Comments on: The 80 and the 20 http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/ Creativity x Technology Sat, 17 Mar 2012 05:09:58 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: seamus http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/comment-page-1/#comment-4094 seamus Wed, 04 Jul 2007 16:59:45 +0000 http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/#comment-4094 iPod Shuffle: Doesn't do anything except play tracks in random order, for pretty close to the price of a full-function MP3 player of another brand. But it's really small and foolproof. 80% wins again. iPod Shuffle: Doesn’t do anything except play tracks in random order, for pretty close to the price of a full-function MP3 player of another brand.

But it’s really small and foolproof. 80% wins again.

]]> By: peterb http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/comment-page-1/#comment-4093 peterb Wed, 04 Jul 2007 16:21:49 +0000 http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/#comment-4093 The proper approach for dorks who want more is to encourage them to go buy a different product. Then they are somebody else's problem. The challenge of product design is to figure out what you can build, and figure out what you can sell, and come up with a spec that does as good a job of intersecting those two things as you can. Once you've done that, you need to have confidence that your plan is good and execute it. Except for certain very carefully defined classes of products, time spent building in extensibility layers as a hedge is generally time wasted. Instead of bolting on extra layers to please people who don't actually like the product you decided to build, spend your time polishing the parts that matter to the people who actually <em>do</em> want to buy the product you decided to make. The proper approach for dorks who want more is to encourage them to go buy a different product. Then they are somebody else’s problem.

The challenge of product design is to figure out what you can build, and figure out what you can sell, and come up with a spec that does as good a job of intersecting those two things as you can. Once you’ve done that, you need to have confidence that your plan is good and execute it. Except for certain very carefully defined classes of products, time spent building in extensibility layers as a hedge is generally time wasted. Instead of bolting on extra layers to please people who don’t actually like the product you decided to build, spend your time polishing the parts that matter to the people who actually do want to buy the product you decided to make.

]]> By: JohnMc http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/comment-page-1/#comment-4092 JohnMc Wed, 04 Jul 2007 15:57:42 +0000 http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/#comment-4092 To psu's point, finding that 20% that fits the bill is part and parcel of proper design. Proper design requires a deconstruction of what the app is trying to solve -- no more no less. The proper approach in my mind for those dorks who want more is to provide an extensible language say like python or ruby as part of the app. That way if Mr. Dork wants it he can cobble it together themselves. If they don't have the talent to do so? So sad, have a nice day! As to your complaint about X11. Well yeah it was a kludge from the start. But don't necessarily blame the X11 team. Go back and blame the various Unix vendors over the years, most now dead. Blame them, for they were the ones who wanted the extensions and expanded widget pallete to add some discerning marketing differentiation. Ha! But considering all the fluff that's been added a simple startx simply configured for a color depth of 24 is a pretty rock solid tool kit. To psu’s point, finding that 20% that fits the bill is part and parcel of proper design. Proper design requires a deconstruction of what the app is trying to solve — no more no less.

The proper approach in my mind for those dorks who want more is to provide an extensible language say like python or ruby as part of the app. That way if Mr. Dork wants it he can cobble it together themselves. If they don’t have the talent to do so? So sad, have a nice day!

As to your complaint about X11. Well yeah it was a kludge from the start. But don’t necessarily blame the X11 team. Go back and blame the various Unix vendors over the years, most now dead. Blame them, for they were the ones who wanted the extensions and expanded widget pallete to add some discerning marketing differentiation. Ha! But considering all the fluff that’s been added a simple startx simply configured for a color depth of 24 is a pretty rock solid tool kit.

]]> By: psu http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/comment-page-1/#comment-4091 psu Wed, 04 Jul 2007 12:00:39 +0000 http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/#comment-4091 It's true. The whole trick is trying to guess which of all the 20 percents are the most important, so you don't have to build 100 percent of the 20 percents to cover the 80 percent users who only want their 20 percent. It’s true. The whole trick is trying to guess which of all the 20 percents are the most important, so you don’t have to build 100 percent of the 20 percents to cover the 80 percent users who only want their 20 percent.

]]> By: Andy P http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/comment-page-1/#comment-4090 Andy P Wed, 04 Jul 2007 11:49:50 +0000 http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/#comment-4090 <I>Another way to say this is that 80 percent of your users will spend most of their time using about 20 percent of the application that you have so painstakingly constructed for them. This leads to a lot of meetings where we spend time trying to guess which workflows we must support in order to please the “80 percent” users.</I> The problem is, only 20% of that 20% will be common across all 80%. The 80% will be using only 20% of your app, but it'll be a different 20%. :-) Another way to say this is that 80 percent of your users will spend most of their time using about 20 percent of the application that you have so painstakingly constructed for them. This leads to a lot of meetings where we spend time trying to guess which workflows we must support in order to please the “80 percent” users.

The problem is, only 20% of that 20% will be common across all 80%. The 80% will be using only 20% of your app, but it’ll be a different 20%. :-)

]]> By: Robert 'Groby' Blum http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/comment-page-1/#comment-4089 Robert 'Groby' Blum Wed, 04 Jul 2007 01:38:30 +0000 http://tleaves.com/2007/07/03/the-80-and-the-20/#comment-4089 I strongly suspect that this is one of the main reasons for Apples' recent successes. *All* of their hardware (and Software) doesn't really care about configurability - as an end user, you get your system, and that's it. (I.e. the old saw "How do you upgrade a Mac? Simple! Throw old one away, buy new one!") The genius in there is that it's still *possible* to configure things, and the fact that it's hard actually *appeals* to the 20% crowd. Now if I could only figure out what 80% my users cared about.... I strongly suspect that this is one of the main reasons for Apples’ recent successes. *All* of their hardware (and Software) doesn’t really care about configurability – as an end user, you get your system, and that’s it. (I.e. the old saw “How do you upgrade a Mac? Simple! Throw old one away, buy new one!”)

The genius in there is that it’s still *possible* to configure things, and the fact that it’s hard actually *appeals* to the 20% crowd.

Now if I could only figure out what 80% my users cared about….

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