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

Apple introduces a universal design across platforms

apple.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

261–270 of 1001 posts

Re: Apple introduces a universal design across platforms

#261

Post by armchairhacker »

coastalpuma wrote: post #179
dimal wrote: post #148

Oh no. It looks like every button and menu is now a translucent layer, so that any noise from the background shows through and muddles the text. This seems like an accessibility nightmare. Translucent layers generally make software unusable for me. In the video, I saw several instances that would be really really bad for me, where I’d be straining to understand the text. Looks really cool and futuristic though. Just…

I agree, I think it extends to anybody who wants a calmer experience or has vision trouble or strain. I guess you can turn those options off but if the aesthetic appeal of the design is based on them then I assume we'll be getting a second-class version of it. I was already leaning towards switching to Linux for other reasons but I think this is the thing that finally pushes me there. I think optimizing for VisionOS…

"Turning off" could just put solid light/dark under the glass. That would be decent-looking (not much different than before), accessible, and easy to implement.

Re: Apple introduces a universal design across platforms

#265

Post by austinl »

dimal wrote: post #148

Oh no. It looks like every button and menu is now a translucent layer, so that any noise from the background shows through and muddles the text. This seems like an accessibility nightmare. Translucent layers generally make software unusable for me. In the video, I saw several instances that would be really really bad for me, where I’d be straining to understand the text. Looks really cool and futuristic though. Just…

This is also likely a performance nightmare. Funny that they mention that "new hardware has enabled us to..." which means that this will perform poorly on old devices.

At a previous company, we were forbidden from using translucency (with a few exceptions) because of the performance cost of blending. There are debugging tools we'd use fairly often to confirm that all layers were opaque.

Re: Apple introduces a universal design across platforms

#266

Post by thenaturalist »

dimal wrote: post #148

Oh no. It looks like every button and menu is now a translucent layer, so that any noise from the background shows through and muddles the text. This seems like an accessibility nightmare. Translucent layers generally make software unusable for me. In the video, I saw several instances that would be really really bad for me, where I’d be straining to understand the text. Looks really cool and futuristic though. Just…

Not autistic, but this is just so weird.

Why would you design readability and visibility to depend on chaotic, highly varied and probably sometimes bad underlying backgrounds?

I fail to see any systematic approach/ consistent design language at play here.

Let's hope this does not survive for long.

Re: Apple introduces a universal design across platforms

#267

Post by willio58 »

I agree with those saying this feels like a step back toward skeuomorphic design for Apple. I personally think it looks nice visually, but I do have some concerns: - Accessibility. I don't see good examples in their promotional videos about how contrast of text is ensured to be in an acceptable range. Even for those without visual impairments, this is important for UX. - Performance. I'm usually the guy in the room saying "Apple is not making devices slower over time on purpose", but this sort of graphical intensity is basically needless and I hope they have something in the plans around automatically disabling more complex visual animations if the phone is showing signs of slow-down.

Re: Apple introduces a universal design across platforms

#268

Post by nlarew »

andrepd wrote: post #252
dimal wrote: post #148

Oh no. It looks like every button and menu is now a translucent layer, so that any noise from the background shows through and muddles the text. This seems like an accessibility nightmare. Translucent layers generally make software unusable for me. In the video, I saw several instances that would be really really bad for me, where I’d be straining to understand the text. Looks really cool and futuristic though. Just…

It is, once again, designing interfaces based on "vibes" instead of science or principles or used feedback, optimising for looking good on screenshots and marketing materials and not for actual usability or user friendly was. With "vibes" here standing for whatever some SV asshole thinks it's cool and modern. Alegria, flat design, pastel colors, or unholy amounts of whitespace. It's been the story of the last 15 year…

Do you really think that Apple, of all companies, did a cross-platform UI refresh based entirely on vibes without considering user taste, usability, accessibility, etc?

You've already judged the system as only good for "looking good on screenshots and marketing materials" when you haven't even seen anything other than the announcement.

Re: Apple introduces a universal design across platforms

#269

Post by rebasedoctopus »

leakycap wrote: post #198
kylehotchkiss wrote: post #93

I really dig apple's work. It's so refreshing to get a tech event in 2025 where design is a huge focus and not just duck taping another LLM to everything. Design is expensive and it's clear they've invested a massive amount of resources into liquid glass. It's not perfect, but I think they'll iron out some of the contrast bugs. Agreed with other commenters that crappy electron apps will look increasingly out of place…

Apple didn't talk about AI or Siri because they're currently flailing and so behind it's concerning. This was design-focused because skin-deep was all they accomplished.

only concerning if you have major investments in apple, and rely on ai hype to drive the stock up. I don't know if it's because I watch so much sports but to see someone fall behind doesn't really make me believe they lack the ability to catch up

Re: Apple introduces a universal design across platforms

#270

Post by brailsafe »

I don't use iOS in any capacity, but I'm sure anything they do will only improve what has always felt like a clumsy OS.

On the Macos side, I'm open to the new aesthetic, but I just hope to god they've been actually investing in performance improvements when it comes to SwiftUI, which has only barely been viable in some cases thus far. If MacOS gets a full UI update, but the Settings screen still lags when navigating between sections, someone's doing something wrong.

Post reply on HN