21–30 of 57 posts
Global menus only make sense in an environment where only one application is on screen at once. This is especially true when you throw in "focus follows mouse"and you have to cross another application on the way to the global menu. What I really hate lately is the iconification of menus, be it ribbon or that firefox abomination. Having to learn a different set of hieroglyphs for each application is a terrible UX. Thi…
From the second part: https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/1*EXYbO_qnV2m8fv4mB... > Adjusting the volume in KDE Plasma — why is there more than one slider for playback? Hardly intuitive Because there are multiple outputs and you can assign a source to whichever outputs you want. Why shouldn't the controls reflect the actual capabilities of the device? The next step is saying that the device is too capable and nee…
Even as a technical user the amount of volume controls can get quite ridiculous. There is the device volume, the app volume (games, media players), the context volume (typically on phones), a volume control on the output device (speakers or display), volume controls on the output devices of output devices (TV -> stereo setup), volume controls on the input devices (Bluetooth, keyboard controls). It really is amazing that we have so many places to control such a seemingly simple so I can't really blame non-technical people for getting confused.
I'd love to have just one analogue knob on my keyboard to control everything and never think about volume again.
I feel like the author needs to explain why the menu-based user interface is better. That's taken for granted, but is it actually true? And consider that the response to that is likely to be different for people who learned computing on environments like Windows (where global menu bars would be really weird), Mac OS (where they're normal) or various earlier UNIX GUIs (where who knows, anything goes and each applicati…
Would they really be weirder than hamburger menus?
Also, GNOME 3 has a global application menu in the top-left corner, but it only contains around 5 entries on average and is largely ignored. It's the worst of all worlds.
Ubuntu's Unity had the right idea when they let users choose whether to display menus at the top, or inside each window. The implementation was terrible, but I wish the concept would have caught on as some kind of XDG standard.
From the second part: https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/1*EXYbO_qnV2m8fv4mB... > Adjusting the volume in KDE Plasma — why is there more than one slider for playback? Hardly intuitive Because there are multiple outputs and you can assign a source to whichever outputs you want. Why shouldn't the controls reflect the actual capabilities of the device? The next step is saying that the device is too capable and nee…
You're a technical user, the blogger was speaking of non-technical users who's mental map of the machine don't accommodate multiple volumes. They also have no idea what "audio adapted analogue stereo" or "HDMI / display port" means. Even as a technical user the amount of volume controls can get quite ridiculous. There is the device volume, the app volume (games, media players), the context volume (typically on phones…
Really, they can't understand that the speaker has a different volume to their headphones?
At least this is better than having multiple volume knobs on one audio path.
From the second part: https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/1*EXYbO_qnV2m8fv4mB... > Adjusting the volume in KDE Plasma — why is there more than one slider for playback? Hardly intuitive Because there are multiple outputs and you can assign a source to whichever outputs you want. Why shouldn't the controls reflect the actual capabilities of the device? The next step is saying that the device is too capable and nee…
You're a technical user, the blogger was speaking of non-technical users who's mental map of the machine don't accommodate multiple volumes. They also have no idea what "audio adapted analogue stereo" or "HDMI / display port" means. Even as a technical user the amount of volume controls can get quite ridiculous. There is the device volume, the app volume (games, media players), the context volume (typically on phones…
Btw, iphones have context-dependent volume control, probably because combining ring and music volume is impractical. The same for speaker vs headphones. But now I never know if I turned volume down for “volume”, “headphones”, “ring” or whatever it shows on that vague screen. This is a complex issue, and when you hide it behind too clever logic it can get even worse than explaining.
Btw2, in my childhood we had no computers or experience, but no one failed to manage volumes on chained-together audio systems. A good subject to think of.
To be fair to firefox, this has changed recently.
- Hamburger menu is still there.
- Sidebar-everything is still there.
Global menus only make sense in an environment where only one application is on screen at once. This is especially true when you throw in "focus follows mouse"and you have to cross another application on the way to the global menu. What I really hate lately is the iconification of menus, be it ribbon or that firefox abomination. Having to learn a different set of hieroglyphs for each application is a terrible UX. Thi…
Global menus assume a single monitor setup. And as such are unsuitable.
The Mac OS X desktop metaphor does attempt to solve this somewhat, the last application in focus on a particular monitor, is presented within the menubar on that monitor - regardless of whether or not the program is currently been interacted with.
For example: currently I have 4 displays with a program full screen in each, each Menu Bar has the menu options for each program.
All inactive programs present in the menu bars on the other monitors are greyed out - the effect of this can be seen in the linked image (I have minimised the other windows because work business) - https://imgur.com/MM8sQdt
I have Safari Tech Preview [the currently active window], Outlook, iTerm and Firefox (the display for which isn't included in the screenshot because it it's a vertical panel with odd dimensions), open on a monitor a piece.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're a technical user, the blogger was speaking of non-technical users who's mental map of the machine don't accommodate multiple volumes. They also have no idea what "audio adapted analogue stereo" or "HDMI / display port" means. Even as a technical user the amount of volume controls can get quite ridiculous. There is the device volume, the app volume (games, media players), the context volume (typically on phones…
Non-technical users, who don’t know what HDMI and headphones are, probably have no computer at all, not to mention a specific linux distribution. And all these attempts to make an OS for an average complete idiot (that nowhere exists) just make things worse every year. Thank god few sanity bastions like xfce are still alive. Btw, iphones have context-dependent volume control, probably because combining ring and music…
I agree, but to many try to ride that middle ground, KDE is probably the best example. It aims to be simple but so much is configurable via hidden context menus and drag and drop controls that users can completely rearrange their desktop accidentally, even when it's locked. I don't know how but they do. If they'd just hide everything in text config files it would be better for both groups.
> Btw2, in my childhood we had no computers or experience, but no one failed to manage volumes on chained-together audio systems. A good subject to think of.
My family were constantly getting confused by things like the volume button on the VCR remote and the surround sound home theatre craze was a nightmare (and notice how so few people bother with this complication any more?). Other things like only changing the channel on the TV while recording something on the VCR and why the have to press AV2 when they used to just put it on channel 5 needed constant reminders. Their way of looking at the world just never understood input/output pipelines, at best they had to learn what to do by rote.
> Non-technical users, who don’t know what HDMI and headphones are, probably have no computer at all
I think you're hugely underestimating the people that still need them for work and creative tasks that tablets/phones will always suck at. They still act as the universal hub for all devices so people can do things like print documents or upload pictures from their digital camera to facebook. Not to mention the better ergonomics of something like a screen you can tilt but don't have to hold constantly.
Bonus points to Nautilus, which somehow manages to have 2 buttons side-by-side that look like hamburger menus, the actual hamburger menu and view as list.
I really dislike everything looking and acting different, it's like having to learn a new language just to talk with a new application.
From the second part: https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/1*EXYbO_qnV2m8fv4mB... > Adjusting the volume in KDE Plasma — why is there more than one slider for playback? Hardly intuitive Because there are multiple outputs and you can assign a source to whichever outputs you want. Why shouldn't the controls reflect the actual capabilities of the device? The next step is saying that the device is too capable and nee…
>The next step is saying that the device is too capable and needs capabilities removed to make it easier to understand. No thank you.
Sadly, yes, this is how Linux Desktop people think. GNOME especially.