Re: Linux and Software Freedom

On Aug 18, 11:08 am, Scottish <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Aug 17, 2:36 pm, Asa Dotzler <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > > Please give us data explaining why you assume that the most common use
> > > of the about dialog is to check if firefox is up to date, because it
> > > sounds like a huge distortion of what good old english words actually
> > > mean. I didn't see any in this thread, sorry if there are.
>
> > Maybe I didn't say this well.  I'm asserting that the purpose of the
> > *version number* in the about dialog for most users is to determine if a
> > user is up to date, not that the purpose of the About dialog is to
> > determine if a user is up to date. The About dialog also tells users the
> > name of the product and that's a really important user case as well. The
> > about dialog has several use cases, but the use case for the version
> > number in the about dialog of Firefox on rapid release cadences is to
> > find out if you're on the latest version or not.
>
> > - A
>
> Fine. Please provide some data to back up your assertion that that is
> why most people look at the version number in the About dialog.
>
> Also, please explain why you can't have your cake and let us eat ours.
> Why can you not have your friendly language about whether Firefox is
> up-to-date (or when it was last able to check), and yet retain the
> version number in the dialog (hidden or not).
>
> I haven't seen any evidence offered to back up the assertion that
> leaving it there, in the presence of your proposed friendly language,
> hinders usability. I believe I saw a supposition that it increases
> distrust of what the friendly language is saying, but I think that
> users will inherently distrust the friendly language anyway. Having
> the version number there makes it no less trustworthy.

I'd just like to point out for the record that Asa replied to several
posts that occurred since I wrote this one. He has yet to offer any
data to support the proposed change.