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iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

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Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#121

Post by gnicholas »

dceddia wrote: post #62
epistasis wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't completely agree there. Contextual menus by right-click (or ctrl-click) have been core since OS X came out in 2000. (I would distinguish between "core" meaning extremely useful and effective, as opposed to "essential" meaning the only possible way to accomplish a task. Right click is still not "essential," just very useful.) And back in the pre OS X days, tons of functionality was "hidden" with the option key.…

Lots of magical things are still hidden behind modifier keys. Option-click the wifi icon: special diagnostics info Option-click the bluetooth icon: diagnostics info Shift-Option-click the bluetooth icon: debug menu Hold option while resizing a window: resize from both sides at once (see gif: https://twitter.com/dceddia/status/859518600931143680 )

Shift-Option-Volume up/down (or Brightness up/down): Adjust the volume or brightness in finer-grained increments

The option-resize window trick is crucial when you come across a monitor/video card bug that doesn't let you touch the edge of the window that you need to drag in order to bring the window on-screen. Just option-drag the opposite edge as a workaround.

Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#122

Post by sanbor »

seanwilson wrote: post #116
quink wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean the company that has you dragging disks into the trash for about three decades now?

I've always found installing apps on desktop completely unintuitive as well. You double-click a downloaded package, see a window containing the app icon (...why?), drag and drop the icon into your app folder usually with no feedback after then you have to manually launch the app e.g. using cmd+space. Why not just have a "do you want to install this app?" dialog when you click on the app file the app launches after?

You can just open the app without installing it.

Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#123

Post by int_19h »

canuckintime wrote: post #103
hendersoon wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My take is this. Win8 was actually an excellent tablet OS, but compromised, deliberately compromised in many cases, its desktop experience to get there. In sharp contrast Win10 took the opposite approach-- it is markedly less pleasant to use exclusively with touch, but a great desktop with mouse+keyboard. They didn't /try/ to compromise touch, but they didn't put much effort into it either.

I wouldn't say the desktop experience was 'compromised'. 'Depreciated' (i.e. made legacy) or 'encapsulated' would be the description I'd use. Consider how the transition from command-line interfaces to GUI was made. Even today you can open up the Command Prompt in Windows (or Terminal in OSX) and run legacy MS Dos apps. Well Balmer saw Jobs heralding the iPad as the future of computing, the launch lines, and the earl…

It absolutely was compromised. The start screen was a horrible UI on desktops.

Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#124

Post by [deleted] »

canuckintime wrote: post #88
hungerstrike wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd much rather have arrow keys to move the cursor around. They're always in the same spot and you only need one finger to use them. Unfortunately, if you replace the keyboard on iOS you lose the quick dictation key because Apple doesn't let the third party keyboard initiate dictation. Speaking of dictation, Windows is finally going to bring a dictation key to their virtual keyboard this fall so I'll probably switch…

Apple put left and right arrow keys in the landscape mode of their default keyboard for iPhone+ models ― which you probably haven't heard off because it truly is as awful as that sounds. Yet another bullet point that Apple's UX design quality has taken a dive the past few years

[deleted]

Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#125

Post by copperx »

notadoc wrote: post #100
lawkwok wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know the “user is never wrong”, but sometimes it is up to the user to learn how to use an interface. I’m not saying I don’t have relatives with the same issue, but I would hope that we don’t design interfaces to cater to those who don’t care to learn the difference between “hold” and “press”. These verbs aren’t even technology-specific.

I would argue that good design should never be confusing and prevent errors and guess work to begin with.

A Poka Yoke UI. Interesting.

Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#126

Post by copperx »

rhencke wrote: post #102
Doctor_Fegg wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very much. Having Tetris and MacWrite Pro open simultaneously would cause a bomb, every time. It genuinely did wonders for my productivity. I remember System 7.1 most for its purity of interface. Everything from 7.5 onwards seemed to be bolting on more bells and whistles in a faintly uncoordinated fashion, and OS X has continued that. 7.0/7.1 were simple, efficient and fast. Much of the featuritis in the last 25 year…

If you hide the toolbar in the OS X finder, you can get Spatial Finder back (!). When the toolbar is hidden, double-clicking folders springs them open to new windows, and folder windows remember their position after closing them. If you turn on the Status Bar, when the toolbar is hidden, it hops up to the top of the window. Just like the old days. sniff

So, you're saying that some people navigate deep folder hierarchies by creating a window for every level? That's just so ... messy.

Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#127

Post by dceddia »

epistasis wrote: post #74
dceddia wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots of magical things are still hidden behind modifier keys. Option-click the wifi icon: special diagnostics info Option-click the bluetooth icon: diagnostics info Shift-Option-click the bluetooth icon: debug menu Hold option while resizing a window: resize from both sides at once (see gif: https://twitter.com/dceddia/status/859518600931143680 )

This just made me go and investigate the rest of my menu bar items. Option-click the sidebar icon: turn notifications on and off.

Ooh! I wonder if this silences the "Do you want to restart now, or like an hour from now?" dialog...

Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#128

Post by guu »

danso wrote: post #77
bshimmin wrote: post #69

I'm slightly terrified that this update is going to confuse the hell out of my ageing parents, who find the simplicity, lack of meaningful support for multitasking, and absence of the Dock, to be key selling points of their iPad.

You posted exactly what I was thinking. I recently gave my parents my iPad Air 4th gen and orienting them to it was an eye-opening experience. They are retired but they both worked as programmers (think COBOL-era). I've owned an iPad since launch day and so many features that feel instinctive -- double-tap home button to bring up apps, slide-down-from-top to see notifications -- are decidedly not. And that's before y…

None of the iPads have 3D touch so it is not about your tablet being old.

I looked it up and the discover-ability on this feature is pretty poor. You click the "downloaded" button to get the option to delete.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204343

Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#129

Post by [deleted] »

notadoc wrote: post #44
wildmusings wrote: post #6

It seems like so much core functionality is hidden behind gestures and 3D-touch. What a change for the company that shunned even the right click for many years because it hid functionality.

Even the smartest and most technically capable people I know are confused by 3D Touch, almost all of whom eventually turned it off. What is it for? Why is it better than an alternative or a long press? How does it make anything better or more intuitive? How is it predictable in any way? iOS has been consistently confusing and less intuitive ever since iOS 7, and iOS 10 and iOS 11 are only more so particularly the loc…

[deleted]

Re: iOS 11 turns the iPad into a different machine

#130

Post by rhencke »

copperx wrote: post #126
rhencke wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you hide the toolbar in the OS X finder, you can get Spatial Finder back (!). When the toolbar is hidden, double-clicking folders springs them open to new windows, and folder windows remember their position after closing them. If you turn on the Status Bar, when the toolbar is hidden, it hops up to the top of the window. Just like the old days. sniff

So, you're saying that some people navigate deep folder hierarchies by creating a window for every level? That's just so ... messy.

Not as messy as you might think! Holding down 'alt' while navigating causes the previous window to close as you go along. It makes keeping the windows that you'd like to go back to very easy, instead of having to just hit 'back' or 'up' a lot to get back to where you wanted to go.
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