11 Oct
2011
11 Oct
'11
7:52 p.m.
On 10/11/2011 06:05 PM, jim s wrote:
If you want real Neanderthal views, I don't think
that the X / gui
interface is useful. Real heads down data entry still doesn't work as
fast on anything PC unless it is emulating a good old fashioned terminal.
we had people who could do data entry at full keying speed on our
systems with a Microdata Reality system running 32 terminal. Mind you
this was on a system with an 8 bit microprogrammed data base system,
virtual memory, and interpreted Basic as the system applications
implementation language.
That said, I had several of my keyers up to recently who have never seen
a system which didn't cause more pauses or keying errors than they had
on the keying system.
I don't mind this, but have to say that there are some applications
where the old way got it right, and none of the replacements could fully
come up to the original system.
That's not a "Neanderthal view", that's a practical productivity
view.
I know several professional accountants and a couple of EAs, and they
all say the same thing. Everything "went Windows" in their business a
few years ago, and their data entry efficiency dropped through the
floor. One of my best friends is a guy a few years older than me who
writes custom extensions for a large, well-known, big-company commercial
accounting package that is now Windows-only. He frequently gets
questions from his customers about about writing a character-based
interface for it. (his wife is an EA)
Now, before people like Toby latch onto that and scream at me for
"hating GUIs" or "hating anything modern" or whatever people like to
push my buttons about, I LOVE GUIs, and I LOVE modern things. It's just
that I love the concept of "using the right tool for the job" even more.
If that tool happens to have been introduced to the world at an
earlier time than some other tool, then so be it, it's still the right
tool for the job. Period.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
New Kensington, PA