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How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

jeremyaboyd.com

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Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#351

Post by rsynnott »

throwaddzuzxd wrote: post #343
rsynnott wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> With the wrong keyboard shortcut, the correct one universally being Cmd-X. I think no matter what you do here, you have a problem. When you press ctrl-x on a file in Windows explorer; you're not really cutting it; nothing happens til you paste! (Unlike using cut anywhere else). Both Windows and MacOS end up with a bit of a strained metaphor here; I don't think it's at all obvious which way is _correct_.

>I don't think it's at all obvious which way is _correct_. From a UX perspective the answer is pretty clear. Copy/Cut/Paste is the winning paradigm, which empirically makes it the correct way.

But, again, this isn't really cut and paste at all. It's more like "note position, and _then_ atomically cut and paste". Cutting and pasting files in Windows doesn't work at all like cutting and pasting anything else.

Someone who had never used Windows might reasonably expect, on finding 'cutting' a file did something, that if they never pasted the file would just be deleted, because that's how cut and past normally works.

Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#352

Post by perryizgr8 »

I get confused and irritated all the time by the inconsistent behavior of the home, end, page up and page down keys. Sometimes ends takes you to the end of the line, sometimes it scrolls to the bottom of the page, sometimes it does nothing. Sometimes Ctrl+right arrow is end, sometimes Cmd+right arrow and other times even fn+right arrow. It's just a huge mess. And who thought having no delete key was fine? And then they went and mislabeled backspace as delete! WTF!

Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#353

Post by gowld »

chrisseaton wrote: post #18
rchaud wrote: post #14

I bought a Mac in 2014 after a lifetime of using Windows. I never understood why people called it easier to use than Windows. Maybe this sentiment is a holdover from an earlier era when people would mindlessly run executables and zip files attached in emails and AIM messages. From a UI perspective, it's 90% identical to windows. From a UX perspective though, something fundamental like Finder is still not up to the jo…

> Why is it that when I click Finder, nothing actually opens? I'm not sure what you're doing wrong here - when I click the Finder icon it shows me the top Finder window, or opens a new one if there is no window. Is this not what it does for you?

That's only if the app is already open. If you Quit Finder when no windows are open, the first click opens no windows.

Arguably, it's intuitive:

* If you know what you are doing, you can go to the menu bar or click on the icon again.

* If you don't know know what you are doing, the obvious action is to blame yourself and click the icon again, which does open a window (to the Recents folder). So it's gaslighting a little, but it is intuitive.

Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#354

Post by viktorcode »

shp0ngle wrote: post #44

macOS app installation is broken for about 20 years now. It's not a new thing. Instead of clicking "next-next-next" as you do on Windows, you have at least 3 competing versions of installing things. * you have pkg installers (sometimes zipped, sometimes just .pkg files) * you have those .app bundles that you need to manually move to Application (they are sometimes in a zip and sometimes in a DMG, further complicating…

The whole idea that programs have to be installed to run and uninstalled when no longer needed shows how many people were trained (mostly by Microsoft) to follow along the lines of poor user experience. As it is the norm, people call that 'intuitive'.

Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#355

Post by rjayatilleka »

throwaddzuzxd wrote: post #205
rchaud wrote: post #14

I bought a Mac in 2014 after a lifetime of using Windows. I never understood why people called it easier to use than Windows. Maybe this sentiment is a holdover from an earlier era when people would mindlessly run executables and zip files attached in emails and AIM messages. From a UI perspective, it's 90% identical to windows. From a UX perspective though, something fundamental like Finder is still not up to the jo…

The Finder is atrocious. It's the worst default macOS app and probably the worst program period I've ever used. It's been so dumbed down that it's basically unusable for anyone slightly experienced. - There's no way to create an empty file - There's no easy way to cut a file/folder (Cmd-x doesn't work) - There's no (?) way to keep everything consistently sorted and aligned - ~~Tags are useless and just take up space…

FYI you can do cut in Mac. Do Cmd-C to copy and the Cmd-Option-V to cut-paste. For whatever reason, Windows has cut attached to selecting the file, but Mac has it attached to pasting the file.

Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#356

Post by allenu »

lucideer wrote: post #290
allenu wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you mean “experienced Windows user using macOS”. What you describe are consistent design choices on the Mac. If you flipped things around and only knew Macs and went to Windows, you might be surprised that closing a window there exits an app! There’s no reason one behavior is more correct than the other.

I didn't imply otherwise? Did you mean to reply to the gp comment? I'd say both behaviours could be equally surprising to any user, regardless of their previous OS biases but either way that's not really related to the point I was making. I was just saying that an inexperienced user will notice technical details less (e.g. the ramifications of processes continuing to run in the background without windows, the dock st…

Ah, my mistake. I misread your comment since you mentioned generally "experienced users" and then mentioned specific macOS details that might be confusing for experienced Windows users. I see now what you meant.

Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#357

Post by D13Fd »

dahart wrote: post #69
asattarmd wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst: pressing Enter to rename a file in finder. Command + Down arrow to open it. WTF!

So true, this is a bizarre choice that tells the user that renaming a folder is more important and more frequent than navigating. It makes keyboard navigating in the Finder pretty annoying (unless you only live in column view, which feels very claustrophobic to me). IMO the Finder has a bunch of bad UX, it’s like they never figured out what to do with it during the OSX transition, and then refused to improve it or do…

All it means is that to rename you press enter, and to open you press command-o. It works perfectly fine for keyboard navigation.

After using both for a long time (Windows for 30 years (!) and Mac OS for 16), I actually like the Mac OS way a bit better. In my usage renaming is a very common operation and I don't have F keys on my usual keyboard (renaming in Windows is F2).

Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#358

Post by gowld »

lucideer wrote: post #52
rchaud wrote: post #14

I bought a Mac in 2014 after a lifetime of using Windows. I never understood why people called it easier to use than Windows. Maybe this sentiment is a holdover from an earlier era when people would mindlessly run executables and zip files attached in emails and AIM messages. From a UI perspective, it's 90% identical to windows. From a UX perspective though, something fundamental like Finder is still not up to the jo…

I think this is a common view held by experienced computer users, because they don't consider which parts of their own usage patterns are a component of their advanced knowledge, and which are inherent to all users. For example: an experienced user is more likely to notice that closing a window in macOS backgrounds the app, and more likely to figure out how to fully exit the app process completely (either via Cmd+Q o…

> an inexperienced computer user will likely leave all apps they use open all the time

There are two kinds of novice users:

* Leave all apps and windows open forever * Close everything as soon as context switches, avoiding with multitasking.

You can also blend the two, but closing all windows you leave, but leave open forever when the system forces a switch.

> grow more quickly accustomed to having to Option+N

Novice users don't know what Option+N is. The Mac was always designed to be used without hotkeys.

Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#359

Post by allenu »

samatman wrote: post #289
Kwpolska wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They live in the tray, aka notification area.

That's not the same thing though. macOS has those also, programs can live on the menu bar. But in macOS, closing the last window basically never exits the program. Even for a program like Element, which is just an Electron view, closing the window doesn't quit the program, even though what's left over is useless: there's no way to relaunch the Electron pane except to quit and start it again. This is just how macOS wo…

There is one example of really bad app behavior when the last window is closed and it's one that Apple makes themselves: QuickTime Player.

If you open up QuickTime Player and then play back a video, then close the video, as soon as you background the app, it auto-quits itself. I wonder if they made it behave this way at some point to get around a memory leak. It's such an unexpected thing and it infuriates me each time I encounter it.

Re: How Intuitive Are Macs Really?

#360

Post by m463 »

rchaud wrote: post #14

I bought a Mac in 2014 after a lifetime of using Windows. I never understood why people called it easier to use than Windows. Maybe this sentiment is a holdover from an earlier era when people would mindlessly run executables and zip files attached in emails and AIM messages. From a UI perspective, it's 90% identical to windows. From a UX perspective though, something fundamental like Finder is still not up to the jo…

I find one thing very very very useful with finder.

spacebar to preview.

select multiple items to preview them all.

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