That's just cliche. What is intuitive? I'm using a Mac right now. I like it, but I've had endless troubles explaining it to others. It's things like the difference between installed programs and running programs. The difference between task based and object/type based actions. People don't grasp how file systems work. People don't grasp the difference between main memory and harddisk and everything connected to it like saving documents. And don't get me started about networks and login identities...
The desktop metaphor is useless and inconsistent with other things like windows. The desk I'm sitting at physically does NOT have windows cluttering it up! Windows are in the wall, not on my desk. I don't know who had the idea that this is in any way intuitive. My desk also doesn't have programs that are connected in some magic way to my documents. A menu is something I use in a restaurant, not at work or when I watch a movie.
These are not Mac specific problems, but the Mac doesn't solve them either. We need a radically different idea of how a system's complexity scales with its growing capabilities. We need to stop confronting people with that old Von Neumann architeture and we have to stop the attempt to mitigate it with with grotesque inconsistent metaphors.
The desktop metaphor is useless and inconsistent with other things like windows. The desk I'm sitting at physically does NOT have windows cluttering it up! Windows are in the wall, not on my desk. I don't know who had the idea that this is in any way intuitive. My desk also doesn't have programs that are connected in some magic way to my documents. A menu is something I use in a restaurant, not at work or when I watch a movie.
These are not Mac specific problems, but the Mac doesn't solve them either. We need a radically different idea of how a system's complexity scales with its growing capabilities. We need to stop confronting people with that old Von Neumann architeture and we have to stop the attempt to mitigate it with with grotesque inconsistent metaphors.