Now I’ve been using a computer for a long time and I know what I like. The one thing that drives me a little nuts is that sometimes you see software that is so poorly written you wonder why it was realized. A lot of that exists in the freeware world, the ironic thing is open source is usually pretty damn good, where as closed source freeware can just be plain terrible.
Now I’m very picky when it comes to software and a firm believer in first impressions, if I’m not impressed with the UI, I’m unlikely to care about the functionality, now I’m not a UI snob, because I use Linux all the time and I prefer to do all my stuff via the command line, but when I’m using a Windows App I like it to look good and function well, if it don’t look good, chances are it doesn’t function as well as it could either. I’ve come across a lot of software that fits into these categories, I just wish people would take the time to write a better UI, or make it fairly good on the eyes.
For example the UI with VLC is not the best, but its simple and effective, but its not garish and ugly like some UI’s I’ve seen. If you suck at UI design don’t try and make funky color buttons and toolbars and stuff, go with simple until you can get someone to do a good job for you.
Technorati Tags: freeware, opensource, bad UI, good UI, vlc
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