Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
1–10 of 379 posts
Re: Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
#2What is a console?
Definition:
Console: (verb) To comfort someone in a time of grief because they are forced to use the command line.
Oh, wait. You thought console was a noun?
Re: Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
#3Last year's discussion when it was posted: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13733777
Re: Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
#4> We need a reboot. We need toolkits that produce interfaces that are fast, consistent, bug free, and composable by default
I would add to this list "programmable" so that automation is possible without being too disconnected from the GUI. Imagine clicking on an element in the page and being able to see (and use) the API behind it. This is one of the premises behind our project (shameless plug alert: https://membrane.io)
"Bug free" though...
Re: Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
#5>>> These powerful devices should be propelling our workflows forward with us gangly humans left barely able to keep up, and yet, almost without exception we wait for our computers instead of the other way around. We’re conditioned ourselves to think that waiting 30+ seconds for an app to load, or interrupting our workflow to watch a half second animations a thousand times a day, are perfectly normal.
In addition, the GUI has conditioned us to think that in order to make a computer do work for us, we have to perform precise manual labor to guide it through a lengthy series of tiny discrete steps. "I have seen the computer, and he is us." In addition to making those steps quicker, we should also be thinking about how to eliminate them altogether by having the computer understand natural language.
Re: Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
#6Yes! I am so glad somebody called out the UI animations! The one in 1Password bugs me every time, I don't use Spaces because it takes too long for the animations to play out. There are more examples.
Every time a programmer adds an animation, a settings option should also be added to "disable animations". Advanced users will love you for it!
Re: Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
#7What is a console? Definition: Console: (verb) To comfort someone in a time of grief because they are forced to use the command line. Oh, wait. You thought console was a noun?
It is a noun as well.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/console
Specifically:
3b. a combination of readouts or displays and an input device (such as a keyboard or switches) by which an operator can monitor and interact with a system (such as a computer or dubber)
Re: Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
#8I absolutely agree that aesthetics shouldn't come at the expense of efficiency, but I don't think it's practical to expect every user to be a power user. There are some products and programs, like the Adobe Suite and a bunch of terminal programs, that are marketed for and should be designed with power users in mind. But I'd say the majority of programs we use every day aren't designed with professionals in mind - they're designed for a standard computer user. And having something that "just works" rather than something that is tailored for a power user is absolutely valuable to the billions of people out there that aren't going to be power users.
Slack, like I'm thinking a lot of applications, falls in a middle ground where lots of users are power users, but many use it just a couple times a day, or less. It should be fast for those users, but those users shouldn't have to climb a steep learning curve to get value out of the product. An ideal interface would be easy for a newcomer and powerful for an experienced user, but that's a difficult challenge for a designer, and tradeoffs need to be made.
Re: Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
#9>>> These powerful devices should be propelling our workflows forward with us gangly humans left barely able to keep up, and yet, almost without exception we wait for our computers instead of the other way around. We’re conditioned ourselves to think that waiting 30+ seconds for an app to load, or interrupting our workflow to watch a half second animations a thousand times a day, are perfectly normal. In addition, th…
This extends to how people think about teaching others about computers. I would get so frustrated with E-mails that consisted of about 9 “steps” to walk through when using a WEB site, instead of posting a direct link to the final target!
The progress animations are out of control too. Every time I see one, I imagine the engineering hours it took to animate and wondered if they could have just spent hours optimizing the code instead. The weirdest thing about a lot of progress indicators is that developers don’t even get the point: your indicator has to be in sync with the activity! It has to give meaningful updates, it can’t just be a background animation that looks alive even when the server has died and isn’t coming back.
Re: Learning from Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces
#10I'm switching away from macOS to Linux with the i3 window manager for precisely this reason. But all of his criticisms of terminals are spot on: no multimedia, no support for anything other than monospaced fonts, etc. Lord, somebody give me a terminal program that produces laid-out text and can show inline video.