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

The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

uxdesign.cc

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 490 posts

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#111

Post by mgdlbp »

roland35 wrote: post #30

The subreddit /r/Programmerhumor sometimes had a whole bunch of memes around volume controls, but there are often times other funny themes that can go on for weeks... - bad phone number inputs - how large node packages can get - software interview process - backend vs front end engineers And my favorite meme was when they parodied the Hawaii missile alarm back a few years ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/ProgrammerHumor…

There's an entire subreddit for bad UI: https://www.reddit.com/r/badUIbattles/top/?t=all

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#112

Post by kayodelycaon »

Tempest1981 wrote: post #78
rectang wrote: post #6

Nearly all volume controls suck because by and large the software world is ignorant of the fact that loudness scales logarithmically. 99.9% of volume controls scale the output linearly.

On every iPad I've seen, only the lower 3-4 (of 16) steps are normal indoor range. Even the 1st step is too loud at night. I need half-steps. Is this due to linear vs logarithmic scaling? Or are people throwing wild parties where the iPad needs to fill a room with sound?

> Or are people throwing wild parties where the iPad needs to fill a room with sound?

I’ll often use my iPad as a portable media player and max volume is nice for things like music while showering or cooking in the kitchen.

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#113

Post by triggercut »

Is this podcast TOO LOUD? Or are your arms tired from holding your headphones a couple of inches from your ears at all times? Or would you just like to be able to mute ads like these that override your volume settings in your podcast app? Well, you can fix that, with a $2.97 monthly plan to volumeslider.com Listeners to this podcast use the promo code "STFU" for 22% off an annual subscription.

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#114

Post by temporallobe »

heywire wrote: post #42
temporallobe wrote: post #7

Car manufacturers are easily the winners here. If your car’s audio system doesn’t have a simple knob you can grab and twist, well, that just sucks.

Mazda got this right on the CX5 (at least in my 2016). Not only is there a knob, but it is on the center console where you can easily reach it without looking. Same goes with the controls (the touch screen is disabled when the vehicle is moving)

My 2016 MX-5 (Miata) has the same thing, and it’s one of the many reasons why as soon as I sat in the car, I immediately fell in love with it. Mazda seems to investment a lot in ergonomics and driver enjoyment. Case in point: the new Mazda 3 2.5 Turbo.

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#115

Post by mikewarot »

jeffbee wrote: post #12
temporallobe wrote: post #7

Car manufacturers are easily the winners here. If your car’s audio system doesn’t have a simple knob you can grab and twist, well, that just sucks.

I can twist mine as much as I like, but the radio comes on instantly and the software that cares about the volume knob being twisted starts about 3 seconds later.

In our Subaru, the radio comes on, but you can't turn it off for at least 10 seconds, and then it might come back on, depending on exactly how many times, and when, you tried to turn it off earlier.

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#116

Post by malshe »

spoonjim wrote: post #58
stefan_ wrote: post #36

I think the worst UI is simply the Teams one, because it presents as an app volume control but then simply controls the global device volume . Fuck off, you are not the only app running. But that comes second to the microphone gain control, which Teams similarly exerts unilateral control over - only this time through an automated algorithm that for some microphone types just ends up muting them entirely. It's wild, y…

What I find perplexingly awesome about how terrible Teams is is the fact that now people don’t keep bothering me all day with useless messages. The software is so terrible that like a gas station bathroom you just get in, do what you need to, and get out.

OMG, this is so damn accurate! Thanks for that gas station analogy!

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#117

Post by bombela »

cm2187 wrote: post #90

The volume control in VLC deserves a place somewhere in this list. It works fine if you click on it. But if you use the keyboard's up/down arrow keys, it seems to severely rate limit how fast you can increase or decrease sound. Not great when you need to stop a big bang from waking up your neighbors.

It also can go above 100%. And it seems that I can never get it back to 100% if I move it by mistake. Even using the keyboard it will never comes back to exactly 100%. Maybe 103%, or 98%. It drives me crazy.

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#118

Post by spoonjim »

hnick wrote: post #55
mianos wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Teams is the reference for bad UI. Paste a code block. Select a word in the code block. Copy and you get the whole block copied not the selected word. I could write a page of the issues like this. Maybe it would not be so bad if you only used Teams but when you use slack at the same time it is like someone is wacking you in the back of the head every few minutes.

We had network issues the other day and a few minutes into the meeting we realised my audio stream was delayed by a whole minute. There was no indication on the Teams UI this was happening. I'd hear a question about a window I'd already closed on screen share, type a response, and they got it a minute after asking. As someone who uses Discord at home, Teams is pain.

LOL. I wonder where that data was physically sitting for a whole minute.

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#119

Post by addicted »

AceJohnny2 wrote: post #50

Obligatory Google Wave scrollbar mention... http://ignorethecode.net/blog/2009/11/15/google_waves_scroll... (Damn, it's already been over a decade already since it ended?)

These aren’t good scrollbars, but it’s clear that they were trying to solve certain problems.

And considering Waves were designed to potentially be extremely long, I can understand what they were trying to achieve.

I am ok with design that fails while trying to solve real problems, as opposed to what we have today, where designs fail because they’re trying to either look better or match the current UI fad.

Re: The worst volume control UI in the world (2017)

#120

Post by javajosh »

nyanpasu64 wrote: post #81
rectang wrote: post #6

Nearly all volume controls suck because by and large the software world is ignorant of the fact that loudness scales logarithmically. 99.9% of volume controls scale the output linearly.

> 99.9% of volume controls scale the output linearly. Wrong. Windows's volume output is the percentage squared, and Linux PulseAudio's volume output is the percentage cubed. Nonetheless I would prefer that the volume output was exponential (2^(slider position / constant)). This way, pressing the "volume up" key 3 times always increases the volume by a constant factor, regardless if you're on loud or quiet speaker/hea…

You've given me an idea for a volume control - enter a function like x^2 or x^3, which is graphed (on a linear scale). Then pick an x. The y value will be your volume. (The component should reverse any platform specific non-linearity first.)
Post reply on HN