[tiben_]

I agree with the fact that error messages in some applications can be improved. This article shows a good example.

Conventions are really important to speed up the basic usage understanding of a tool, both cli and gui applications. In my memory ESR did a good job at explaining cli applications Unix conventions (defaults arguments, configuration file locations etc.) in is book "The Art of Unix Programming".

But the complexity of a tool depends on the domain it covers and targeted users. In fact i disagree with the conclusions of the coffee machine analogy. One machine is for professional user the other not.

I disagree with the "no documentation" argument too. "Understand by intuition" paradigm works for basic scenarios from domains understund by anyone (music player, email) but it has its own limits when the software involves complex concepts sometimes inherent to the domain covered. In theses cases, a well written documentation is far more useful to understand theses concepts than clicking everywhere like a monkey ihmo.