intuitive:

1 a : known or perceived by intuition : directly apprehended b : knowable by intuition c : based on or agreeing with intuition d : readily learned or understood

– Source: Merriam-Webster Online

As I’ve written in this space time and time again, I don’t believe that any software (and definitely most of the software I’ve documented) is intuitive. It’s familiar — people have used certain applications and interfaces for so long that they’ve gotten used to them. But they didn’t start out that way.

Somedays, I feel like I’ve been shouting in the wilderness with only trees and mountains hearing me. But, as it turns out, I’m not alone. A few days ago, I stumbled across an interesting article at LinuxInsider.

The article goes into quite a bit of depth about whether or not operating systems should be intuitive. Not surprisingly, the title of the article is “Should Operating Systems Be Intuitive?”.

A couple of quotes from the article struck me:

“‘Intuitive’ has nothing to do with computers,” (Carla) Schroder wrote. “It’s all learned.”

“Nothing is intuitive,” Montreal consultant and Slashdot blogger Gerhard Mack told LinuxInsider. “Think about it: We have to be taught to use a toilet, how to use a fork and how to drive. Why do we expect computers to be some magic thing that does not have a learning curve?”

There is some interesting food for thought in there. Give the article a read. It’s time well spent, no matter what side of the fence you’re on.

Related posts:

1. Putting the wrecking ball to the UI
2. Intuitiveness and adaptability
3. How much prior knowledge should we expect or assume?