Ask HN: What is the most incredible UI you have experienced and why? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: What is the most incredible UI you have experienced and why?

#11

Post by gnusouth » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 12:19 AM UTC

I really like XFCE's Thunar. In particular, the bulk rename feature is easier to use than any command-line tool and is really powerful. I use it for all my file renaming.

In the 10ish years that I've been using software I don't feel it has really improved much. I think my ideal UI is a traditional window with a few menu items and a really deep preferences window, like some of the software I used to use on OS X Leopard. Lots of recent software seems to sacrifice customisability in the name of simplicity (Windows 8+, GNOME 3, Ubuntu Unity). I don't think this needs to be the case, complexity tucked away inside menus won't ever bother users who want pure simplicity. I think lots of developers drawn to the "command-line-only" mindset would actually be happier with GUIs of this kind, but I'm speaking only from my experience (I use the command-line extensively, and Linux, not OS X).

Re: Ask HN: What is the most incredible UI you have experienced and why?

#12

Post by kphild » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 2:47 AM UTC

Airbnb. It still amazes me how playing huge video clips in the background adds to the experience without being distracting.

Re: Ask HN: What is the most incredible UI you have experienced and why?

#13

Post by LarryMade2 » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 3:15 AM UTC

Second Life's 3-D navigation, menus and editing, from the camera control for the AV to constructing #D virtual objects with primitives.

I think that’s why SL is still so popular because it got the interface right, non-technically inclined people can learn to build rudimentary objects in a couple hours and its enough to hook many of them into becoming content builders.

Another would be FoxBase+/Mac for under a meg of object code the UI for data management and screen/form building was great. I got ugly when MS came in and standardized it into FoxPro for Windows compatibility.

The oldest best UI was the Print Shop on 8-bits changed the face of cork bulletin boards since.

Re: Ask HN: What is the most incredible UI you have experienced and why?

#14

Post by rprospero » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 7:20 AM UTC

garethsprice wrote: post #6

Truly great UIs aren't memorable - they just work and you don't even think about them. Elevators, gas ovens, hourglasses. If you can make a useful application with a UI as simple, intuitive and forgettable as any of those, you've succeeded.

Not a UX person, so I'm a little surprised that you list the hourglass. I always thought that they had a terrible UI, mostly on account of not having a proper reset mechanism.

Re: Ask HN: What is the most incredible UI you have experienced and why?

#15

Post by n_coats » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 11:32 AM UTC

kphild wrote: post #12

Airbnb. It still amazes me how playing huge video clips in the background adds to the experience without being distracting.

yes! That's a great example!

Re: Ask HN: What is the most incredible UI you have experienced and why?

#16

Post by brudgers » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 12:03 PM UTC

AutoCAD. Keyboard. pointer. non-branching scripts. branching scripts, dumb simple UI configuration, simple UI configuration, and full blown API's for creating full blown application layers.

It's UI's are sufficient for the spectrum of users, not tailored as demoware or onboarding new users You can even awk and sed the drawing data.

Re: Ask HN: What is the most incredible UI you have experienced and why?

#17

Post by rfergie » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 1:31 PM UTC

rprospero wrote: post #14

garethsprice wrote: post #6

Truly great UIs aren't memorable - they just work and you don't even think about them. Elevators, gas ovens, hourglasses. If you can make a useful application with a UI as simple, intuitive and forgettable as any of those, you've succeeded.

Not a UX person, so I'm a little surprised that you list the hourglass. I always thought that they had a terrible UI, mostly on account of not having a proper reset mechanism.

Can't tell if you are joking or not.

The reset mechanism for an hourglass is intuitive and gives very clear feedback on whether or not the operation suceeded

Re: Ask HN: What is the most incredible UI you have experienced and why?

#18

Post by AnimalMuppet » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 4:29 PM UTC

I think it was FrameMaker, on an SGI Indigo. It was the most amazing example of "progressive disclosure" that I've ever seen. It was amazing how easy it was to find what you wanted, and yet how uncluttered it was.