Im not a machine... I prefer human language!

Adobe PDF Writer informs its users of an error in a very non-human manner

PDF Writer is Adobes program to create PDF Documents. When converting a document I encountered the cryptic error message below. The Adobe PDF Writer doesnt give me any information on how to recover from the error, nor what which effect it has on my document.

Figure 1: Adobe PDF Writer error message

It would be as if

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I go to my mechanic to have my car checked up. He tells me in English that there is a severe problem with it. When I ask him what the problem is, he starts mumbling in Russian - which I don't understand - and looks very, very serious. I leave the garage with my car - not knowing what's wrong with it and with a very nervous feeling.

How to fix this problem

Software is bound to err, just as humans are. Software malfunctions cannot be avoided. However, if you display an error message it must mean something to the user, not just be random debugging information. An error will leave the user anxious and discouraged and so it is important to explain how to recover from it and how to avoid it in the future (if possible).

Other examples

Figure 2: Newsgator Outlook edition 2.0 (an RSS news feed client)

Figure 3: Error caused by unknown program: The error suddenly popped up with no clue as to which program or which action caused it.

Research themes surrounding this misdesign

A Programmerism is the inappropriate use of technical terminology used in an interface, which can lead the user to feel that the interface has been written in a foreign language . See the encyclopedia entry on Programmerisms
In his seminal book "The Elements of friendly software design", Paul Heckel lists some heuristics (see the encyclopedia entry on Heuristics) for designing user-friendly software. A couple of these apply to this particular misdesign:

Speak the user's language.
If you can't communicate it, don't do it.
Support the problem-solving process.
Help the user cope.
Don't let the user focus on mechanics.
Reduce the user's defensiveness.
Give the user control.
Find more research on heuristics in the bibliography - see results from the bibliography...

You can also browse the bibliography for research on error handling- see results from the bibliography...

User Contributed Notes

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Your Name (127.0.0.1)
Posted November 20th, 2008 at 07:40

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Changes to this page

10 Jun 2008: Page was edited
10 Jun 2008: Page was edited

10 Jun 2008: Page was edited

Page information

Author(s): Mads Soegaard
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