Not the truth that's in it, but the truth of what's outside of it.
Click to enlarge
Today's New York Times, as pointed out by Roger Simon sports a spiffy graphic detailing a number of factors in "Post-War" Iraq. How "Post" the war in Iraq actually is is anybody's guess, but the Times is out, as usual, to control the debate by controlling the Power Point elements.
Powerpoint reasoning has become increasingly popular in the last decade and increasingly stupid, as Edward Tuftes notes: "PowerPoint templates (ready-made designs) usually weaken verbal and spatial reasoning,and almost always corrupt statistical analysis."[Source]
The graphic reproduced above is a classic case of data manipulation. It seems to tell a story about Iraq today, and, in a limited sense, it does. But does it tell the whole story? Of course not. To tell the whole story about Iraq today the very least you'd want to have is a graphic that takes a look at an entire year. After all, that's when we like to get the story about corporations, our lives, and other significant personal and public histories.
Here's an example of what the Times might have done it it was actually dedicated to the a fair and balanced" snapshot of conditions in Iraq. It would have made it for a year and included, perhaps, this list of numbers indicative of Pre-War Iraq:
Some of the figures are easy to ascertain, but it would have been a service to the nation for the Times to put its staff on the project so that all the relevant indicators could be filled in.
Security Indicators in Pre-War Iraq
Top 55 Baathists at large: 55
Total Baathists Killed or Arrested: 0
Iraq citizens in mass graves: +300,000
Top Baathists in graves: 0
U.S. Troops in Iraq: 0
Non-US (Iraqi) Troops in Iraq: 375,000
Number of dictators: 1
Typical number of daily attacks by the state on Iraq citizens: Unknown
Iraq citizens killed by Iraq: Unknown
Annualized State Murder Rate: Unknown
Number of Republican Guards: 80,000
Number of tons unaccounted Anthrax: 17
Iraq citizens killed by gas: +5000
Villages destroyed: +3,000
Iraqi children "killed by sanctions": 500,000
Economic trends in Pre-war Iraq
Non-Baathist Unemployment rate:
Average Government monthly salary: $3.50
Electricity produced nationwide:
Electricity produced Baghdad:
Oil Production:
Diesel and Kerosene Available:
Percentage of GDP controlled by Hussain:
Percentage of GDP controlled by citizens:
Number of independent newspapers:
Number of independent media outlets:
Non-Baathist life expectency:
Internal Deportation of Kurds and Turkomen populations: 900,000
Inflation since 1991: 900%
Just a few of the points that might have been added to give the NYT powerpoint some persuasive power.
Posted by Vanderleun at November 14, 2003 2:47 PM | TrackBack
Okay, I just told you what Apple wants you to look out for with window positions, but in the real world, not everyone uses the hiding feature of the Dock, and it is unrealistic to be able to predict where each user will place their Dock at any given day or how large they will have it. However, you can build a feature into your application that allows spacing for the Finder. You can give users the option of where to position their windows and what area of the screen not to cross. I know that BBEdit provides me with this feature, and I wish more developers gave me more control over my windows.
Posted by: Michael at January 13, 2004 10:55 AMWhether native or not, this is obviously one of the first steps on your way to OS X. Keep in mind that often, the functionality of your code has a lot to do with how your interface is designed. How many developers have come up with great functional ideas from working with their interface or looking at their competitors'? Start working on your Aqua compliance from day one. Don't wait until the last minute.
Posted by: Wilfred at January 13, 2004 10:56 AMOther examples of these animations might be to show the status of an FTP transfer, the progress of media being digitized, or an updated time signature. And don't forget that users may want to have some control over this, so give them plenty of options, including the ability to turn these functions off.
Posted by: Court at January 13, 2004 10:56 AMIf an application is designed well, the reward for users is that they will learn it faster, accomplish their daily tasks more easily, and have fewer questions for the help desk. As a developer of a well-designed application, your returns on that investment are more upgrade revenue, reduced tech support, better reviews, less documentation, and higher customer satisfaction. The rewards of building a good-looking Aqua application are worth taking the extra time.
Posted by: Morgan at January 13, 2004 10:56 AMAdhere to File Locations. Make sure that when your users save documents, your application knows where to put them and also gives users flexibility.
Posted by: Georgette at January 13, 2004 10:57 AMIn building your amazing Aqua application, one of the most important things to consider is the Dock. There are three things your app needs to be "Dock Compliant." Now, I write this knowing that the Dock will be going through some major changes soon, but for the most part, these should still hold true.
Posted by: Susanna at January 13, 2004 10:57 AMAt WWDC, I listened to Apple representatives make some excellent points about taking the time to build a 100%-compliant Aqua application, and I think all developers need to look beyond the code and listen to what the folks at Apple have to say
Posted by: Valentine at January 13, 2004 10:58 AMFor my Paint application, I created a series of icons to simulate a rendering algorithm. While the application is performing this CPU-intensive task, you can always see the status of the document by the icon changing in the Dock.
Posted by: Roland at January 13, 2004 10:58 AMAdhere to Layout Guidelines. Did you leave 12 pixels between your push buttons? Does the positioning of your pop-up menus make sense, and when do you use a pop-up versus a scrolling list? Are you using the right types of buttons for the proper functions?
Posted by: Emery at January 13, 2004 10:59 AMWhether native or not, this is obviously one of the first steps on your way to OS X. Keep in mind that often, the functionality of your code has a lot to do with how your interface is designed. How many developers have come up with great functional ideas from working with their interface or looking at their competitors'? Start working on your Aqua compliance from day one. Don't wait until the last minute.
Posted by: Elizabeth at January 13, 2004 10:59 AM"It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood." -- Karl Popper N.B.: Comments are moderated to combat spam and may not appear immediately. Comments that exceed the obscenity or stupidity limits will be either edited or expunged.
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