Are computers really becoming user friendly?

Gone are those days when users had to learn all the shell commands (Dos or Unix), to be able to use their PCs. Now you have Graphical User Interfaces or GUIs which allow you to do all those tasks simply by pointing and clicking at icons or menus with that small device near your keyboard called ‘Mouse’. This means that we simply need to buy a computer and sit in front of it, and soon we will be able to use it effectively to manage all required information.

But wait!!!!! As computers are becoming smarter and smarter, some new age pirates are also becoming smarter. They are now finding new ways of hacking into your computer to steal your information with use of Trojans and viruses. For example, read this report on BBC News called ‘Parking ticket leads to a virus’.

This makes me feel that nothing has changed as yet. Earlier, it was difficult to use computers because users had to learn all the commands which were required to operate it. Now, common users are often scared to use their computers for doing activities like online transactions as they need to learn all the ways to protect themselves and their data from hackers.

Well, what does this mean for software developers? Software developers must keep themselves updated about various security issues and design stable and secure system so that more and more users will be able to use technology without even having to learn things they are not supposed to. For those who think software development is easy, I agree with you. Yes, software development is easy. BUT, developing a stable, user friendly and secure application is definitely not as easy as writing ‘var x=a+b;’.