Everyday we use tool to get jobs done. Whether working on the computer, on a production line or in outer space, it is the tools that enable us to get our work done. Unsurprisingly the main tools I use each day are those on the computer.
One of the things that surprises me every so often is how willing people are to adapt to inferior tool rather than try to find better ones. The case of web browsers mentioned in my last post is a prime example. On a computer you are not forced to use any particular program. For nearly everything you could want to do with your computer there are a plethora of programs avaiable, yet often we just use what is provided without thought to the other alternatives out there.
For a long time I used the Explorer shell in Windows along with everyone else. Then one day I came across and my computing world changed. Suddenly I could make Windows react to my inputs in very different ways. The explorer shell is very much aimed at new computer users. If you are willing to put a few hours into learning how to use a different shell, and you set it up to suit you needs correctly, using the computer can become much more efficient. For example, having my programs on a right click menu from anywhere on my desktop make it much faster to load things than having to navigate through Start-Programs etc. It took a while to set up right, but I would say that the few seconds saved each time I load a program must have easily saved that amount of time a few times over.
Now, of course, I use Linux as much of the time as I can. Linux is a case in point of getting to know the commands to improve efficiency many times over. Personally, I spend much of my time at the shell. Once you have mastered the basic commands, it’s a much faster environment to work in, in my opinion. Even with an Athlon XP, it is much faster to type cp blah than open a file manager. I beleive that using the shell is not harder than using a gui file manager, just people are most used to having the spatial relationship between files spelt out to them by the gui interface. To use the shell effectivly you have to be able to visualise your folder tree in your head. In some ways this also frees you to view your files in a different way. Rather than seeing the spatial relationships the way a gui forces you to, you are free to think more in terms of the content relationship between files and group them in more logical ways to your way of thinking. Maybe I should extend this thinking into a filemanager myself some day…
Anyway, enough random posts, time to get some lunch!