From: utzoo!decvax!cca!mo@LBL-UNIX@sri-unix Newsgroups: net.works Title: Re: WORKS Digest V2 #68 Article-I.D.: sri-unix.2401 Posted: Mon Aug 2 08:54:44 1982 Received: Tue Aug 3 00:43:34 1982 From: mo at LBL-UNIX (Mike O'Dell [system]) In reply to Sam Hsu's question about menus.... We have used a version of "Menunix" for training a couple of new secretaries and have had interesting experiences. (FYI, Menunix is a menu-based shell done by Gary Perlman, et al, at ucsd.) For the first day or two, the people liked the menus very much. However, one of them actually wandered in and asked "Isn't there some way I can just type the command I want to do instead of having to do the menus?" We think this means the menu interface is nice for rank beginners, but as soon as they learn what the most frequently-used menus have to say, they just want to type the command and not be prompted and prodded by the machine. On occassion, the people go back to the menu interface when they want to learn something new, but really seem to be using it as a help system with the ability to support examples and experimentation. They are generally back in their normal shell within a few minutes. My personal biases are similar (and may be coloring the interpretations!). The menus are nice when you are trying to get a feel for something very alien, but as soon as you have a "working set" in your head, you just want to type the commands. I don't care how fast you can repaint the menus, and that I can read very quickly; I simply want to type the commands. -Mike