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The History of User Interfaces

history.user-interface.io

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Re: The History of User Interfaces

#61

Post by Narishma »

Anthony-G wrote: post #55

Two things I noticed from looking at the screenshots: 1. The MS Windows 7 Task Manager look very similar to the KDE 1 version (from the late nineties): https://history.user-interface.io/img/kde-1/task-manager.jpe... 2. In 1990, Microsoft referred to plain text files on the local system as “on-line documents”: https://history.user-interface.io/img/windows-3.0/notepad.pn...

Regarding 2, back then online was often used to mean something in the computer, as opposed to outside of it. For example online help vs paper manuals.

Re: The History of User Interfaces

#62

Post by DebtDeflation »

kypro wrote: post #22

I really miss Windows 95/98 era UIs. They were so much more practical and less noisy than current generation UIs. Opening the start bar on my Windows 11 I literally have no idea what's going on. All the "apps" at the top of my start bar are things I've never used and I don't think I've ever even installed. Stuff like Tiktok and XBox. Then below that I get recommendations, but I don't want recommendations, I just want…

Same thing has happened with Ubuntu Desktop/GNOME. I used to know where things were. Now it wants you to just click Activities and type in your search (for an Application, Setting, etc).

Re: The History of User Interfaces

#63

Post by bhandziuk »

yreg wrote: post #17
memetomancer wrote: post #4

minor nit - this is a very poorly named site. A better name might be "the history of workstation and personal computer graphical user interfaces", a very far cry from blanket coverage of all "user interfaces". Even foregoing simple UI such as the handle of a hammer, or even the mechanical interfaces of yesteryear such as the differences between a Curta calculator and the original Burroughs adding machine, or a Jacqua…

www.the-history-of-workstation-and-personal-computer-graphical-user-interfaces.io ?

The URL isn't taken!

Re: The History of User Interfaces

#64

Post by BeFlatXIII »

scyzoryk_xyz wrote: post #31
kypro wrote: post #22

I really miss Windows 95/98 era UIs. They were so much more practical and less noisy than current generation UIs. Opening the start bar on my Windows 11 I literally have no idea what's going on. All the "apps" at the top of my start bar are things I've never used and I don't think I've ever even installed. Stuff like Tiktok and XBox. Then below that I get recommendations, but I don't want recommendations, I just want…

I feel like what you’re describing boils down to a change in priorities for designs and how the user behavior is measured. Today, it seems to be mostly about recording what users do and then endlessly modifying the UI to extract the desired behaviors. This results in these kinds of layouts where a clean choice takes a back seat and user manipulation takes the front. This is less so the case with actual tools and UI’s…

> Of course when you look at recordings of user behavior for interfaces you realize how dumb the majority of all users really is. And how without those tiles advertising “Xbox” and “TikTok” those users would probably fail to find those even if they were looking for them

It's a shame that there are so many stupid users that it's profitable to cater to them rather than leave them behind and cater to the experts.

Re: The History of User Interfaces

#66

Post by foobarbecue »

My user experience on this site: scroll to cool picture, click cool picture, click back button expecting to go back to text. Back button takes me back to hacker news, urgh. Click link to site again, scroll to where I was. Click next cool picture and forget that back is broken. Click back. Urgh! Actually I've tried to use the back button four times now and I guess it's best if I just don't finish reading the site.

The back of the internet is broken...

Very cool site though.

Re: The History of User Interfaces

#67

Post by game-of-throws »

mngnt wrote: post #47
sedan_baklazhan wrote: post #9

If only this quite interesting work could be read on a normal, no-JS webpage! Scrolling to see more content fading in is such a bad UI practice. Completely negating all the natural reading experience.

For bonus points, try to visit from a smartphone. a few scrolls into the page, I got a modal begging me to subscribe and it was not closable - positioned too high so I didn't get to the x to close it, I guess. Ironic - a website about user interfaces has a UI so bad that I could but glimpse the content.

For extra bonus points, read this blog post by the author of the site: https://user-interface.io/why-you-probably-shouldnt-put-form...

And all the screenshots are stolen, as mentioned in other comments. This guy is just a hustler.

Re: The History of User Interfaces

#68

Post by memetomancer »

Anthony-G wrote: post #55

Two things I noticed from looking at the screenshots: 1. The MS Windows 7 Task Manager look very similar to the KDE 1 version (from the late nineties): https://history.user-interface.io/img/kde-1/task-manager.jpe... 2. In 1990, Microsoft referred to plain text files on the local system as “on-line documents”: https://history.user-interface.io/img/windows-3.0/notepad.pn...

The KDE 1 task manager looks _very_ similar to the Windows NT 4 task manager (from the mid nineties): https://guidebookgallery.org/screenshots/winnt40 (scroll down to 'task manager' and click the faint tab control marked '3' in the upper left of the specific screen shot)

Until Win10, the NT OSes had that same basic task manager with the cool looking green graphs. WinNT 3.51 had a much more crude looking task manager

Re: The History of User Interfaces

#70

Post by doodpants »

preezer wrote: post #44

I'm just at 1/4 of the article. But I have to say that the design and the ux of the site is just perfect. Well done!

I strongly disagree. Content fades in moments after scrolling, and there's no content at all if JavaScript is disabled. The author clearly values style over usability.
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