Design evolution of the Windows control panel • Hacker News Board

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#51

Post by vardump » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 9:36 AM UTC

bob1029 wrote: post #49

clavicat wrote: post #45

The control panel was solved, so to speak, once they added a search interface. It doesn’t matter how complicated the hierarchy of modules is if what you want is only a search away. Only Microsoft could unsolve a solved problem by segregating the settings into two paradigms, neither of which is a superset of the other. Even the duplicated functionalities are not equivalent—the list of programs you can uninstall with t…

This is what happens when you have too many chefs in the same design kitchen. Microsoft really could use some product/UX zealot in the driver seat for a while. They should also work on reducing the latency of their products in general... Everything feels like laggy trash now. Someone should do a study on stress levels between windows XP and windows 11 user groups for basic daily office tasks and then throw it into th…

"Microsoft really could use some product/UX zealot in the driver seat for a while."

I hate to say this, but I think it would just result yet another UX camp in the system. The weight of legacy is heavy.

To clean up the UI mess, Microsoft would need to heavily deprecate supported APIs and conventions, and I don't think that's going to happen.

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#52

Post by Aeolun » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 9:37 AM UTC

claviska wrote: post #4

My first PC had Windows 3.1 and I very vividly remember the buttons, the menus, and many of the icons. In a way, they still inspire me to this day. In fact, I themed a Shoelace button based on 3.1 a few months ago. https://codepen.io/claviska/details/zYwgyEO

A shoelace button?

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#53

Post by causi » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 9:38 AM UTC

atoav wrote: post #39

beardedscotsman wrote: post #36

I was involved in part with the Windows 8 control panel refresh. What a nightmare it was working with that team. There was just no care for actually improving user experience, everything was shoehorned into the modern ui mainly as a push for ARM windows devices which were so slow they just never took off. MS wanted to force an enclosed ecosystem like apple iOS, but just didn’t have the hardware to make it happen. I r…

> only 0.005% of users ever used Bluetooth speakers successfully? How many tried? This can btw. be an issue with telemetry: if people don't manage to do something, maybe you will never know.

I tried using bluetooth speakers with Windows. It was fucking atrocious because Windows makes zero effort to compensate for bluetooth lag. Watch a video file or a Youtube video on Android and it inserts a split second of delay into the stream so the video and audio sync up. Windows does nothing of the sort, and it feels like you're watching a dubbed foreign language film.

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#54

Post by sorenjan » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 9:38 AM UTC

beardedscotsman wrote: post #36

I was involved in part with the Windows 8 control panel refresh. What a nightmare it was working with that team. There was just no care for actually improving user experience, everything was shoehorned into the modern ui mainly as a push for ARM windows devices which were so slow they just never took off. MS wanted to force an enclosed ecosystem like apple iOS, but just didn’t have the hardware to make it happen. I r…

I can understand Bluetooth speakers being rare, but at least now Bluetooth headphones must be increasing rapidly in popularity. I don't remember how common they were at that time, but it should have been clear that they would increase in use in the near future.

If you want to connect to a pair of previously paired Bluetooth headphones in Windows 10 you can press Win+K to open the connect quick action.

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#55

Post by pulse7 » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 9:55 AM UTC

vardump wrote: post #51

bob1029 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what happens when you have too many chefs in the same design kitchen. Microsoft really could use some product/UX zealot in the driver seat for a while. They should also work on reducing the latency of their products in general... Everything feels like laggy trash now. Someone should do a study on stress levels between windows XP and windows 11 user groups for basic daily office tasks and then throw it into th…

"Microsoft really could use some product/UX zealot in the driver seat for a while." I hate to say this, but I think it would just result yet another UX camp in the system. The weight of legacy is heavy. To clean up the UI mess, Microsoft would need to heavily deprecate supported APIs and conventions, and I don't think that's going to happen.

Backwards compatibility is pure gold and is worth more than any new trend...

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#56

Post by gjvc » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 10:19 AM UTC

einpoklum wrote: post #37

userbinator wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think all the icons looked great, with minor changes, until Win10's new "Settings" --- in which it looks like they just decided to throw away decades of careful design and replace them with dumbed-down flat and bland ones. All the more infuriating that new Settings is noticeably less responsive and at the same time less functional.

Such visual style change has happened in quite a few applications, perhaps inspired by the same kind of 'wisdom'. Thunderbird is a prominent example.

Seems like the beginnings of the "flat" trend was of Jonathan Ive's making -- once Steve Jobs and Scott Forstall had gone, there was nobody who would prevent it.

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#57

Post by dusted » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 10:23 AM UTC

Windows 2000 control panel was perfect. I'd take pretty much any of the interfaces over the abominiation that is windows 10 control panel.

It's form over function so hard it hurts, in a place where function is all I want. I'm not on a "journey" or having an "experience" or whatever they're aiming for. I just want to change a setting, so show me ALL the settings programs, RIGHT NOW. It's laughable how much you need to click on random stuff to see where stuff may be hiding.. Search is great, if you can remember what it's called, but often, I can't and I need to look through the options to be reminded.

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#58

Post by najqh » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 10:31 AM UTC

causi wrote: post #53

atoav wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> only 0.005% of users ever used Bluetooth speakers successfully? How many tried? This can btw. be an issue with telemetry: if people don't manage to do something, maybe you will never know.

I tried using bluetooth speakers with Windows. It was fucking atrocious because Windows makes zero effort to compensate for bluetooth lag. Watch a video file or a Youtube video on Android and it inserts a split second of delay into the stream so the video and audio sync up. Windows does nothing of the sort, and it feels like you're watching a dubbed foreign language film.

This does not match my experience using Airpods Pro on Windows.

On the other hand it is seemingly impossible to use the microphone of these Airpods and listen to music at the same time. The quality is atrocious. Something that I assume is possible on a Mac. (Anybody knows of a solution? I read it's because of bluetooth profiles or whatever...)

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#59

Post by usrusr » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 10:36 AM UTC

vardump wrote: post #51

bob1029 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what happens when you have too many chefs in the same design kitchen. Microsoft really could use some product/UX zealot in the driver seat for a while. They should also work on reducing the latency of their products in general... Everything feels like laggy trash now. Someone should do a study on stress levels between windows XP and windows 11 user groups for basic daily office tasks and then throw it into th…

"Microsoft really could use some product/UX zealot in the driver seat for a while." I hate to say this, but I think it would just result yet another UX camp in the system. The weight of legacy is heavy. To clean up the UI mess, Microsoft would need to heavily deprecate supported APIs and conventions, and I don't think that's going to happen.

Yet another camp is the most likely outcome, but it could be avoided by declaring a winner.

But that's certainly the approach they always try, yet it never works. Because that declared winner always turns out to be yet another superficial subset full of broken promises. And this declared but failing winner is always the latest incarnation.

What they have never tried: going back to the oldest and extending that with new additions. There are always far fewer new additions than the backlog of existing settings that would have to be ported to the latest variation, doing the reverse, properly, wouldn't be that hard.

Re: Design evolution of the Windows control panel

#60

Post by qalmakka » Fri, Dec 17, 2021, 10:40 AM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #38

The old one that people praise isn't that good. It does all the things it needs to, but it uses eight layers of popup dialogs, it works poorly at DPI's over 150% and so on and so forth. Basically, a 2005 Windows UI is mostly a bad windows UI. The proper solution would have been to refresh the old one. Make a full-featured control panel that uses just slightly more modern UI paradigms and technologies. And with zero w…

Yeah Windows UI really took a turn for the worse with Windows XP. People now praise it mostly due to a nostalgia factor, but when it came out its UI was derided due to resembling something out of a Fisher Price toy. Still given that it finally brought NT to a mass of people accustomed to an interior OS, it was a massive improvement.