Archive for May 2007
Firefox Pwns IE
If you were ever looking for the amazing Firefox icon showing the Firefox chewing the blue IE logo, here it is in its full-size glory.
I’m not certain who the original artist is, but if you know, please do let me know and I’ll give them credit.
If you’re looking for the icon in .ico format, you can download it from DeviantArt.
Ubuntu Machines Make it to Dell Homepage
Found on Digg, Dell is advertising the new Ubuntu-powered machines on their homepage:
In case you hadn’t heard, some time ago Dell created a Digg-like site called IdeaStorm where the public could submit innovative ideas to Dell and vote those ideas up or down. The suggestion that quickly rose to the top of the list was for Dell to start selling machines pre-loaded with Linux. There was initially some question as to whether Dell would go through with it or not as Dell reps had previously stated that they were considering Linux, but the support issues were a serious blocker on moving forward into the space.
Following the popularity of the IdeaStorm Ubuntu idea, it was later discovered that Michael Dell had a personal laptop (Dell Precision M90) running with Ubuntu. That pretty much confirmed what many believed was Dell’s interest in Ubuntu.
Subsequently, Dell officially announced that they would begin selling a few select machines with Ubuntu pre-loaded; Ubuntu was the natural choice given it’s skyrocketing popularity and it’s tremendous ease-of-use.
So, here we are today, seeing Ubuntu on the Dell homepage! Kudos, Dell!
By the way, if you can’t see the Ubuntu promotion on the homepage, keep refreshing until you do. Dell employs a rotation script that displays a different promotion on each page load.
Bill Higgins on ‘The Uncanny Valley’
Bill Higgins has written an excellent post titled, ‘the Ucanny Valley of user interface design‘. It discusses the application of the Uncanny Valley theory to AJAX web applications.
This makes for a great foundation to a very interesting discussion. He posits that as AJAX applications extend to apply new desktop user-interface paradigms, they will essentially become less usable because they’ll break the mental model that people generally have about the way a desktop-looking application works. Web applications can’t achieve true desktop functionality and where they differ, it will contradict user expectations.
Personally, I find myself agreeing with Bill. The comments on the post are also very interesting as some of the readers raise very good objections to this theory and Bill is able to address many of them. One point made in the comments is that Mr. Higgins is not against UI innovation, but where an interface attempts to mimic an existing paradigm and not able to mimic it entirely, he thinks that will back-fire.
Excellent read as we move into an RIA-ified world.
