操作系统发展史_有史以来最好的操作系统的可怕的用户界面

操作系统发展史

In 1981, before the development of what we call today as user experience design or usability — not to mention the graphic user interface — a Psychology professor from the University of California, San Diego with a little background in electrical engineering,

1981年，在我们今天开发所谓的用户体验设计或可用性(更不用说图形用户界面)之前，这位来自加利福尼亚大学圣地亚哥分校的心理学教授在电气工程方面有一点点背景，

wrote an article for a computer magazine with a caustic critique of the user interface of the most popular and devoted operating system at the moment. Its title was ‘The Trouble with Unix’. 他为一家计算机杂志写了一篇文章，批评了目前最流行和专用的操作系统的用户界面 。 它的标题是“ Unix的麻烦”。

The group that built Unix didn’t take the criticism well. Michael Lesk, a computer scientist who thirteen years later received the Flame award for his contributions to Unix, was in charge of responding to the affront.

建立Unix的小组没有很好地接受批评。 计算机科学家迈克尔·莱斯克(Michael Lesk)十三年后因对Unix的贡献而获得了Flame奖，他负责应对这种侮辱。

To start, Michael Lesk argued that the author of the article didn’t have the academic credentials to be taken seriously. He had seven books published at the time, but all about Psychology. It didn’t help that the professor used an ironic tone at some moments and a ruthless tone at others. Also, he was accused of not having research to support his remarks — even when the developers didn’t do any research to design the Unix interface or the magazine was not an academic one — and, worst of all, for not offering a better alternative to the operating system.

首先，迈克尔·莱斯克(Michael Lesk)辩称， 文章的作者没有被认真对待的学术资格 。 当时他出版了七本书，但全部涉及心理学。 教授在某些时候使用讽刺语气而在其他时候使用无情的语调并没有帮助。 另外，他被指控没有进行研究来支持他的言论-即使开发人员没有进行任何研究来设计Unix接口或该杂志也不是学术性研究-而且，最糟糕的是，没有提供更好的选择到操作系统。

Despite the response from the developers, the users who read the article published in Datamation loved it. They truly identify with all the problems and the common sense failures or the user interface that the author related. Interesting enough was the new discipline he was talking about, “so new that it doesn’t exist, but it ought to”: cognitive engineering. And the system design principles that he proposed were thought-provoking: be consistent, provide the user with an explicit model, give feedback, provide sensible memory aids…

尽管开发人员做出了回应，但阅读Datamation上发表的文章的用户还是喜欢它。 它们能真正识别出所有问题以及常识性故障或与作者相关的用户界面。 有趣的是他正在谈论的新学科，“太新了，它不存在，但应该如此”：认知工程。 他提出的系统设计原则令人深思 ：一致，为用户提供明确的模型，提供反馈，提供明智的存储帮助……

In 1988, seven years after the publication of ‘The Trouble with Unix’ in Datamation magazine, the author published a book that would change design forever, elevating it to a very deep and complex process and highlighting the attention in the user and the experience: The Psychology of Everyday Things (re-edited and published later as The Design of Everyday Things).

在1988年，在Datamation杂志上发表了“ Unix的麻烦”之后的七年， 作者出版了一本书，该书将永远改变设计 ，将其提升到一个非常深入和复杂的过程，并着重强调用户和体验的关注： 《日常事物的心理学》 (重新编辑，并在以后出版为《日常事物的设计》 )。

Yes, the author of that article criticizing the Unix user interface was Don A. Norman, considered today as the founder of UX and the father of cognitive engineering.

是的，该文章批评Unix用户界面的作者是Don A. Norman，他今天被认为是UX的创始人和认知工程学之父。

什么是Unix？ (What is Unix?)

To weigh the importance of the criticism of Unix and its influence on what we call today UX design, we have to know a little how the operating system worked.

要权衡批评Unix的重要性及其对当今UX设计的影响，我们必须了解一些操作系统的工作原理。

Unix is considered one of the best operating systems of all time. To give you an idea, Unix is the father of modern Linux and, in some way, macOS is the cousin of Linux itself. New versions of Unix are still in use on some big servers supporting the Internet itself.

Unix被认为是有史以来最好的操作系统之一。 为了给您一个主意，Unix是现代Linux的父亲，从某种意义上说，macOS是Linux本身的表亲。 某些支持Internet本身的大型服务器仍在使用新版本的Unix。

Photo by Kevin Horvat on Unsplash

凯文·霍瓦特 ( Kevin Horvat)在 Unsplash上 摄

Unix was an operating system with a text-based user interface, which means that the user only had access to the system by typing on the keyboard text commands. Experts call it command-line interface (CLI). Today we deal with graphic user interfaces (GUI) in most of our computers and gadgets, and recently with voice user interfaces (VUI).

Unix是具有基于文本的用户界面的操作系统，这意味着用户只能通过在键盘上键入文本命令来访问系统。 专家称其为命令行界面(CLI)。 今天，我们在大多数计算机和小工具中处理图形用户界面(GUI)，最近在处理语音用户界面(VUI)。

The “shell” is like an app that translates text commands to the operating system. To access the shell on your computer today, you’ll need another app that emulates old video terminals.

“外壳”就像一个将文本命令转换为操作系统的应用程序。 要立即使用计算机上的外壳，您将需要另一个可模拟旧视频终端的应用程序。

If you haven’t used the Terminal app in your Mac or Windows Terminal in your Windows operating system, you still can recognize the typical black screen with green fonts where the hackers in the movies use to quickly type commands instead of using a mouse or trackpad.

如果您尚未在Mac或Windows操作系统的Windows终端中使用Terminal应用程序，则仍可以识别带有绿色字体的典型黑屏，电影中的黑客可使用该字体快速键入命令，而无需使用鼠标或触控板。

Once a user is in the terminal, the interaction between user and system is line by line — hence its name. The terminal prompts waiting for instructions, the user types a command and pushes enter, and the terminal responds with the result.

一旦用户进入终端，用户与系统之间的交互就会逐行进行，因此也就是其名称。 终端提示等待指令，用户键入命令并按Enter键，终端对此结果做出响应。

Several things have changed in the new terminal apps depending on the operating system and the version — like the commands, a richer design, and the ways to interact to it — but they are still text based interfaces very similar to Unix.

在新的终端应用程序中，根据操作系统和版本的不同，已经发生了一些变化，例如命令，更丰富的设计以及与之交互的方式，但它们仍然是基于文本的界面，与Unix非常相似。

For example, in Unix, if you typed and send the command “date” on the terminal, then the system printed the current date in the next line.

例如，在Unix中，如果您在终端上键入并发送命令“ date”，则系统将在下一行打印当前日期。

In the next gif we can see the use of the same command in a ChromeOS terminal:

在下一个gif中，我们可以看到在ChromeOS终端中使用了相同的命令：

On one hand, you have a system function that prints the date, and on the other hand, you have a command to execute the function. The name of the command should reflect the function to make it easy to recall. The function is “date” and we call it by the command “date”. Sounds easy, right?

一方面，您具有打印日期的系统功能，另一方面，您具有执行该功能的命令。 命令的名称应反映该功能，以使其易于调用。 函数是“ date”，我们通过命令“ date”来调用它。 听起来很简单，对吧？

In the old systems, you always had a problem with the memory capacity of the machine, hence the use of abbreviations for the commands.

在旧系统中，机器的存储容量始终存在问题，因此使用命令的缩写。

1981年Unix的麻烦 (The trouble with Unix in 1981)

One of the most relevant critiques of Don Norman to the Unix user interface was the lack of consistency. For example, to change a password you typed “passwd”. To copy you typed “cp”. They look easy to recall but there was no consistency in the number of characters or the way they were constructed.

Don Norman与Unix用户界面最相关的批评之一是缺乏一致性。 例如，要更改密码，您键入“ passwd”。 要复制，请键入“ cp”。 它们看起来容易记忆，但是字符数量或它们的构造方式并不一致。

In some cases, you use two characters of the function name, in others the first ones, and in another, you use the consonants. Zero consistency.

在某些情况下，您使用函数名称的两个字符，在其他情况下使用第一个字符，而在另一个情况下，使用辅音。 零一致性。

To open the editor app you typed “ed”. Once open, you could write on it whatever text you were working on. To close the editor, you typed the command “q” (you guessed it, abbreviation of “quit”) and the editor quitted… without saving your work and without any warning that your text was going to be lost.

要打开编辑器应用程序，请输入“ ed”。 打开后，您可以在上面写任何正在处理的文本。 要关闭编辑器，您键入命令“ q”(您猜对了，缩写为“ quit”)，然后退出了编辑器……没有保存您的工作，也没有警告您文本将丢失。

文本的一点解释 (A little exegesis of the text)

I found two versions of the article written by Don Norman. The final version published in Datamation — scanned from the original — and a version uploaded directly by Norman himself. It looks like the latest was the final draft previously to be edited by the magazine. Some differences are worth noting.

我发现了Don Norman撰写的文章的两个版本。 在Datamation中发布的最终版本(从原始文件中扫描)，以及由Norman本人直接上传的版本。 看来最新的是该杂志先前编辑过的最终稿。 一些差异值得注意。

The title of the original version was ‘The truth about Unix: The user interface is horrid’. The published version softened it to ‘The Trouble with Unix’, and added the much less aggressive running head ‘The system design is elegant but the user interface is not’.

原始版本的标题是“关于Unix的真相：用户界面令人恐惧”。 已发布的版本将其软化为“ Unix的麻烦”，并添加了更具攻击性的运行头“系统设计优雅，但用户界面却不好”。

The last paragraph in the original version closed with:

原始版本的最后一段以以下内容结尾：

“Treat the user with intelligence. There is no need to talk down to the user, nor to explain everything. But give the user a share in understanding by presenting a consistent view of the system.”

“以智能方式对待用户。 无需与用户交谈，也无需解释所有内容。 但是，通过提供一致的系统视图，可以使用户分享理解的知识。”

The final version eliminated the reference to the user intelligence and added:

最终版本消除了对用户智能的引用，并添加了：

“But give the users a share in understanding by presenting a consistent view of the system. Their response will be your reward.”

“但是，通过提供对系统的一致看法，可以使用户有共同的理解力。 他们的回应将是您的回报。”

Datamation also added two boxed texts in the magazine, one titled “What is Unix?”, that it’s a helpful explanation for the novice, and the other titled “Another view”, that is the anticipated reply from Michael Lesk, the Unix developer.

Datamation还在杂志上添加了两个框式文本，一个标题为“什么是Unix？”，这对新手来说是一个有用的解释，另一个标题为“另一个视图”，这是Unix开发人员Michael Lesk的预期答复。

These are important remarks because you can see the extreme precautions the editors took with an article that dared to point out the errors of the best operating system designed to date.

这些是很重要的评论，因为您可以看到编辑们在采取敢于指出迄今为止最佳操作系统设计错误的文章时所采取的极端预防措施 。

革命思想的起源和发展 (The origin and growth of a revolutionary idea)

Other takeaways for those like me who love to see how ideas are born and grown are some of the condensed insights that the father of the user experience design wrote. You can see the origin of what he proposed later in his foundational books and papers about user experience design.

对于像我这样喜欢看到创意如何诞生和成长的人来说，其他要点是用户体验设计之父所写的一些精辟见解。 您可以在后来的有关用户体验设计的基础书籍和论文中看到他提出的建议的起源。

The thing that marvels me too is how these ideas were thought of with a text-based user interface in mind. We are so used to thinking about an interface as graphics-based that it amuses me how Norman could begin composing his principles thinking about words, characters, line-by-line interactions and so on.

同样让我惊讶的是，在想到基于文本的用户界面时如何想到这些想法。 我们习惯于将界面视为基于图形的界面，这让我很吃惊，Norman如何开始构想他的有关单词，字符，逐行交互等的原理。

“System designers take note. Design the system for the person, not for the computer, not even for yourself.” — Don Norman

“系统设计师要注意。 为个人而不是计算机，甚至不是您自己，设计系统。” —唐·诺曼

In some way, the first computer UX design ideas were more what we call today UX writing than UI design — considering that when you hear or read UI design you usually think in a graphic user interface. What Don Norman was doing in the article is what you expect today from a UX writer.

在某种程度上， 第一个计算机用户体验设计思想比我们今天所说的用户体验写作更像我们今天所说的用户体验写作 -考虑到当您听到或阅读UI设计时，您通常会在图形用户界面中思考。 Don Norman在本文中所做的就是您今天对UX编写者的期望。

Just with the recent massive use of smart speakers and assistants we are coming back to a text-based interface and the subsequent design of them. I wonder if the previous use of command-line interfaces gives me some advantage understanding of how Alexa, Siri or Cortana work, in juxtaposition to the trouble my wife and daughter — who haven’t use a CLI — have with them.

随着最近大量使用智能扬声器和助手，我们回到了基于文本的界面以及它们的后续设计。 我想知道以前使用命令行界面是否使我对Alexa，Siri或Cortana的工作方式有了一些了解，从而使我的妻子和女儿(没有使用CLI)与他们的麻烦并存。

Let me finish quoting five jewels from the article, but I really recommend you to read it yourself. This selection is free of criticism and irony and collects positive suggestions and propositions. And remember, they were written in 1981, seven years before the original “The Design of Everyday Things”.

让我最后引用该文章中的五种珠宝，但我真的建议您自己阅读。 这种选择不受批评和讽刺，并收集了积极的建议和主张。 请记住， 它们写于1981年，比原始的“日常用品设计”早了7年。

• “People are complex entities and can adapt to almost anything. As a result, designers often design for themselves, without regard for other kinds of users.”
  人们是复杂的实体，几乎可以适应任何事物。 结果，设计师经常为自己设计，而不考虑其他类型的用户。”

• “Users develop mental models of the devices with which they interact. If you do not provide them with one, they will make one up themselves, and the one they create is apt to be wrong.”

  “用户开发了与之交互的设备的思维模型。 如果您不给他们提供一个，那么他们会自己弥补一个，而他们创造的一个则容易出错。”

• “Feedback is of critical importance, both in helping to establish the appropriate mental model and in letting the user keep its current state in synchrony with the actual system.”
  “反馈在帮助建立适当的心理模型以及让用户保持其当前状态与实际系统同步方面都至关重要。”
• “System designers take note. Design the system for the person, not for the computer, not even for yourself.”
  “系统设计师要注意。 为个人而不是计算机，甚至不是您自己，设计系统。”
• “People are also information processing systems, with varying degrees of knowledge, varying degrees of experience.”
  “人们也是信息处理系统，具有不同程度的知识，不同程度的经验。”

翻译自: https://uxdesign.cc/a-horrid-ui-in-the-best-os-of-all-time-ebc2be63b230

操作系统发展史