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Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

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Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#191

Post by climech »

exporectomy wrote: post #147

Seems like old fashioned computer literate people are becoming the new computer illiterate. Perhaps kids learn these things socially from each other? I recently discovered the iPhone Notes app has an undo capability. There's no indication of it on any of the screens but you have to shake the phone . Shake to undo? Is that common now? How do you learn this stuff?

The "shake to undo" feature is actually very old, I remember discovering it around 2010. It works in all text fields system-wide, not just in the Notes app!

Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#192

Post by Monory »

systemvoltage wrote: post #112
todfox wrote: post #5

For more of these daily annoyances: https://grumpy.website The growing user hostility of UIs makes me want to stop developing software and even stop using computers. I started using computers because they made more sense to me than a lot of things. Now, I'm encountering these little moments of illogic and unreason every hour of the day. It's not just beginners who need little cues. I'm deeply familiar with the APIs b…

I tried reading the footer to get the contact information for on https://grumpy.website but it keeps doom-scrolling and only visible for a fraction of a second. What an irony. I dream of a day when we go back to pagination. No, not just pagination numbers on the bottom of the page to flip through pages, but also the URL should reflect that and be able to share the 7th page with someone using a link.

You can just turn the site over with the button on the top, and all the information will stay fixed (:

You can also just go to any post, there will be no scrolling, too

Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#193

Post by jp57 »

valuearb wrote: post #178
jp57 wrote: post #52

> Apple are slowly undoing their great usability work in the name of elegance. Not slowly, or recently. The big removal of affordances happened with IOS 7, and Jony Ive's "flat" UI aesthetic. Don Norman and Bruce Tognazzini, former Apple UI researchers and champions of UI affordances, wrote an essay[1] complaining about this problem in 2015. It seems like this era might be slowly _ending_ now that Ive is gone. [1] ht…

What about when MacOS started hiding scrollbars? Ugh.

I think that's around the same time? Not sure. Anyway, at least that one is easily overridden in System Preferences >> General.

Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#194

Post by zorrolovsky »

PoignardAzur wrote: post #188
zorrolovsky wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some experiences, content needs to be updated in page 1 (google is a good example). How would you then share page 7? that requirement could only be met if content was static (no updates) or the ordering of results was old to new. Am I missing something?

The classical solution is to have a "content before ID_OF_LAST_ITEM_ON_PREVIOUS_PAGE" url, though there isn't really a way to do that and also display page numbers on the bottom.

Many thanks for the insight. I am now going on a rabbit hole to discover what that solution implies, how it works, etc. :)

Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#195

Post by zorrolovsky »

systemvoltage wrote: post #132
zorrolovsky wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some experiences, content needs to be updated in page 1 (google is a good example). How would you then share page 7? that requirement could only be met if content was static (no updates) or the ordering of results was old to new. Am I missing something?

That's true. Pagination makes sense when it is static and not chronological, thanks for pointing that out. But, the problem still exists that I cannot get to the footer where there seems to be some contact information of the author :-)

You're right, the behaviour of the footer clearly creates a major usability issue. I personally dislike infinite scrolling with a passion. I can't see any big advantages and there are a lot of cons. I keep my hopes high that one day I will see it die... like Adobe Flash :)

Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#196

Post by jlokier »

valuearb wrote: post #178
jp57 wrote: post #52

> Apple are slowly undoing their great usability work in the name of elegance. Not slowly, or recently. The big removal of affordances happened with IOS 7, and Jony Ive's "flat" UI aesthetic. Don Norman and Bruce Tognazzini, former Apple UI researchers and champions of UI affordances, wrote an essay[1] complaining about this problem in 2015. It seems like this era might be slowly _ending_ now that Ive is gone. [1] ht…

What about when MacOS started hiding scrollbars? Ugh.

I think the hidden scrollbars are great. They remove clutter, yet are always readily available when needed.

Scrolling in MacOS is one of my favourite things about the UI compared with various versions of Linux and Windows I've used. This is due to the two-finger swipe gesture being really well done and the scroll bar being available when needed.

I used Linux as my primary desktop non-stop for 19 years, and in the end the scrolling had got worse. The Ubuntu desktop weird scroll handle thing was awful. MacOS scrolling was so much more ergonomic than that it convinced me to switch. I still develop primarily on Linux, but prefer to do it over SSH even though I have a Lunux desktop when I want it.

It doesn't take long using MacOS to develop an instinct for scrolling things with two-finger swipe, and scrolling is generally a very safe thing to do so trying it is harmless. The way swipe scrolling is independent of the focused window is just right, and the scrollbar which appears is easily grabbed on the occasions it's needed.

Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#197

Post by jlokier »

logbiscuitswave wrote: post #92
DonHopkins wrote: post #60

The original Mac would pop up a dialog with a threatening icon of a bomb with a lit fuse, whenever it crashed! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bomb_(icon) >The Bomb icon is a symbol designed by Susan Kare that was displayed inside the System Error alert box when the "classic" Macintosh operating system (pre-Mac OS X) had a crash which the system decided was unrecoverable. It was similar to a dialog box in Windows 9x th…

Not sure if you’re being serious or not, but these stories seem awfully apocryphal to me. I can’t imagine anybody - not even a total novice - running away from their computer upon seeing a cartoony image of a bomb. It reminds me of the made-up but often used story of terrified audiences running for the exits upon watching a film of a train for the first time.

When I first got a Nigerian scam email, I thought it was a genuine request for help...

Happens to us all.

Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#198

Post by wander_homer »

jlokier wrote: post #196
valuearb wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about when MacOS started hiding scrollbars? Ugh.

I think the hidden scrollbars are great. They remove clutter, yet are always readily available when needed. Scrolling in MacOS is one of my favourite things about the UI compared with various versions of Linux and Windows I've used. This is due to the two-finger swipe gesture being really well done and the scroll bar being available when needed. I used Linux as my primary desktop non-stop for 19 years, and in the end…

I don't have a Mac to try it, so would you care to explain how the hidden scrollbar works? Like when you open a dialog, do the scrollbars of its scrollable elements always appear and then slowly fade out, or do how do you know something is scrollable without trying to scroll?

Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#199

Post by OJFord »

andai wrote: post #171
OJFord wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're only puzzled because of its ubiquity, and your accustom to it. Nothing about it inherently says 'opens a menu from the side'.

Late "edit": Turns out I'm the confused one! (Bit of sleep dep...) I thought this was the main menu for a page, just in a weird low position, but it's the menu that appears on hover for each item and in this context indeed would be interpreted as a drag handle. In this context perhaps something unambiguous like three vertical dots would have been better? Also I agree with you -- perhaps the three lines represent a pi…

Sure, but that's not an affordance. If it were vertical instead of horizontal lines for example, it'd be like a grip horizontal pulling.

Re: Whatever Happened to UI Affordances?

#200

Post by mackrevinack »

dejawu wrote: post #85
HKH2 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In another well-known OS, the pointer can be somewhere inside the corner, and you can press a meta key and click and drag the corner without being on it exactly. I used to miss that functionality quite a bit when using Windows, but I think I use window snapping more now.

I loved that too! I use AltDrag[0] to get that functionality in Windows. It's a bit old and you may have to tweak it a bit to make it work with HiDPI, but it's now become a must-install when I set up a new machine. [0] https://stefansundin.github.io/altdrag/

there's a new fork that is supposedly more up to date. (i dont use windows anymore though so i hasn't used it myself)

https://github.com/RamonUnch/AltDrag

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