[instaviz-users] Rotated squares aren't diamonds?

[Daniel Sachs]

Since Glen has indicated it's time to play up Instaviz, I showed it to  
my mother and let her play with it a bit. One of the things I saw her  
do, repeatedly, is try to make a diamond form by drawing a square  
rotated at 45 degrees, carefully, repeatedly. She expressed  
frustration that she "clearly" wanted to draw a diamond, and why did  
it keep drawing a square?

I explained that to get a diamond you had to draw a parallelogram, and  
showed her how, but she still had trouble drawing something that  
wasn't recognized as a square.

I never really liked the recognition of squares rotated 45 degrees as  
squares rather than diamonds myself, but watching a reasonably  
intelligent potential user struggle with this when the intent is quite  
obvious seemed like something that should be brought up and discussed.

Is recognizing 45 degree rotated squares as squares rather than  
diamonds the right thing to do?

dan

-- 
| Daniel Grobe Sachs      <dgsachs at nekito.net> |
| The time is gone, the song is over, thought  |
|        I'd something more to say...          |