naive Untutored in the perversities of some particular program or system; one who still tries to do things in an intuitive way, rather than the right way (in really good designs these coincide, but most designs aren't "really good" in the appropriate sense). This trait is completely unrelated to general maturity or competence or even competence at any other specific program. It is a sad commentary on the primitive state of computing that the natural opposite of this term is often claimed to be "experienced user" but is really more like "cynical user".
Last updated: 1994-11-29
