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Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

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Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#11

Post by rosybox »

threeseed wrote: post #6
bitwize wrote: post #3

Apple has fallen into the same trap that Microsoft has -- changing their UI not to advance the state of the art, but just for the sake of changing it so they have something new to sell.

This comment makes no sense. Apple hasn't fundamentally changed the UI on iOS or OSX since the initial releases apart from say the iOS look & feel refresh and gestures to support iPhone X. And in the last few releases there have been almost no UI changes. It's actually one of the disappointments of the Apple platforms.

Not fundamentally changing the design is a plus for usability and accessibility.

It would be a disappointment if I had to relearn a UI I've been using over a decade just because I upgraded my software. I don't have time for that. Go get your crazy wizbang UI interfaces on Linux. There are plenty there.

Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#12

Post by t34543 »

josteink wrote: post #9
threeseed wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment makes no sense. Apple hasn't fundamentally changed the UI on iOS or OSX since the initial releases apart from say the iOS look & feel refresh and gestures to support iPhone X. And in the last few releases there have been almost no UI changes. It's actually one of the disappointments of the Apple platforms.

> Apple hasn't fundamentally changed the UI on iOS or OSX since the initial releases apart from say the iOS look & feel refresh and gestures to support iPhone X. So for the iPhone alone Apple has changed the 1. look and feel to be more “modern” (which means showing less accordances), 2. fashionably removed the very affordable home-button for no functional reason and 3. replaced it with non-discoverable, complex gestu…

I’m increasingly frustrated with iOS 13 text selection, copy, and paste semantics.

I had the first iPhone and I remember it was really good at selecting text. A far cry from the painful experience today.

Rearranging icons is also pretty awful, it takes me multiple tries to move something into a folder and then rearrange said folder.

Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#13

Post by egwor »

josteink wrote: post #9
threeseed wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment makes no sense. Apple hasn't fundamentally changed the UI on iOS or OSX since the initial releases apart from say the iOS look & feel refresh and gestures to support iPhone X. And in the last few releases there have been almost no UI changes. It's actually one of the disappointments of the Apple platforms.

> Apple hasn't fundamentally changed the UI on iOS or OSX since the initial releases apart from say the iOS look & feel refresh and gestures to support iPhone X. So for the iPhone alone Apple has changed the 1. look and feel to be more “modern” (which means showing less accordances), 2. fashionably removed the very affordable home-button for no functional reason and 3. replaced it with non-discoverable, complex gestu…

Supporting this argument: I remember googling how to switch apps since the new iPhone X's feature didn't explain it. I've had to verbally explain it a few times to others who use my phone.

Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#14

Post by Lammy »

charlesism wrote: post #10
krackers wrote: post #7

I feel that for OSX, everything past Mavericks has been a downgrade. What's the point in having a beautiful hiDPI display if you're going to flatten all UI elements into a solid color?

Everything past Snow Leopard . Lion was a disaster, and there is literally no feature I use that I prefer in any Mac OS created since then. What's more, the OS has become uglier and buggier. Edit: actually, I like the addition of Finder > Cut, and Finder > Rename. So, hey, there is something!

For me, Panther (10.3) was the last release where every new feature or addition was something I wanted. Spotlight and Dashboard in Tiger (10.4) were dog slow on my G3 back in the day and got disabled immediately.

Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#15

Post by spectramax »

One of the biggest gripes I have with modern UI (both Apple and Android) is animation times. Try exporting an image from Dropbox app to Photos app on the iPhone. There are so many animations that take up precious time. Do it 10 times and you're tired.

I feel like designers today want "sleekness" more because it sells when people look at it. Ohh...look at that shiny animation, so impressive.

I want instant actions at the expense of not knowing where something poped-up from. This is usually the case made by designers that animations help you understand the "Context" of where something came from. I feel like this needs to be toned down a bit. UI would feel 1000% faster.

Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#16

Post by tinus_hn »

josteink wrote: post #9
threeseed wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment makes no sense. Apple hasn't fundamentally changed the UI on iOS or OSX since the initial releases apart from say the iOS look & feel refresh and gestures to support iPhone X. And in the last few releases there have been almost no UI changes. It's actually one of the disappointments of the Apple platforms.

> Apple hasn't fundamentally changed the UI on iOS or OSX since the initial releases apart from say the iOS look & feel refresh and gestures to support iPhone X. So for the iPhone alone Apple has changed the 1. look and feel to be more “modern” (which means showing less accordances), 2. fashionably removed the very affordable home-button for no functional reason and 3. replaced it with non-discoverable, complex gestu…

> fashionably removed the very affordable home-button for no functional reason

Except making room for the one thing iPhone has always been about: the touch screen.

Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#17

Post by egwor »

bitwize wrote: post #3

Apple has fallen into the same trap that Microsoft has -- changing their UI not to advance the state of the art, but just for the sake of changing it so they have something new to sell.

The Apple TV app is a great example of half thought out design.

* You start downloading a movie. It doesn't show it downloading anywhere that I could see it. The only place I could find it was by going back * I had to login about 5 times * The Apple TV app is so new that you can't give Apple Feedback because the app isn't listed. * Supposedly I get a free year of apple tv with my new mac. I have no idea where to find that option to sign up. * When in you own library you can't seem to search your own library.

It just isn't thought through. And don't even get me started on the migration assistant. Buggy, and a poorly tested pile of crap.

Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#18

Post by jbverschoor »

threeseed wrote: post #6
bitwize wrote: post #3

Apple has fallen into the same trap that Microsoft has -- changing their UI not to advance the state of the art, but just for the sake of changing it so they have something new to sell.

This comment makes no sense. Apple hasn't fundamentally changed the UI on iOS or OSX since the initial releases apart from say the iOS look & feel refresh and gestures to support iPhone X. And in the last few releases there have been almost no UI changes. It's actually one of the disappointments of the Apple platforms.

The iPhone has become a 2-handed device instead of a 1-handed device.

Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#19

Post by afandian »

I remember as a child showing my mother how to do stuff on our family Mac with OS 7.5 and being baffled that she didn't 'get' the UI.

A decade ago I wrote some Cocoa stuff and read the HIG religiously.

Now I'm in my 30s. I can't work out how to do stuff on my iPhone (Android makes perfect sense). mac OS, of which I have used every major version of since 6, is starting to break with the mental model I understand and is becoming slowly less usable to me.

Suddenly I feel old.

Re: Apple's products are getting harder to use, ignore principles of design (2015)

#20

Post by cycloptic »

threeseed wrote: post #6
bitwize wrote: post #3

Apple has fallen into the same trap that Microsoft has -- changing their UI not to advance the state of the art, but just for the sake of changing it so they have something new to sell.

This comment makes no sense. Apple hasn't fundamentally changed the UI on iOS or OSX since the initial releases apart from say the iOS look & feel refresh and gestures to support iPhone X. And in the last few releases there have been almost no UI changes. It's actually one of the disappointments of the Apple platforms.

The over-reliance on gestures and other hidden things like 3D Touch is the exact problem. It's a complete about-face from their classic 90s design policies, which were about ensuring applications were fully discoverable and did not hide any state from the user.
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