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What was nice about the UI of Windows 2000

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Re: What was nice about the UI of Windows 2000

#21

Post by xg15 »

> Me: "I don't like smartphone UIs. Everything is flat, nothing indicates where you can touch or not. I have to randomly try everything on the screen."

Response by non-tech person: "Well, yeah, of course you have to try everything? How else would this work?"

I think this goes deeper than many tech people realize.

From what I understood from talking with "nontechnical"(*) friends, relatives, etc, for a good potion of them, computers had always been "unpredictable magic". They got by through memorizing some very strict and rigid interaction sequences - "click this icon, then click that menu, then click that button, etc" and prayed nothing unexpected would happen. They were too scared and/or uninterested in computers to even try and find any rules or consistency in it.

I feel as if those nontechnical people "won" now. Now all UIs feel as inconsistent and unpredictable even for "techies" as any computer interaction felt to those people back then.

(* repeated from another thread: "nontechnical" in the "not fluent with PC use" sense, which is actually quite arrogant - they can have very high technical skill in other areas obviously)

Re: What was nice about the UI of Windows 2000

#23

Post by madaxe_again »

bluedino wrote: post #4

Was this peak Windows UI? I would say so, but the Active Dekstop stuff wasn't the right move. Fisher-price came next, with Windows XP. At least you could easily switch back to classic. And then Windows 8, we won't even talk about that.

Almost. The NT5 RCs, which became windows 2000, were better IMO - not massive differences but it hadn’t been slobbered upon by marketing yet.

Re: What was nice about the UI of Windows 2000

#24

Post by minkeymaniac »

usrnm wrote: post #16
alberth wrote: post #6

It was clear, clean and understandable. Buttons looked like buttons. Windows (which have frames), looked like windows. And there was no distracting design elements.

I remember those times and there were a lot if windows that did not look like windows and buttons that did not look like buttons. Not in the apps provided by the OS itself, but in third-party software. It was the time of wild experiments, especially in software created by enthusiasts. We just tend to forget this stuff

And crazy themes I had the matrix one with the "dodge this" sound instead of a ping... good times

Re: What was nice about the UI of Windows 2000

#25

Post by reaperducer »

bromuro wrote: post #7
marginalia_nu wrote: post #3

Design language, like any language is metaphorical. The thing that makes these skeumorphic designs work so well is that it kinda forces a consistent metaphor, and consistency above all else is huge for UX. The fact that it's based on things we've seen in real life is also helps, as it means we can reason about the UI with the same faculties we've spent our entire life training.

Like the floppy disk for “save”? Or the old school phone receiver for “call”?

There's nothing wrong with either of those.

No different than "windows" or "desktops" or "files." When was the last time you actually saw a file folder? Or a document separated by sheets with "tabs."

95% of computer users have never seen an ethernet cable, but they're still the symbol for networking.

99% of car drivers have never seen brake calipers, but they're part of the icon when my car's parking brake is on.

Re: What was nice about the UI of Windows 2000

#26

Post by Zak »

I agree with the author's wish for visual cues when something is clickable, scrollable, etc.... This, on the other hand:

> Imitating real objects is good, too -- I don't have a single one of Android's "sliders" anywhere in my house, for example, so why don't you make this a checkbox, because writing down a check mark on paper is something that I actually do:

feels like an idea from a time when many people were encountering UIs on screens for the very first time as adults. I think the slider would be recognized as a toggle in its usual context of a settings screen by most people who have seen a settings screen before, but not that specific design for a toggle.

Re: What was nice about the UI of Windows 2000

#28

Post by Telaneo »

vslira wrote: post #20
petilon wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are designers not understanding this these days? I think one reason is that flat UI is super easy. Skeuomorphic is extremely hard to get right, and if you don't get it right it looks super tacky. Most people who have the word "designer" in their job title don't have the artistic skills needed to pull it off. This is why most designers are opposed to skeuomorphic. Somewhere in between is the right approach. The Ne…

What’s the meaning of skeuomorphic design for a generation that has never worked with the original physical artifacts they’re based on, though?

Consistency. Even if you've never held a telephone receiver, if it means 'call' in one place, it's very likely to mean the same thing in another.

We could be using random hieroglyphs to the same ends, but people seem to always make their own (barring a few exceptions, like the hamburger menu). It's probably a better idea to use something with some grounding in reality rather than make your own from nothing, since doing that is hard, even for actual designers.

Re: What was nice about the UI of Windows 2000

#29

Post by groan »

I liked every version of Windows that I’ve used, back to 3.1 all the way up to 11. Nowadays I mostly use 10/11 at home and at work. A new Windows upgrade was always a magical treat for me, the old slow HDD speeds building up anticipation during the installation phase, making me excited to finally use it. Growing up with computers unfortunately demystifies many things, but such is the price of poignance.

Re: What was nice about the UI of Windows 2000

#30

Post by EGreg »

xg15 wrote: post #21

> Me: "I don't like smartphone UIs. Everything is flat, nothing indicates where you can touch or not. I have to randomly try everything on the screen." Response by non-tech person: "Well, yeah, of course you have to try everything? How else would this work?" I think this goes deeper than many tech people realize. From what I understood from talking with "nontechnical"(*) friends, relatives, etc, for a good potion of…

It started with iOS 7 and Jony Ive

Steve Jobs was right. Then when he died (after removing Scott Forstall), Jony Ive got to do his hardware minimalism in software too. And everything Steve Jobs favored was suddenly derided as “skeumorphism”. It’s like what USSR did with Stalin under Khrustchev. I still remember when Chrome app just had a big white area where you’re supposed to enter the url and you had no idea unless you randomly happened to click there. And if the website background was white, too? Oh too bad LMAO. Minimalistic! Chrome had no… chrome.

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