Re: [kidsUI] (several)

[Sanjay Chandrasekharan <schandr2@chat.carleton.ca>]

Hey folks,

Good point about the Netscape Dog. It illustrates kids' natural tendency to attribute agent status to inanimate objects. Ethopoeia, as it is known in the literature. This is what we are trying to exploit.

I think the direct manipulation paradigm has extended itself a bit over in trying to keep to its Object-based  icon structure. I think the dog makes more sense as as security icon than whatever it is that netscape has. What the heck is it anyway? :-) A lock?

Sanjay

Chris wrote:

> Hi folks,
>
> I have no real suggestion in the moment, but I want to tell you a little "story": suddenly in an internet cafe, I heard a little child telling his father "please click on the little brown dog, daddy!" - while he pointed at Netscape's "Security" icon.
> In my opinion, many toolbar icons (not only in Netscape) are too abstract or in some way ambigous. What do you think about toolbars in special, and about GUI design (for childrens) in general?
> OK, I didn't ask this question solely to hear your opinion about
> toolbars :-) I'm a KDE (third party) programmer, and I'm working on a project of a "new" programming language, that tries to make GUI programming more easy for every programming newbie, and in fact nearly 20% of the people who wrote me a feedback e-mail told me, that they want to use it to teach their sons (or their little brothers :-)) programming. So I wonder, what I can do to optimize the languages (C-like) syntax for childs. Furthermore I'm looking for people, who are interested in writing a tutorial for childs ;). Please visit http://www.viskprog.org .
>
> Kind regards
> Chris
>
> P.S.
> Please excuse my low level English ... :-(
>
> Hi! I'm a virus. Please add me to your signature
> to help me spread!
> ----------------------
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--


-------------------------------------
Sanjay Chandrasekharan,
Ph.D Student (Cognitive Science),
Carleton University,
Ottawa, Ontario,
Canada K1S 5B6
Phone: 520-2600 ext 1568

http://wabakimi.carleton.ca/~schandr2