Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

hisham.hm

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 333 posts

Re: Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

#241

Post by msie »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #193
Mountain_Skies wrote: post #175

Good Lord, just give me control over the appearance of scrollbars again. Was there some international UI/UX meeting where they declared a holy war on scrollbars? Seems like everyone is trying to make them disappear like they're an embarrassing and unwelcome distant relative they're passive aggressively trying to make go away.

Scroolbars are useful for making large coarse leaps within a page in an instant, while scroll wheels are good for accurate positioning over short distances. But please. just stop making everything flat ffs. On the GUIs of old, you knew straight away what you could interact with, while now, everything is so flat or hidden away that everything blends together, I have no idea what I can click on and what's static unless…

Loved the Windows 95 UI. I dream of hacking Windows to restore that look. I've tried WindowBlinds but they don't go far enough to change everything.

Re: Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

#242

Post by germ »

crysin wrote: post #227
inetknght wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Scroolbars are useful for making large coarse leaps within a page in an instant, while scroll wheels are good for accurate positioning over short distances. That's funny. I use them in the exact opposite way. When I want exact positioning then I will use the scrollbar. When I want to scroll past pages and pages, I will just fling the scrollwheel.

I think it's dependent on your mouse too. Personally I only use mice that have a click wheel, I absolutely hate free-spinning scroll wheels.

I use a Elecom Huge with drag-scrolling enabled (check xinput if you're curious!). For any kind of scrolling I just hold a sidebutton down and roll the ball, it's very handy and feels better then using a wheel, even if imprecise.

For exact scrolling I'll use the scroll wheel or dive for the scrollbar.

What I really want is a toggle bound to a button for enabling/disabling drag scrolling. Most of my flow is keyboard based so being able to toggle that on/off for a dedicated stroller would be great.

Re: Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

#243

Post by p1mrx »

wolrah wrote: post #240
crysin wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's dependent on your mouse too. Personally I only use mice that have a click wheel, I absolutely hate free-spinning scroll wheels.

IMO the best mice ever are the Logitech MX Revolution and MX Master series that have an electronic clutch on the wheel. It's clicky by default but if you whip it the clutch unlocks and you can traverse an entire EULA in 0.6 seconds. Some of their newer gaming mice have a half-ass version of this as well with a manual mechanical toggle.

The MX Master 3 takes this further by using an electropermanent magnet, which is technology I didn't know existed:

https://blog.bolt.io/logitech-mx-master-3-vs-2s/

Re: Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

#244

Post by asiando »

kitsunesoba wrote: post #156
acquacow wrote: post #73

There was a free/shareware app for Apple's OS 6/7/8 called Kaleidoscope. It was a resource editor that would let you change pretty much any aspect of the desktop interface. Apple folks definitely had customization before OSX, but not sure if OSX killed that entirely or not.

Kaleidoscope is by far the best implementation of system theming I've used. A single file was responsible for the appearance of window chrome, window controls, control and text colors, fonts, desktop icons, cursor, text selection color, etc. Furthermore, the schemes were free to rearrange and reshape window chrome as the artist pleased, meaning it was possible to do things like have a titlebar on the bottom of the wi…

That reminds me, theming was possible in Tiger times too, but I don’t remember the name of the application.

Re: Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

#245

Post by jonpurdy »

deckard1 wrote: post #212
jonpurdy wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Technical PM, I fought against a former boss when they wanted to forego native controls because they wanted their app to be branded, because without a custom look they felt that their app would not be unique and memorable. If an app can't survive on its usefulness alone, it probably shouldn't exist. As a user, if an app doesn't have a native UI, I disregard it unless I need it for a specific and mandatory use.

> As a user, if an app doesn't have a native UI, I disregard it I disagree rather strongly with this. You should use the UI elements that make sense. It doesn't make sense for Maya or Blender or Photoshop to constrain themselves to whatever Microsoft picked out for them to use. The palette of native widgets and native UX methods is woeful across all systems. It's constrained to the set of generic elements which are a…

Parent here. I suppose my beliefs are more nuanced than what I specified in my post.

> You should use the UI elements that make sense. It doesn't make sense for Maya or Blender or Photoshop to constrain themselves to whatever Microsoft picked out for them to use.

The nuance in my beliefs is that if UI elements aren't available for the function, then apps should absolutely build custom UI. I agree with you there.

It's when you have a basic app that can entirely use native controls and chooses to forego them to do everything custom that I have a problem with.

For my particular example, we were building a cryptocurrency wallet for a new blockchain. It was simple enough to use entirely native controls but definitely didn't need a custom UI.

Re: Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

#247

Post by gambiting »

tokai wrote: post #209
gambiting wrote: post #84

It's truly shocking to me how few people even change their wallpaper. I work in a video games studio and like 90% of people have the default windows logo on blue background wallpaper. Don't get me wrong, it's a nice wallpaper, but people have their custom figurines and personal trinkets on the desks, but won't bother to change the wallpaper on their desktop.

It's shocking to me that anyone would chance the background on a work pc.

What do you mean? Chance in what way? I like cars so my wallpapers are usually like some nice photos of sports cars or my own car in interesting locations. It's perfectly inoffensive. And I mean even some landscapes, geeky wallpapers with cheesy matrix letters etc....literally anything other than the stock windows wallpaper would be an improvement.

Re: Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

#248

Post by neogodless »

godot wrote: post #142

Here's one counterpoint, that doesn't necessarily argue against the author (I love Windows 3.1 and Windows 95 theming btw!) -- diminishing ownership of the computer experience over the years gave me one great benefit, that is I'm much less reliant/tethered to everything on my computer. Sure, it's not an effect of themes, for sure. It's everything from, code for all my personal projects are in a git repo somewhere onl…

> I'm much less reliant/tethered to everything on my computer.

I agree with pretty much everything you said, but I also agree it doesn't argue against the author. That is to say "why not both?" I remember using NT on a domain with active directory profiles in the 90s, and while my memory is quite foggy, I believe some settings were carried between computers on my profile.

In the world of today, I can lock my taskbar on the side instead of the bottom and set my wallpaper, and the customization is saved to my Microsoft account, and loaded on other computers when I login (unless there's a local override, like Bing Wallpaper.)

But I believe colors (like your Accent Color) is still specific to each device. And I have no idea why - though I don't mind since I like using a different color on my laptop and desktop.

I'm rambling, but I think they could still allow all the customization, but also store parts of it on the cloud and carry it with you.

Re: Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

#249

Post by fchu »

The reality is that most users don't care about computer personalization anymore, a computer is just a conduit to the actual desired activity (browsing the web, playing games, watching movies, etc.).

Sure, 20 years ago, when content was scarce, people would find joy customizing their Winamp themes/visualizations, or changing their ringtones every week (remember when spending money for 20s of midi music was a $B business?).

Nowadays it feels like a chore for most of us.

Re: Remembering Windows 3.1 themes and user empowerment

#250

Post by sildur »

fouric wrote: post #183
sildur wrote: post #170

> But then I realized how much I struggled to get my Android UI the way I wanted, until I installed Nova Launcher that gave me Linux-levels of tweaking. The average user does not do this. No. Stop, please stop with the paternalism. I cringe every time someone talks about "the user" in third person, like they were laboratory specimens. We all are mostly average users. There is not really any difference between your fa…

I don't understand the point you're trying to make here. > We all are mostly average users. If by "we" you mean the population of HN - that is blatantly false. The average HN user is far more technically sophisticated than the average computer/phone user. >> The average user does not do this. This is completely true, and not "paternalistic" in the least - it's a statement of fact. > There is not really any difference…

> That's what the post is arguing against. You seem to be under the impression that separating "users" and "developers" implies taking control away from the former - which is false. Users are different than you - and you should give them power.

False, but it happens. And I don't like it. I feel like we are making a mistake here (a mistake older than time) by separating users between "technical" and "average", and "protecting" the average, "for their own good". These "average" users don't exist, we are creating them by keeping them digitally illiterate "for their own good". As I said, this theme is older than time.

Post reply on HN