On the Aesthetics of Outliners, Pims, and Personal Knowledge Applications

Posted by Chris Thompson
Oct 22, 2009 at 10:17 PM

Lots of great comments in this thread. I think it’s important to distinguish usability from aesthetics, though the latter may have some influence on the former. DOS applications like GrandView had a Zen-like aesthetic quality: sparse, few distractions, rectangles as the dominant visual feature, appealing color schemes. Some were more usable than others (why “quit” was assigned to F7 in WordPerfect never made any sense to me).

I don’t think there’s anything aesthetically wrong with ConnectedText at all. Grey, boxy uniform toolbars are far less distracting to me than Office 2007-style ribbons with icons of varying sizes, positions, orientations, and alignments. Where CT seems weak to me is actual editing usability. Having to work in code ends up taking longer than WYSIWYG editing, though one’s initial impulse is the opposite. I spent some time earlier in the year writing some documents in LaTeX, thinking I’d be more productive, but the opposite turned out to be true. It takes the mind more time to cognitively process codes than WYSIWYG text. Some of CT’s wiki competitors have direct text editing now (TWiki, etc.), so I’m surprised CT doesn’t offer it as an option.

I’d definitely agree that color and other visual distractions can affect usability. Sometimes I switch my monitor to greyscale (using the built in OS X facility for this or a program called Nocturne) and it is surprising how a lack of color cues helps the mind to focus… much more than one would expect. I imagine part of the appeal of full screen modes and retro text apps is the lack of visual distractions to disrupt the subconscious.

—Chris