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New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

feedback.photoshop.com

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Re: New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

#11

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

melling wrote: post #6
alexbilbie wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is not liking change for the sake of not liking change and then there is not liking change because it is affecting your ability to work. The linked forum thread seems to have a large quantity of people complaining about the later.

yes, I know the story. I've heard it a million times. Like I said, people don't like change.

No, people don't like having their time wasted by clueless product managers who are trying to justify their existence with cosmetic updates.

People don't, on the whole, complain about things that genuinely make their lives better.

Re: New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

#12

Post by agumonkey »

Peanuts my friends. It's not a deep technical problem, if users shout hard enough Adobe will either rollback or make it optional. Still amusing to see an 'experienced' company doing such a stupid thing, they know about UIs, at least they knew.

Adobe Photoshop 2016, aka Adobe Gamma Cloud Calibrator.

Re: New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

#13

Post by julie1 »

melling wrote: post #2

People don't like change?

People love it.

Why don't we change where the clutch, the break and the acceleration pedals are from time to time on cars? Just for fun.

Why don't we switch riding right side and left side of the road? Every once in a while? Or the shape and colours of traffic lights?

Why do piano keyboards keep the same boring interface since decades (7 whites 5 black keys)?

Why do we have books with always the same size and boring indexes, table of matters and introductions?

Why don't we change VAT tax forms every months?

Oh I know, because changes are costly and not needed.

Re: New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

#14

Post by nkozyra »

alexbilbie wrote: post #3
melling wrote: post #2

People don't like change?

There is not liking change for the sake of not liking change and then there is not liking change because it is affecting your ability to work. The linked forum thread seems to have a large quantity of people complaining about the later.

I think that's the big problem with digesting reactions to change. Sometimes a company goes and just arbitrarily changes something because 1 or 2 people feel like it makes sense. Then everyone's paying for it.

But other times they do UX testing and over time discover that B is better than A. But throw that in front of a new user and it's initially harder and therefor frustrating.

If the driving paradigm is "if it ain't broke, don't fix it," that's going to lead to a stagnant product. Because sometimes it ain't broke, but it also ain't ideal and people are just used to it.

So when there are fundamental changes to UX beyond color scheme - and perhaps even including - I think there needs to be detailed communication as to why and why it's better now.

Re: New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

#15

Post by DonHopkins »

melling wrote: post #6
alexbilbie wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is not liking change for the sake of not liking change and then there is not liking change because it is affecting your ability to work. The linked forum thread seems to have a large quantity of people complaining about the later.

yes, I know the story. I've heard it a million times. Like I said, people don't like change.

People don't like slick trendy shallow cargo cult designs made by imitating popular fads from big corporations based on marketing campaigns dreamed up by advertising executives, in the place of hard earned empirically tested iteratively refined interfaces, made by applying, trading off and balancing user interface design principles based on decades of research by scientists and feedback from customers.

Re: New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

#16

Post by nsns »

Seems like software design needs a concept similar to the English highbrow/lowbrow distinction (professional vs. amateur?); this change seems to introduce lowbrow UI design into an highbrow product; like if the NYT suddenly started using the tabloid format.

Re: New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

#18

Post by nickpeterson »

People don't like relearning how to do a thing they feel they've already mastered. People in applications like Excel or Photoshop are usually quite vocal since many of the changes are for appearance or to help new users, and it feels like a betrayal for all the people who've already battled the application to learn the quirks.

Re: New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

#19

Post by paulojreis »

awesomerobot wrote: post #17

I understand why people are upset — but let's not pretend that Adobe's interfaces have ever been able to pass any usability tests.

I think the issue is not a good UI going bad. Rather, it's a familiar UI going unfamiliar.

I can use Ps with my eyes closed, and it's software aimed for professional usage. Changing the UI means I'm losing hours and hours of conditioning myself to its quirks, as well as familiarity with the software. Even if the new UI is better, you'd have to weight how much better it is.

Re: New Photoshop UI has become a major problem on the official feedback forum

#20

Post by paulojreis »

kyriakos wrote: post #10

I honestly don't see the problem. Its a matter of getting used to. Now the question is whether its an improvement visually over the older version. Which is probably not, its just a change for the sake of change.

That matter costs time and money. It's a real problem; for many people, Photoshop is their main work tool. Changing it has a cost.
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