Recent newsgroup posts have shown that some people strongly dislike
EAGLE's current user interface. Sometimes written in, erm, harsh words,
these complaints were often disqualified as mere whines of people not
caring about reading manuals.
With rather strong opinions on both sides, it is perhaps not so easy to
see that there is some truth in ALL posts:
1. People complaining about the user interface are often quite new to
EAGLE. They expect an Office-like interface and are faced with
something completely different, which makes it rather hard for
them. They CANNOT see from scratch that SOME functions are much
more effective the way EAGLE presents them than with Office-like
interfaces.
2. Long-term users know lots of EAGLE's tricks and use command line,
scripting and ULP programming with ease to achieve what they need.
It is hard for them to see that other people don't know how to do
certain things, as it 'should be obvious how to do that with the
following syntax... - and it's all in the manual'.
I myself am CERTAINLY a long-term user and therefore see that some of
EAGLE's non-Office functionality is REALLY useful and makes life REALLY
easy. I LIKE EAGLE. Nevertheless, I would perhaps NOT want to buy it if
I were a new user and had downloaded it to make a decision which layout
program to use.
The reasons for this are clear: When testing a new program, I
- expect an Office-like user interface (and if I don't get it, I want
to see immediately WHY I don't get it, and why the ACTUAL interface
is better suited for me),
- just play around with it, look at the menus and click here and
there (and know by heart that more or less ALL functionality will
be accessible this way), and
- do NOT read manuals (and only sometimes look into help files).
If I don't understand the user interface, or if the interface doesn't
present me with the functionality I need, I will throw the program away.
Yes, of course that's a pity, but I just DO NOT WANT to spend the time
to REALLY dig into a program BEFORE buying it. Reading manuals and help
pages is done AFTER delivery (some people NEVER do it).
Yes, the first look DOES count. Inner qualities come later. That's
surely the wrong approach for choosing your partner, but it's a VERY
common (and sometimes even time-saving) approach for things you can BUY.
Therefore, a program should do the following:
3. Present the user with an interface that is AS EASY TO UNDERSTAND
AS POSSIBLE without ruining the expert's workflow.
4. Show as many of its functions as possible in menus, buttons,
on-screen texts etc. without cluttering up the screen too much.
5. Make often-used functions VERY easy to find and use (more
complex functions may be a little bit more hidden).
6. In case of doubt, make the CORRECT help pages appear in an
instant, showing clear and concise information with proper
linking.
People who ARE already experts don't need that. But NEW users do, and
especially NON-users who just take a look around (the potential new
customers).
Unfortunately, EAGLE is NOT so very good in the above points. It quite
definitely WAS once, nearly twenty years ago, when all other programs
were even MORE cryptic and strange. Considering their graphical user
interfaces (GUI), nearly all other programs have evolved CONSIDERABLY in
the meantime. EAGLE also DID evolve, but, unfortunately, VERY slowly
and, at least in my opinion, NOT ENOUGH!
Having a completely different user interface with every new version is
absolutely terrible, of course (some software companies seem to like
that approach, though), but having NO user interface for some functions
(and a rather, erm, BAROQUE interface for others) doesn't seem to be
sensible to me, either.
In the next time, I will try to show several points that might very well
frustrate new users (our institute is FULL of new users, and I DO hear
some complaints), and which can be corrected either VERY EASILY, or at
least without restructuring the whole program and giving everybody
headaches.
Andreas Weidner
