Berners-Lee以一种强大且易于实现的方式将简单的客户机-服务器协议、标记语言和寻址方案结合在一起。

我认为大多数创新都是以一种原创的方式重新组合现有的作品。万维网的每一部分以前都以某种形式存在过,但两者的结合只有在事后才变得明显。

我确信你现在正在使用它。

过去30年里处理器速度的大幅提升不容忽视。各种聪明的想法,如流水线和抢占式分支,以及处理器设计电子方面的改进,意味着今天的程序员可以更多地担心程序的设计和可维护性,而不必担心计算时钟周期。

在人机交互中使用物理学提供了另一种可理解的隐喻。这与手势和触觉相结合,很可能会取代70年代发明的、从80年代中后期开始普遍使用的当前常见GUI隐喻。

1980年的计算能力还不足以让这成为可能。我相信游戏可能引领了这一方向。iPod Touch/iPhone中的列表滚动交互便是一个很好的例子。交互机制依赖于动量和摩擦如何在现实世界中工作的直觉,以提供滚动项目列表的简单方法,而可用性依赖于导致滚动的物理手势。