{"id":117,"date":"2010-02-11T19:07:17","date_gmt":"2010-02-12T01:07:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/?p=117"},"modified":"2010-02-11T19:07:17","modified_gmt":"2010-02-12T01:07:17","slug":"the-pre-and-the-typical-web-user","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/archives\/117","title":{"rendered":"The Pre and the Typical Web User"},"content":{"rendered":"

So, I hit a link<\/a> last night where a ton of people, looking for their Facebook login by searching it off Google, left all these hilarious comments all over that blog’s site complaining that they couldn’t “log in to their facebook”. <\/p>\n

After laughing and leaving a comment that the author of the blog shouldn’t encourage people to “type things into their google” to “find their facebook”, I began thinking…people have been telling me for years that all they want out of their computer is to type something into it, and have it go where they want. I began to realize that I’m possibly a different kind of user, one that is used to scanning through lists and finding what I want instead of typing what I’m thinking.<\/p>\n

One of the features of the Palm Pre that people don’t really talk nearly enough about is that to really use the device well, you use the universal search built into webOS and use it religiously. You start typing, and your applications, files, phone numbers, contacts, appointments, email addresses, etc. all start popping up in the search list, and the more you type, the more the automatic filters remove the things you’re not looking for until you have what you want. You can use the device like you would an iPhone or Treo, but the universal search is amazingly powerful (and from what I hear, voice activation is coming to the platform…and if that gets coupled with that search, it’ll make the Pre just about the best “on the road smartphone” on the market. You would literally be able to do almost anything with voice commands…and that’s not just fluff.) <\/p>\n

It’s the thing about the Pre I haven’t been able to nail down since it came out. I like a lot about webOS, but that all kind of came together for me all at once. You can really use the Pre to the best of its capabilities in almost the same way that these people use Google to find their Facebook page, and it’s actually not that much slower or faster than swiping and flicking your way through lists of applications or contacts or whatever. You have a general idea of the name of what you’re searching for, and you just type a few letters…then bam, you’ve got it. Probably a big reason why the Pre and Pixi love that physical keyboard so much…a virtual keyboard really doesn’t let you use the device as effectively in that manner. <\/p>\n

We’ve all been taught by Apple and Microsoft to visually scan for little pictures instead of remember words. But the truth is that most average users remember words, not pictures. You read a whole lot more every day than you think, and most people think in words, not pictures. (Well, unless you’re an ancient Egyptian or no one taught you how to read.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So, I hit a link last night where a ton of people, looking for their Facebook login by searching it off Google, left all these hilarious comments all over that blog’s site complaining that they couldn’t “log in to their facebook”. After laughing and leaving a comment that the author of the blog shouldn’t encourage […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-all"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":118,"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117\/revisions\/118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zullnero.com\/blah\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}