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I think your analogy misses the point.
I understand what my car does for me even if I don't understand how it does it.
I also understand how to get my car to do what I expect it to do for me.
This woman treasures her pictures but has no clue as to whether or not her phone is backing them up and if they're backed up she has no idea as to where they're backed up. For the task she has chosen for her phone she has no concept if it's doing it or not.
She doesn't have to understand how her photos are backed up - but she should at least know if they are backed up.
She'll complain that her phone provider failed.
She'll complain that the phone failed.
She'll complain that the technician failed.
This same woman will go out and buy a $65,000 Lexus and wonder why she cannot pull water skis on the lake behind it. She's not connecting the dots between what she wants to accomplish and the technology she's using.
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OriginalGriff wrote: we need to take the software equivalent of the spark timing and move it to
electronic ignition, and replace the whole technology "engine" with a "black
box" so users don't have to understand what is happening to use their devices
safely.
Nice analogy - wrong of course but still nice.
You are equating the car to the phone\tablet while ignoring the complexity which means that one app on the phone is equivalent to the car. After all someone might be upset that their pictures disappeared but they are also going to be upset if all the money in their bank account disappears too. One phone - two completely different apps.
And it also ignores the rate of innovation. After all cars have been around for 100 years and electronic ignition for 50, but how long have cell phones with apps been around? How long has the cloud been around?
Not to mention of course that there were in fact people who drove cars in the early days who didn't know how to do minor repairs. And then they ended up stuck on the side of the road until someone came along, perhaps in a car or even a horse drawn wagon and got them to where they needed to be.
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MehGerbil wrote: User manuals, instructional videos, community college courses, forums
You're missing the point.
You said "Had she managed to get them onto the "cloud" they'd be lost behind a forgotten password or a closed service a couple of years down the road"
My point wasn't that we try and teach someone about how technology works. How many drivers know how an internal combustion engine works? Does that make them stupid or unqualified to drive? I'm suggesting we keep pushing to make technology the same: ensure data is automatically backed up to the cloud without even offering the option to not have it happen. Make it easy to restore from these backups, and if someone is unable to even do this, then make it easy enough thay most other people she knows will be able to do it for her if she hands over her device.
Sure - people forget passwords all the time, but secondary questions, fingerprint scanners, 2-factor authentication - all these are working towards making it easier to recover lost credentials.
I just don't believe in giving up on people. Not always.
cheers,
Chris Maunder
The Code Project | Co-founder
Microsoft C++ MVP
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Chris Maunder wrote: Or we could stop treating users as sheep being led to the slaughter and (collectively, as an industry) work to make it so things like this are less likely to happen.
That would the correct thing to do but no one is going to do it unless they can make a butt load of money off it.
I've got photos from when I was in diapers on paper and has lasted all these years (60+) and I've got a hard disk with 150GB of photos I've taken in the last few years and when I'm gone, or god forbid the backups fail, or technology no longer recognizes them they will be gone forever and my kids will have nothing.
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But then who are we supposed to laugh at...? 
The United States invariably does the right thing, after having exhausted every other alternative. -Winston Churchill
America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between. -Oscar Wilde
Wow, even the French showed a little more spine than that before they got their sh*t pushed in.[^] -Colin Mullikin
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Chris Maunder wrote: Or we could stop treating users as sheep being led to the slaughter and
(collectively, as an industry) work to make it so things like this are less
likely to happen.
How exactly does one do that?
Hopefully you have a general answer because it would be nice to be able to apply it to many things - for instance keeping people from sticking their hands into lawnmowers that are running.
Naturally it won't work if it isn't really, really cheap also. Because, for example, even though it possible to create a car which would practically eliminate all automobile deaths (but not pedestrian) it would be so expensive that it wouldn't sell.
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But all my pictures are in the cloud...because I have Dropbox set to sync all my pictures. Which turned out great when I had to replace my phone, no need to transfer them because I already had them all. People need to realize computers aren't magic though, you do have to configure these things...
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Well... on the other end of the spectrum... something happened to our VPN some time ago and our IT guy replaced the components providing the service and said, "there, fixed". Weeks later, and I still can't get onto our VPN  .
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Excellent! We need more comments like that, or UKIP will stand a good chance of being in government in a year and a half...
The only instant messaging I do involves my middle finger.
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I rather like Godfrey Bloom. Even if you don't care for what he says you have to admire his complete anti-PCness. Very refreshing in British Politics.
Regards,
Rob Philpott.
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Refreshing...but kinda stupid, perhaps?
Good way to encourage people to vote for your party 
The only instant messaging I do involves my middle finger.
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I think it might be better than you think. Look at Tony Blair - someone who never revealed himself from behind a wall of spin. New Labour brought PR to politics and I don't think people like it. UKIP leave you with no uncertainty of where they stand, it's just a matter of whether you agree or not.
Regards,
Rob Philpott.
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I just don't trust any politician - "When the lips move, they're lying" - and suspect that the UKIP top brass are rather more radical in reality than they publicly state. Not sure I'd like to live in a UKIP state...
The only instant messaging I do involves my middle finger.
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A giant tv in Manchester insulted Farage earlier.
I'll leave the reader to find their own link (unless they use twitter in which case they've already seen it).
“I believe that there is an equality to all humanity. We all suck.” Bill Hicks
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Yes, as I feel that you might feel the wrath of the UKIP police as I did. Somehow 2 peope reported my link as abuse / spam for some reason.
Every day, thousands of innocent plants are killed by vegetarians.
Help end the violence EAT BACON
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Pretty much expected behaviour. Pleb party gonna pleb.
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This interesting Win8.1 DirectX sample:
HLSL shader compiler sample [^]
Use D3DCompile[^], whose documentation states:
MSDN said: You can use this API to develop your Windows Store apps, but you can't use it in apps that you submit to the Windows Store
In other words works on your machine, NOT on the client's one! 
[EDIT] mmm this function appears in the local help but not online...
I wonder if it was true in 8.0 but is OK in 8.1. The sample just passed the Windows AppStore certification Kit (minus error for app images)
modified 20-Sep-13 11:57am.
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Super Lloyd wrote: You can use this API to develop your Windows Store apps, but you can't use it in apps that you submit to the Windows Store
Does this serve any purpose then?
Starting to think people post kid pics in their profiles because that was the last time they were cute - Jeremy.
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Do you see that phrase there? I don't.
Keep Clam And Proofread
--
√(-1) 23 ∑ π...
And it was delicious.
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mm.. it's on the local help.. I wonder if it's 8.0 doc...
Maybe it is OK in 8.1?
Have to check that...
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That's M$ for you.
EDIT: I don't see that phrase. Where is it?
EDIT2: This function[^] has it.
I think the version you have has as error related to that particular function.
Keep Clam And Proofread
--
√(-1) 23 ∑ π...
And it was delicious.
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mm.. it's on the local help.. I wonder if it's 8.0 doc...
Maybe it is OK in 8.1?
Have to check that...
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Thanks!
Also, mm.. it's on the local help.. I wonder if it's 8.0 doc...
Maybe it is OK in 8.1?
Have to check that...
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