"Computer Games Are An Utter Waste Of Time. Discuss"

Sunday 1st November 2009

This is perhaps hardly suitable as a question for a GCSE IT paper, but it does nevertheless have a serious element to it

The need for public speaking arises in various situations.  Obvious examples include the school teacher, the Vicar preaching in Church on Sunday and even the politician demonstrating his skills as an orator.  Whatever the occasion, the speaker's greatest challenge is first to capture the listeners attention and then to keep it.  In some respects, clergy and politicians generally have a more difficult task than, say, a school teacher - after all, their listeners can simply get up and walk out!  They will therefore use such devices as humour and interesting anecdotes, in an effort to put their point across.  

Teachers face a further challenge, in that their main objective is to educate their pupils.  If their lessons have any entertainment value, it is a bonus.  However, as good teachers know well, pupils learn better when they find the lessons fun.  One way that this can be achieved is by making a game of the subject matter.  This is not restricted to humans, of course.  A litter of lion cubs will spend hours playing chase or stalk-and-pounce games.  Far from being an enjoyable way to pass the time, these games are vital for the cubs to learn the skills they will need to survive as adults.

Properly-designed computer games can fulfil the same purpose as the lion cubs' games.  The cubs think they are just "having fun" and have no idea that they are learning essential skills, in much the same way as the pupils playing games, whether computer-based or otherwise.  Many computer games are indeed an utter waste of time, or worse.  The greatest risk is that of generalisation and thus dismissing them all out-of-hand.

It Is Sometimes Said That "Advice Is Worth Only What You Pay For It"

Sunday 25th October 2009

Even if that adage is true, does it also apply to software?

Most people know of software which shares two atributes with the Emperor's infamous new clothes.  One is that it must be good, because everyone says it is good.  The other is that it is very expensive indeed.  On the other hand, there is plenty of software which is genuinely good and enjoys a justifiably high reputation.  Sometimes, it may be very expensive, but this is not invariably the case.

It is of course true that "cheap" does not equate to "good value for money".  If a product of any type is unfit for the purpose for which it is intended, even if it is free, it represents very poor value for money.  Equally, a product which, although expensive, serves its purpose admirably, can often represent excellent value for money.

Some free software is so appallingly bad that it is not worth even the minimal effort required to download and install it, let alone the considerably greater effort required to learn how to use it.  However, there are exceptions.

The "Photoshop" application enjoys a justifiably high reputation among those who need to perform heavyweight manipulation of images.  With the popularity of digital cameras, its vast array of features are being used as never before, although not everyone who would like to benefit from using Photoshop is able to justify the cost of purchasing it.  Fortunately, there is a free alternative in "The GIMP".  Its name is an acronym for "GNU Image Manipulation Program", which is basically a polite way of saying "Open-source Alternative to Photoshop".   It is available as a free download for Windows, Mac and many flavours of Linux (of course!) from http://www.gimp.org.

The GIMP is an excellent free alternative to Photoshop, but there are even cases where free software is both very well-regarded and totally without a paid-for equivalent.  An example of this is DSL or "Damn Small Linux".  This 50MB marvel comes complete with a graphical interface and runs like greased lightning.  It is available as a free download from http://www.damnsmalllinux.org, while a Google search for "Damn Small Linux" gives over 200,000 results.  A selection of DLS desktops features on the first page of the results.  Well worth a look!

Do You Find Those Pesky Advertisements On Web Pages Slow Down Your Surfing?

Sunday 18th October 2009

Well, now you can fight back! It is really easy and it won't cost you a single penny

Firstly, if you have not already switched to using the superb Firefox as your browser, do so now.  As well as being faster and less insecure than Internet Explorer, it does not require its users to reboot after every update.

Next, open Tools | Add-ons from the menu bar, which is shown at the top of every Firefox screen, then click on "Get Add-ons".  In the little search box, near the top left corner, type in "AdBlock" and press the ENTER key.  The "AdBlock Plus" add-on will appear at the top of the list.  Click on the "Add to Firefox..." button and follow the prompts.  When Firefox restarts, Adblock PLus will be active and will suppress the majority of advertisements.

Adblock Plus makes an amazing difference on advertisement-heavy web pages.  Instead of your computer having to squander its power on rendering clever, whizzy advertisements for products you would never buy anyway, Adblock Plus merely substitutes a plain white panel.  Since this takes very little processing power, the affected page loads much more quickly than it would have done.

The difference is less marked on pages which carry little external advertising, while there is no difference at all on pages which carry no advertising or, like http://www.Google.com, take simplicity just about as far as it can be taken. This minimalist approach is, of course, one of the reasons for the speed with which Google's main page loads, which is in turn one of the reasons for its enviable reputation as the world's most popular search engine.

When Did You Last Give Your Software Designers A Piece Of Your Mind?

Sunday 11th October 2009

Can't remember? Then it is high time you gave them the benefit of your opinion!

It is a common belief that software designers live in a different world to the rest of us and even that they may belong to a different species of human being!  However, there are two sides to every coin, of course.  Although software designers are undoubtedly expert in their field, this expertise unfortunately does not extend to telepathy.

Whilst it may be easy to design a product, it is much more difficult to design one which meets the end-users' actual needs rather than what those needs are perceived to be.  Without the benefit of input from the end-users, how can the designers know what is really needed?  The motor industry has given us two examples which illustrate this rather neatly.

The infamous Edsel almost brought down the Ford Motor Company.  Its the designers thought "they knew best" and, backed by a grossly-excessive marketing campaign, tried to foist their ideas on the great American public.  It took several years for Ford to recover its reputation.  On the other hand, when Toyota decided to design a new luxury car which would compete with the BMW 7-Series and the Mercedes S-Class, they did things differently.  They had found that such vehicles tended to appeal to the "yuppies" on the West Coast of the United States, so they sent their designers to live with the target market for a year or so, in order to find out what they really wanted from a car.  This gave them the insight they needed to design the first Lexus, which was an immediate success.  It could hardly have been otherwise, of course, since it had been explicitly designed to "tick all the boxes".

Admirable though Toyota's approach may be, it is not always practical, or even possible.  Instead, it is the responsibility of the end-users to tell the designers what they like and dislike about the product concerned, as well as any suggestions and requests for enhancements.  As far as software designers are concerned, "Ignorance is most certainly not bliss"!

Equally, it is the designers' responsibility to take note of what the end-users say.  Should you find that your software designers refuse to listen to you, dump them and take your business elsewhere.  A good product which has been designed with little or no user input is a rare animal indeed.