Clive Thompson Quotes

Any version of Windows is going to have lots of great new things that people use and things that are tough.

I've been using a computer for quite some time, and I don't understand everything.

For many years, even as users became more sophisticated, personal computers took too much effort to use without problem-solving, keeping alive the yearning for greater simplicity. Microsoft's dominant Windows platform, in particular, was a home for all manner of bugs and problems that required IT people to straighten out.

Red Carpet Enterprise has been really well received since one guy can install it in about an hour, and it makes it trivial to deal with software management issues like deploying updates and creating standard package sets for your various machines.

The definition of an 'operating system' is bound to evolve with customer demands and technological possibilities.

I've been using the Mac solely for years, and got very comfortable with it.

Windows Updates have sometimes been a pain point for users. The update pop-ups can interrupt a movie or a video game, and the automatic restarts can result in lost data or confused users.

What commercialism has brought into Linux has been the incentive to make a good distribution that is easy to use and that has all the packaging issues worked out.

Limit use of shareware and public domain software to systems without fixed disks. If you do use them on fixed disks, allocate separate subdirectories... Public domain or shareware software should never be placed in the root directory.

I couldn't tell you in any detail how my computer works. I use it with a layer of automation.

Windows is the best place; it's the home for the very best Microsoft experiences.

People are very confused about how to do things on a computer, but generally, if you hover your cursor over things, it will tell you what it is.

This Windows 95 hairball has become so big, so unmanageable, so hard to use, so hard to configure, so hard to keep up and running, so hard to keep secure. Windows 95 is a great gift to give your kid this Christmas because it will keep your kid fascinated for months trying to get it up and running and trying to figure out how to use it.

The manual for WordStar, the most popular word-processing program, is 400 pages thick. To write a novel, you have to read a novel - one that reads like a mystery to most people. They're not going to learn slash q-z any more than they're going to learn Morse code. That is what Macintosh is all about.

For systems in which you already have a lot of hardware and software, change is difficult. That's why apps are so popular.

One of the problems with computers, particularly for the older people, is they were befuddled by them, and the computers have gotten better. They have gotten easier to use. They have gotten less expensive. The software interfaces have made things a lot more accessible.

Dropbox sweats the user experience details as commendably as it masters the considerable engineering challenges required to reliably sync files everywhere a user may need them.

If you use a proprietary program or somebody else's web server, you're defenceless. You're putty in the hands of whoever developed that software.

I used to do tech support for MSN in Canada.

UNIX is basically a simple operating system, but you have to be a genius to understand the simplicity.

Things that are ultimately complex must have a simple end user experience if they are to be successful.

Any product that needs a manual to work is broken.

It's important to be informed about issues like usability, reliability, security, privacy, and some of the inherent limitations of computers.

Most software today is very much like an Egyptian pyramid with millions of bricks piled on top of each other, with no structural integrity, but just done by brute force and thousands of slaves.

I spend a fair amount of time on my computer, but I don't hack into anything. I have to open the manual and follow instructions.