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0 pointsmaxbond6mo ago0 comments

> Software usability, in this context, is measured objectively, there is no interpretation.

What is the objective measure of usability to which you are referring? I'm not aware of any such metric.

> As for your high standards vs tendonitis distinction, I'd say these things are not mutually exclusive, and the comparison is not related to what we're talking about.

The connection is that I have different needs in HIDs, just like some people have different needs in Obsidian. There are great ergonomic keyboards available for $50. I just can't use them.

Generally I buy the cheapest peripherals available. My standards are not all that high. Several of them have bugs I've learned to work around.

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kid646mo ago

> What is the objective measure of usability to which you are referring? I'm not aware of any such metric.

Evaluators normally use scoring systems for this purpose, in which heuristic violations are rated on a severity scale (commonly 0-4). So when apps like Obsidian rack up many 3s and 4s, you have an objective basis on which to characterize it as unusable. Besides this, there are accessibility and security metrics consisting of pass/fail tests, which are countable.

I guess the best analogy would be a street vendor passing dog meat off as beef. You may think the dog is delicious, but that doesn't make it beef.

maxbondOP6mo ago

That's interesting and thank you for sharing, but that does still seem like a judgment call and I would guess different companies would have different rubrics. Quantifying things is helpful but doesn't really mean that there isn't interpretation involved. Just that it's communicated more clearly and consistently.

I don't think the beef analogy is appropriate. For one it involves deception, and I don't think that's fair to Obsidian. For another Obsidian presents itself as a personal knowledge base, and is a personal knowledge base. Maybe it's a bad one. But that would make it inferior beef, not dog meat. If you think it lacks necessary features, a.) that would seem to me to be beef that needs some steak sauce and b.) the existence of people who do not use plug-ins would seem to empirically prove those features are not always necessary. Because different people have different needs.

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