Ben Shneiderman

Author of DesigningTheUserInterface and SoftwarePsychology?. Head of the department of HumanComputerInteraction at the University of Maryland.

• Coined the term DirectManipulation.
• Inventor of the TreeMap technique for structured data visualization.
• Co-inventor of NassiShneidermanDiagrams, a similar technique for code flow visualization.

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He talked at Millersville University, and seems like a cool, reasonable guy. I wish he would do applied work to the likes of Gnome instead of just telling everyone that they need to do a better job. If you want to see what a better job means, then you need to pay him to do one.

What's wrong with that? UserInterface is a difficult problem domain that demands artistry and a strong unified vision at the application level, neither of which are requirements that FreeSoftware can easily meet, unless it's a well funded project performed by a government or corporate entity and released OpenSource for a compelling reason.

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