[darcs-users] darcs in 2010: talk/video online

Eric Kow kowey at darcs.net
Tue Sep 14 10:52:59 UTC 2010


On Mon, Sep 13, 2010 at 08:59:22 +0200, Karel Gardas wrote:
> Also, although UI of prezi might look kind of geeky, it's awful at least
> to my eyes. All this rotating and jumping is good enough to just get
> seasickness! And also it consumes a lot of time. My guess is 50/50 for
> jumping/rotating and reading itself.

Many thanks!

Feedback on the video (*especially* criticism) is useful to have
especially considering that we're partly communicating outside the happy
little Darcs world, so we need to work hard on getting things right :-)

If I had the energy to redo this video, I may do the following
differently:

* Turn on my camera for at least a bit of the video: one because staring
  at the same slide for X minutes is boring and two because natural
  facial expressions could be useful for communicating

* Send people a stable link to something like
    http://wiki.darcs.net/Talks/Darcs-2010
  so that I can make corrections like the missing 7th video.

* SLOW DOWN! Chipmunk on amphetamines

* TALK LESS (learn to cut) [but I guess still saying enough that
  it's clear that Darcs is moving]

* Rethink infinite canvas usage: I'm experimenting with Prezi not
  because of the it-looks-cool factor, but because the promise of an
  infinite canvas is that you can show, visually, how ideas are related
  to each other.  In other words, it's all about trying to achieve clear
  communication.
  
  Here, for example, I tried to show the three development themes all
  follow a Now -> Soon -> Later track, but considering Mathias's query
  about annotate, I didn't do a very good job of making it clear.
  Perhaps a table structure would have been easier to follow.

  ===========   ==========   ========  ==============
                NOW          SOON      LATER
  ===========   ==========   ========  ==============
  Performance   record       get       huge repos?
                             annotate
  -----------   ----------   --------  --------------
  Reliability   Windows      API       patch theory 3
  -----------   -----------  --------  --------------
  Usability     UTF-8        annotate  GUI
                defaults     rebase    conflicts
                interactive
  -----------   -----------  --------  --------------

  I'm going to try using Prezi for a few more presentations.  I think
  that learning to use an infinite canvas effectively requires some
  practice, so I'm not going to give up just yet, but just make lots
  of mistakes and hopefully get better at it in the process.

-- 
Eric Kow <http://www.nltg.brighton.ac.uk/home/Eric.Kow>
For a faster response, try +44 (0)1273 64 2905 or
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