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The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

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Re: The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

#101

Post by digi_owl »

RandallBrown wrote: post #98
digi_owl wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Touchscreens are pretty natural and intuitive Try to watch someone in their 60s operate them and you will learn that the are anything but. My dad find them endlessly frustrating, as his first instinct when talking about something in an image or something is to put his finger on it. But that invariably triggers something on such a screen. He also struggles with things like Google Maps on a PC with a scroll mouse, as…

Try watching children operate touchscreen and you'll see that they are quite intuitive. The biggest difference is they don't have 60+ years of experience telling them what won't work (because it didn't used to) like your dad probably does.

Kids will try anything, just to see what happens (i think i issued the format c: command within days of the first PC arriving in our home back in the day). They are possibly the worst indicator of "intuitive" out there.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

#102

Post by ge0rg »

charleyma wrote: post #3

Would also potentially add "voice control" to this list. It's amazing to me that by trying to be "innovative/modern", most car user interface designs have become increasingly user unfriendly. Case in point, the other day I spent 15 minutes trying to figure out how to connect my phone to a car via bluetooth (I'm still used to there just being a button for pairing). Ended up having to search online for the instruction…

Voice control isn't friendly either. It often fails to understand what you say, requires significant focus from you to say the exact magic words, and works less well when it's loud outside.

On my Android Auto, the voice-activated voice control also tends to trigger inadvertently when playing podcasts.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

#103

Post by cesarb »

leejo wrote: post #39

Touch screens and mixed user interfaces on things like cash machines, petrol pumps, etc kind of bother me - maybe later posts will go into this as the blog ends saying there will be a follow-up. Just a couple of anecdotes - the first being cash machines where I input the PIN using the traditional buttons on the numeric pad, then i start using the touchscreen to make other choices. Pick one or the other, not a mixture…

AFAIK, there's a special reason for the PIN pad: it encrypts the PIN, so the ATM doesn't have access to it. That's why even ATMs with touch screens still keep the PIN pad.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

#105

Post by RandallBrown »

oftenwrong wrote: post #20

>we never tested it on the road That is an even bigger issue than the decision to use a touchscreen. Don't these companies want to make good products? I can't imagine releasing something without even attempting to put it through some realistic usage. Given the sorry state of in-car interfaces, I suppose I should not be surprised.

I worked at Microsoft on what would have been the next gen system after Ford SYNC and MyFord Touch. Our design team put a HUGE effort into making the UI usable at arms reach and at a glance. They had all this research about button sizes and how accurate a person could be with their outstretched arm. They built a full car simulator and we had modified cars in our parking garage we could actually test on.

Ford decided to go a different direction and I left the project shortly before it was ultimately scrapped. The ideas were awesome, but for various reasons, we never really built anything.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

#106

Post by rsl7 »

maxsilver wrote: post #91
stillworks wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Playing the devil's advocate here... but it's easier to show advertisements if a screen is available ? The skeptical side of me thinks that car manufacturers are simply preparing us slowly to accept screens in the car so that the next generation accepts it by default. I recently switched to a car which is the outgoing generation of that particular model and (almost ironically) has a physical button on the dashboard t…

> The skeptical side of me thinks that car manufacturers are simply preparing us slowly to accept screens in the car so that the next generation accepts it by default. I'm not quite this cynical. I think car manufactures got all excited by the tech (in part due to Tesla just lazily slapping in a huge touchscreen and getting lots of coolness points for it, and in part due to the massive success of Android / iPhone / i…

That is better... but does the shifter really glow blue?

Re: The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

#107

Post by brixon »

Marsymars wrote: post #99
NeedMoreTea wrote: post #56

I sometimes feel I am in a minority of one these days. Just about every car I've owned, I develop a muscle memory of where all the important switches are, and how far to turn to "hot enough" or "cool enough" etc. Same for most things around - I know fairly well how far to turn the oven for 180 +-10, no need to look. I might check if it's something especially sensitive (rare). Thanks to iPhone (I have one, and like it…

I live in a climate that has cold winters, and have Raynaud's syndrome. If it's cold outside, I wear -30C rated mountaineering mitts, and I'm fine, as long as I don't expose my hands to the cold . Touchscreens (and tiny steering wheel buttons) in cars are literally unusable for me for a good portion of the year.

Would a Stylus work on these screens? Granted that is probably more dangerous while driving than a finger.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

#108

Post by bobwaycott »

scrooched_moose wrote: post #85
Angostura wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just bought a car (with Carplay), but I was adamant that I would only have one that had physical buttons and volume knobs on the centre console. Sat in Tesla the other day and was really surprised about how awful the UI was in terms of information heirarchy. Everything seemed to have the same weight. A sea of clickable buttons.

Can I ask which brand you went with? I'm currently looking and have already tossed out several models I otherwise really wanted.

I recommend taking a look at Audi. No touchscreens. Smart functionality. Tactile buttons for everything. I love my 2018 A5 Sportback.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

#109

Post by bobwaycott »

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #56

I sometimes feel I am in a minority of one these days. Just about every car I've owned, I develop a muscle memory of where all the important switches are, and how far to turn to "hot enough" or "cool enough" etc. Same for most things around - I know fairly well how far to turn the oven for 180 +-10, no need to look. I might check if it's something especially sensitive (rare). Thanks to iPhone (I have one, and like it…

I’m with you on most of this. As far as cars go, I recommend a look at Audi for smart functionality, tactile buttons/knobs/switches, and zero touchscreens. I love my 2018 A5 Sportback.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Touchscreens

#110

Post by macintux »

pythonaut_16 wrote: post #81
nottorp wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're solving a problem they introduced themselves eh? Voice command: shout at car to make it cooler. Car doesn't understand. Shout at car to turn off radio so your voice command is clearer. Car doesn't understand. Take eyes off road to turn off the damn radio with the touch screen. Crash! The button interfaces actually work 100% of the time. Voice command... lol...

It's fine because you can just turn on the Autopilot while you adjust the radio and everything will be fine.

Tesla created an interface that can only be used while driving by handing control over to software that is unable to recognize when a vehicle in front of you is at a dead stop.

And everything is just fine?

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