The second is to be able to accomplish the tasks that we set out to do without going through a steep learning curve. With regard to the former, Novell said, 'We believe that a 'common feel' is more important than 'ease of installation', as installation issues can boil down to personal preference. Ease of use is a criterion that sharply differentiates off the shelf software from that which runs an enterprise. Those who use the latter fully expect some degree of difficulty before they acquire mastery of a program. Also, said the vendors, 'ease of use' is highly subjective and cannot be promised in a warranty.
Different users have different skill sets and learn how to use software at varying paces.
However, spokesmen from Oracle and Microsoft did point out that in thirty years, software use, as a whole, has become more and more intuitive-specially when GUIs became so common as to be unremarkable. Microsoft spokesman Ashok Sharma said that his company was particularly innovative in developing context sensitive help. But there is a Web site which shows why the GUI is not an end in itself. Good quality software is greatly aided by well designed, consistent interfaces-but, as the hall of shame entries show, not all software have them. There are technical reasons why it can't.