I just spent nearly two hours trying to install the upgrade. I finally succeeded, but I'm not happy. You could have saved me that time.
I've been using OS X for over a year. I sit in front of my screen six-ten hours a day. I’m no novice. Yet until two hours ago, I didn't have the faintest idea what an "input method" or an "input menu" were.
Before I finally got it, I had to go to the web site, read several pages of FAQs, fool around with something called the "International" preferences, and even then it wouldn't work because I couldn't get the Spell Catcher icon back on the menu bar, despite the fact that it was turned on in the Input tab in the International preferences. For that I had to go back to the FAQs for the fifth or sixth time, where I found a message referring me to the manual. This, after I've been using Spell Catcher for years. I came very close to chucking the whole project. No utility is worth this frustration.
How hard would it have been for you to have given clear instructions in the Readme of the upgrade? To explain what the Input Menu is, and where to find it ? I had looked all over Spell Catcher first, then the System Prefs, and never had found it. How was I to know that it was supposed to appear in my menu bar, and that this was controlled from a tab in the International Preferences? Was this some knowledge I was supposed to have been born with?
In the installation instructions you mentioned crucial "input menus" and "input methods" and rebooting, then left me to my own devices to research what these things were, where they were to be found, and what I was supposed to do about them.
I'd call this really lazy, thoughtless installation support. I’m a bit astonished that I actually stuck with it as long as I did.
Tom
0
Why not make it easier?
Started by Tom Kirshbaum, Aug 27 2003 02:57 PM
3 replies to this topic
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Posted 27 August 2003 - 05:17 PM
Tom Kirshbaum, on Aug 27 2003, 03:57 PM, said:
I just spent nearly two hours trying to install the upgrade. I finally succeeded, but I'm not happy. You could have saved me that time.
I've been using OS X for over a year. I sit in front of my screen six-ten hours a day. I’m no novice. Yet until two hours ago, I didn't have the faintest idea what an "input method" or an "input menu" were.
Before I finally got it, I had to go to the web site, read several pages of FAQs, fool around with something called the "International" preferences, and even then it wouldn't work because I couldn't get the Spell Catcher icon back on the menu bar, despite the fact that it was turned on in the Input tab in the International preferences. For that I had to go back to the FAQs for the fifth or sixth time, where I found a message referring me to the manual. This, after I've been using Spell Catcher for years. I came very close to chucking the whole project. No utility is worth this frustration.
How hard would it have been for you to have given clear instructions in the Readme of the upgrade? To explain what the Input Menu is, and where to find it ? I had looked all over Spell Catcher first, then the System Prefs, and never had found it. How was I to know that it was supposed to appear in my menu bar, and that this was controlled from a tab in the International Preferences? Was this some knowledge I was supposed to have been born with?
In the installation instructions you mentioned crucial "input menus" and "input methods" and rebooting, then left me to my own devices to research what these things were, where they were to be found, and what I was supposed to do about them.
I'd call this really lazy, thoughtless installation support. I’m a bit astonished that I actually stuck with it as long as I did.
Tom
I've been using OS X for over a year. I sit in front of my screen six-ten hours a day. I’m no novice. Yet until two hours ago, I didn't have the faintest idea what an "input method" or an "input menu" were.
Before I finally got it, I had to go to the web site, read several pages of FAQs, fool around with something called the "International" preferences, and even then it wouldn't work because I couldn't get the Spell Catcher icon back on the menu bar, despite the fact that it was turned on in the Input tab in the International preferences. For that I had to go back to the FAQs for the fifth or sixth time, where I found a message referring me to the manual. This, after I've been using Spell Catcher for years. I came very close to chucking the whole project. No utility is worth this frustration.
How hard would it have been for you to have given clear instructions in the Readme of the upgrade? To explain what the Input Menu is, and where to find it ? I had looked all over Spell Catcher first, then the System Prefs, and never had found it. How was I to know that it was supposed to appear in my menu bar, and that this was controlled from a tab in the International Preferences? Was this some knowledge I was supposed to have been born with?
In the installation instructions you mentioned crucial "input menus" and "input methods" and rebooting, then left me to my own devices to research what these things were, where they were to be found, and what I was supposed to do about them.
I'd call this really lazy, thoughtless installation support. I’m a bit astonished that I actually stuck with it as long as I did.
Tom
BUT they are new to most north americans, even though they are extremely old and long-established portions of the Mac OS.
The problem is that Mac OS X has SO MANY bugs related to the Input Menu and input methods that you see the problems that you do (input menu disappears, have to check on and off and on again in international input menu tab, etc.).
There is NOTHING I CAN DO about Apple's bugs. I have documented work-arounds as best as I possibly can on this web site in our FAQs.
All I can say is these Apple bugs will be gone and installation and operation will be quite a lot better in some future version of the Mac OS.
Which just proves that this isn't at all related to what SCX does, it's all complicated by the fact that Apple didn't get it right in 10.2.x.
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Posted 28 August 2003 - 07:29 AM
Evan,
With all due respect, I don't think you addressed the original poster's issue. If I understand him correctly, his issue wasn't so much the fact that OSX has an input method bug, but that the readme file for SCX erroneously assumes that everyone understands what an input method is, why it's often not accessible in the input method menu, and what to do about it. Yes, I know we've covered the subject ad nauseam in the forum, but that (apparently) doesn't do much good for a lot of people whose sole contact with Rainmaker Research is a readme file.
A lot of software publishers would do well to remember that a huge portion of the computing population is made up of people who aren't particularly comfortable or experienced with computers. A competently written readme file would walk them through the process of successfully installing their software and getting it running correctly.
The poster has done you a favor by bringing a correctable problem to light.
- mdw
With all due respect, I don't think you addressed the original poster's issue. If I understand him correctly, his issue wasn't so much the fact that OSX has an input method bug, but that the readme file for SCX erroneously assumes that everyone understands what an input method is, why it's often not accessible in the input method menu, and what to do about it. Yes, I know we've covered the subject ad nauseam in the forum, but that (apparently) doesn't do much good for a lot of people whose sole contact with Rainmaker Research is a readme file.
A lot of software publishers would do well to remember that a huge portion of the computing population is made up of people who aren't particularly comfortable or experienced with computers. A competently written readme file would walk them through the process of successfully installing their software and getting it running correctly.
The poster has done you a favor by bringing a correctable problem to light.
- mdw
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Posted 28 August 2003 - 02:17 PM
My Dog Wally, on Aug 28 2003, 08:29 AM, said:
Evan,
With all due respect, I don't think you addressed the original poster's issue. If I understand him correctly, his issue wasn't so much the fact that OSX has an input method bug, but that the readme file for SCX erroneously assumes that everyone understands what an input method is, why it's often not accessible in the input method menu, and what to do about it. Yes, I know we've covered the subject ad nauseam in the forum, but that (apparently) doesn't do much good for a lot of people whose sole contact with Rainmaker Research is a readme file.
A lot of software publishers would do well to remember that a huge portion of the computing population is made up of people who aren't particularly comfortable or experienced with computers. A competently written readme file would walk them through the process of successfully installing their software and getting it running correctly.
The poster has done you a favor by bringing a correctable problem to light.
- mdw
With all due respect, I don't think you addressed the original poster's issue. If I understand him correctly, his issue wasn't so much the fact that OSX has an input method bug, but that the readme file for SCX erroneously assumes that everyone understands what an input method is, why it's often not accessible in the input method menu, and what to do about it. Yes, I know we've covered the subject ad nauseam in the forum, but that (apparently) doesn't do much good for a lot of people whose sole contact with Rainmaker Research is a readme file.
A lot of software publishers would do well to remember that a huge portion of the computing population is made up of people who aren't particularly comfortable or experienced with computers. A competently written readme file would walk them through the process of successfully installing their software and getting it running correctly.
The poster has done you a favor by bringing a correctable problem to light.
- mdw
Maybe a section in the manual explaining what input methods are is in order, but we didn't have any time at all to write something like that up. I mean, C&G shipped the manual 3 MONTHS after I was ready with the program! They had no manpower whatsoever to put this thing together - it's remarkable they shipped it at all.
Now we're in a situation where we have no resources to put stuff like this together right now, either. Maybe things will get better in the future, but we're doing what we can.
But because input methods were designed and created by Apple, they would generally have the best documentation on what they are (defininitions) and how they work in a general manner with the particular OS involved (slight differences on OS 8/9 vs. OS X).
