Tangential, but not really: https://medium.com/@timrpeterson/cynicism-21258dc48246
Material UI
141–150 of 166 posts
Re: Material UI
#142I had a talk with myself at the weekend about making a concerted effort to cut out the snark when I comment on the web.... And I'm about to fall at the first hurdle. Being "on trend" isn't good UI design. But I can see how we got here. Through OS X and iOS, Apple's UI ethos became the gold standard in UI design. It was so well designed that it was easy to imitate and by simply adopting the core elements of Apples UI…
I fully agree. I also don't find the new "flat" designs an improvement at all, and that applies both to Google's new designs and to Apple's work.
What's wrong with them, you ask? Well, in brief:
* very little indication as to what I can interact with, * you have to know the interface before you can use it, discoverability is abysmal, * touch-interface-specific: lots of actions require swipes, which you have to learn in advance and remember, * actual tappable areas became smaller (an example: "They are hard to use for me, and even harder for my Mom.
I think this case is similar to what often happens in architecture: form over function. You get beautiful buildings that are dysfunctional. Architects hold conferences and assign awards for the beauty (light, form, straight lines, whatever), while people crowd in passageways and make their way to work next to the garbage dump, because that way is more convenient than the main entrance.
I really hope the pendulum will soon swing in the other direction and we will go back to more "meaty", discoverable interfaces with more visual hints as to how to use them.
Re: Material UI
#143I worked through the demo and actually kind-of liked it, until I got to the checkbox page.
How is that checkbox design better than the commonly used empty square for unchecked, and square containing an X or a V for checked? I can't even tell if the boxes are checked or not!
I would seriously advise taking a look at the usability of these checkboxes.
Re: Material UI
#144Re: Material UI
#145Earlier quoted context omitted.
The "Folder" metaphor is something I've been considering a lot lately. It seems so ingrained in modern computing. Apple has started to move away from it tags and "All my Files." I struggle to think of a better way to solve organizing and collecting items than into nested groups.
We launch next month. Just wait :)
Why the down votes?
Re: Material UI
#146Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wish I could up-vote this a thousand times. I often tap things that are just rectangles and fail to realize that other rectangles are buttons. I can't wait for "everything is flat, two-tone, and rectangular" to be replaced by whatever the next trend is. Hopefully something more useful. Ironic note: the flat trend was really made mainstream by Microsoft when it released Windows Phone 7.
With flat design, sometimes it's really hard to know what you are suppose to click on. I enjoy its simplicity, but it does have some usability problems that come with it. I think we went way overboard with it and the pendulum swung to far to the side of flat design. Hopefully we start moving away from super trendy flat design, much like we moved away from those crazy web 2.0 design styles.
flat design is trending because we have so many "designers" who can't design.
Re: Material UI
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
We launch next month. Just wait :)
Why the down votes?
Your comment had zero content and no value for anyone other than you.
I'm happy you're excited about your launch, but, unless you're linking a technical, or at least informative, blog post or similar that describes ways you're solving the problem the person you replied talked about, Hacker News isn't the right place to brag.
Re: Material UI
#148I had a talk with myself at the weekend about making a concerted effort to cut out the snark when I comment on the web.... And I'm about to fall at the first hurdle. Being "on trend" isn't good UI design. But I can see how we got here. Through OS X and iOS, Apple's UI ethos became the gold standard in UI design. It was so well designed that it was easy to imitate and by simply adopting the core elements of Apples UI…
> You can see that I don't like Material. I also don't like iOs's new UI language.
Could you elaborate? I think Apple's flatter UX approach is very well done.
Re: Material UI
#149Those radio buttons and checkboxes are painful to use.
Re: Material UI
#150Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have you read Pogue's review of the new Android? Here's an excerpt from the review: "Unfortunately, there’s so little ornamentation that there are no cues left to tell you when something is tappable. What’s a button, what’s a label, what’s a heading? You won’t know till you try tapping." Full review: https://www.yahoo.com/tech/android-5-0-lollipop-lighter-simp...
The example he uses is a bit contrived, since everything but the toolbar title is tappable. Does it need raised and colored affordances to signify such? Would this be more or less confusing than what was shipped? And this gem: "In Android of old, you could swipe down from the top of the screen to open a panel of quick settings buttons (brightness, Airplane mode, and so on)." Which tells me the reviewer either has a p…
That quick panel is indeed in stock android. On tablets, swiping down on the right side of the notification bar opens the quick settings. On phones, swiping left from the notification pulldown switches to the quick settings.
Additionally, IIRC swiping down on the right side for the quick settings is default in a number of ROMs.