The perception we develop of the computer systems we use has several influences: Does it do what we want? Is it easy to access? Is it fast? Is it pretty? Most of all perhaps we judge a system by what it feels like to use. In the technical world we call this the ‘User Experience’, a term covering a variety of considerations and shortened, as is obligatory for technical terms these days, to ‘UX’.
Designers of apps and consumer oriented software put enormous focus on making their products fun, simple and easy to use. Consumers are fickle friends at best and they don’t take training courses, so apps and systems aimed at them have to be simple and likeable. Some take this as evidence that there is a widening gap between systems we use in our
personal lives and those we use in our business lives.
