Friday 7 June 2013

Windows 8 Maps and Scottish Pirate Metal

I'm still getting to grips with Windows 8 so this may be an unfair rant. One of the problems in building intuitive interfaces is that the user has to guess what the designer wants the user to do and the designer has to pre empt what the average user will do.

So I was presented with a map roughly centered on Newcastle , with a Bing logo in the bottom left hand corner (and we all know how rubbish Bing searches are) , so that doesnt bode well for the package. Eventually I discovered that a right click on the bottom of the screen brings up a menu with a directions button whicjh I selected , put it my start and destination post codes and it drew a blue line on the map....

...and that was it , no printed directions , no opportunity to put in detours. So went back to Google Maps and got what  I needed.

Anyway it's sunny, and I will we driving down despite having a cough , cold , maybe hayfever and feeling quite rubbish. This day in 1692 an earthquake destroyed Port Royal in Jamaica , a notorious pirate haven . Article here. This gives me the inspiration for todays June's Tunes , the Scottish Pirate Metal (how niche can you get)  band Alestorm