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iPhones are hard to use

blog.fawny.org

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Re: iPhones are hard to use

#21

Post by pcmoney »

Ok, I need to say it. This article just has iPhone in the title to get more views. This is a problem with not just all smartphones but all rapidly evolving technology products. Do you think you could hand an android phone to one of those example cases and have them do any better with it?

Also half of the time I am in an apple store I am helped by someone who needs to use the accessibility features to check me out/in. I think it is awesome that Apple dog foods their products that way.

Re: iPhones are hard to use

#22

Post by tyfon »

polalavik wrote: post #2

And now dumber than ever. At least on my iPhone 6s with the latest update. Now you have to go through 2 screens to send a photo to someone in imessage, whereas before the most recent photos were easily accessible. And on facetime you have to pull up a menu [that covers the entire screen] to flip the camera around, and if you accidentally hit it a couple times theres no way to know which way your camera is facing with…

Two screens to send a photo sound like a bit of a hassle.

On my Sony phone I can take a photo, press the "share" button to get a context based share menu and my most recent signal/email contacts appear right at the top ready to send without leaving the camera app at all. If I want to send it to someone not on that list I have to get into another screen but not two.

The Facetime menu sounds quite crazy and very "un-Apple".

I see my mother struggle quite a bit with her iphone as well and she wants a dumb phone again but I think that would happen with an android too!

Re: iPhones are hard to use

#23

Post by sf_rob »

donatj wrote: post #17
starpilot wrote: post #4

Are any of these issues handled better on Android phones?

I currently own both Android and iOS devices, and have used both for years. I think the single "Omni-Pull Down" from the top works way cleaner than the now 3 seperate pull from side of screen actions. I actually find pulling up from the bottom difficult and frustrating. Swipe to dismiss, tap to open makes so much more intuitive sense than swipe to open. Text editing / selection does what I expect way more often. Andr…

>This one is controversial, but I think a visible always available back button is a huge accessibility win even if it's sometimes inconsistant in behaviour.

As a recent iPhone switcher I can't stand the "back" behavior. I was so happy to discover the swipe right to go back feature until I realized that it didn't apply to images and other full screen elements (where there's an "x" instead of "<back" in the top left corner). For those you swipe up to dismiss. So now I have to keep mental state for what type of content is currently displayed to know how to get back to where I was. This is more annoying than Android's inconsistent back button experience IMO.

Re: iPhones are hard to use

#24

Post by pdimitar »

fudged71 wrote: post #7

Phones are computers now. We can't expect everyone to know AND USE all of the features. Many of the features are obscured on purpose.

Yes. If any smartphone vendor exposes all of its settings front and center right now, then people would just throw their hands in the air and quit right there and then.

I am not overly fond of how Apple does things but they are doing a so-so-okay job trying to pander to the least-common-denominator.

Re: iPhones are hard to use

#25

Post by jplayer01 »

All tech is hard to use. All our interfaces expect a certain amount of familiarity with abstract concepts that have little to no relation to the real world. Most people get by because they memorize the most obvious processes (how to save a file) and build their own largely incorrect mental models that happen to give the correct results most of the time (assuming a consistent environment). As soon as something minor breaks or changes, these models become completely useless.

I've had somebody come to a PC repair shop for columns being the wrong size in Thunderbird. She wasn't a dumb person, but it's clearly a deeply flawed and incomplete understanding of the interface and computers in general that led to her inability to cope with the entirely new state of her desktop (yes, I'm still talking about the columns).

Re: iPhones are hard to use

#26

Post by DRW_ »

tyfon wrote: post #22
polalavik wrote: post #2

And now dumber than ever. At least on my iPhone 6s with the latest update. Now you have to go through 2 screens to send a photo to someone in imessage, whereas before the most recent photos were easily accessible. And on facetime you have to pull up a menu [that covers the entire screen] to flip the camera around, and if you accidentally hit it a couple times theres no way to know which way your camera is facing with…

Two screens to send a photo sound like a bit of a hassle. On my Sony phone I can take a photo, press the "share" button to get a context based share menu and my most recent signal/email contacts appear right at the top ready to send without leaving the camera app at all. If I want to send it to someone not on that list I have to get into another screen but not two. The Facetime menu sounds quite crazy and very "un-Ap…

>On my Sony phone I can take a photo, press the "share" button to get a context based share menu and my most recent signal/email contacts appear right at the top ready to send without leaving the camera app at all. If I want to send it to someone not on that list I have to get into another screen but not two.

You can do that on the iPhone too. What the person you're replying to is talking about is if you're already in messages, the interface for pulling a photo in is now an extra step over what it was before.

Re: iPhones are hard to use

#27

Post by username3 »

jfaat wrote: post #6
polalavik wrote: post #2

And now dumber than ever. At least on my iPhone 6s with the latest update. Now you have to go through 2 screens to send a photo to someone in imessage, whereas before the most recent photos were easily accessible. And on facetime you have to pull up a menu [that covers the entire screen] to flip the camera around, and if you accidentally hit it a couple times theres no way to know which way your camera is facing with…

If you let the app bar show above the keyboard, you should be able to select photos by tapping on the appropriate icon in that row, which will show your latest photos. I agree that it is a usability regression but this option was better than always having to tap twice to attach a photo.

They did it to load the keyboard faster.

Re: iPhones are hard to use

#28

Post by devinus »

I recently switched to iOS from Android after years on Android. I'm coming from being a daily macOS user for almost a decade. I would argue that iOS should no longer be considered the more "user friendly" of the two. That might have been the case years ago, but iOS seems to expect prior experience with what I can only guess are iOS paradigms specifically.

Almost every important action I need to take in an iOS app is hidden behind a gesture. In Android apps, gestures are value adds. They make on-screen actions or actions accessable through contextual menus quicker to accomplish for the experienced user. In iOS they're essential to accomplish some tasks.

Re: iPhones are hard to use

#29

Post by username3 »

gricardo99 wrote: post #3
polalavik wrote: post #2

And now dumber than ever. At least on my iPhone 6s with the latest update. Now you have to go through 2 screens to send a photo to someone in imessage, whereas before the most recent photos were easily accessible. And on facetime you have to pull up a menu [that covers the entire screen] to flip the camera around, and if you accidentally hit it a couple times theres no way to know which way your camera is facing with…

I'm glad I'm not the only one. I was feeling old when I became confused by the facetime pull up menu and accidentally disconnected the call, unable to figure out if the camera was flipped, and how to get back to the call.

They’re preparing for Group FaceTime.

Re: iPhones are hard to use

#30

Post by tyfon »

DRW_ wrote: post #26
tyfon wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two screens to send a photo sound like a bit of a hassle. On my Sony phone I can take a photo, press the "share" button to get a context based share menu and my most recent signal/email contacts appear right at the top ready to send without leaving the camera app at all. If I want to send it to someone not on that list I have to get into another screen but not two. The Facetime menu sounds quite crazy and very "un-Ap…

>On my Sony phone I can take a photo, press the "share" button to get a context based share menu and my most recent signal/email contacts appear right at the top ready to send without leaving the camera app at all. If I want to send it to someone not on that list I have to get into another screen but not two. You can do that on the iPhone too. What the person you're replying to is talking about is if you're already i…

Ah that makes a bit more sense. It it only for apple apps or does it integrate with 3rd party apps like signal as well?
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