Date: 2008-11-02 11:52:02 Created: null
Last week I found, and discussed with friends, some texts by Bruce Tognazzini. He was writing about how Apple had, back around when the original Mac was released, done plenty of researchon how quickly people could accomplish tasks using either the keyboard or the mouse. The interesting thing was this: people consistently felt that using a keyboard shortcut was faster than using the mouse, while in truth using the mouse was consistently faster.This was explained by the fact that using a keyboard shortcut was a more "interesting" and high-level task for the brain, while reaching for and using the mouse was a dull low-level task. People, in effect, got consumed by using the keyboard shortcuts and literally didn't notice it took as much time as it did. Using the mouse seemed to be low-level enough to let your brain stay focused on work while you performed the action, while getting caught up in using keys took you out of flow.
Unfortunately, this was mentioned in pretty brief terms, with no links provided to more detailed reports or other findings. But it really does feel worth thinking about. I've always thought I'd get more productive by learning more keyboard shortcuts, cleaning up my desktop, removing things from the dock and relying more and more on Quicksilver.
Now, I'm suddenly a lot more doubtful.
Perhaps a dock full of shortcuts, important files on the desktop, and heavy usage of drop down menus would make me more focused and efficient? Perhaps I ought to put Exposé on desktop corners again?
I don't know, but it's certainly very interesting to think about. Having your assumptions kicked around rarely hurts in the long run, even if you think at first all you're getting is a sore spot.
Of course, my (attempted) productivity increase from removing icons and things on my desktop is meant to come from removing distractions, rather than from straight speed increase. "Out of sight - out of mind" still ought to be a meaningful improvement. Or might it even be outweighed by the flow-breaking focus of using keyboard shortcuts?
So many questions ...
And how would mouse gestures fit into all this?