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Scott Forstall leaves Apple

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Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#171

Post by eridius »

MetricMike wrote: post #165
eridius wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You give "page flipping in an e-book" as an example of dangerous skeuomorphism, but then cite Address Book as why it's bad. I'm a bit confused. I get why you don't like Address Book, but do you really think page flipping in an e-reader is bad too? If so, why do you think that?

The dichotomy is what's dangerous. Address Book looks like an book, so I'll try to interact with it like that. When that doesn't work, I get confused, angry, and it's generally a "failure" from a UX point of view. Neither form of skeuomorphism is inherently bad, but it's easier to shoot yourself in the foot and ruin the UX when you move from decorative to functional.

Yes, I get the complaints about Address Book. But "page flipping in an e-book" is either really poorly written, or was not referring to Address Book to begin with, since Address Book is not an e-book. Hence my question.

Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#172

Post by ok_craig »

mukaiji wrote: post #33

Just to be clear, he's not "leaving." He got fired. He got fired because after the map fiasco became apparent, he refused to send out an apology or sign his name to the one Tim Cook sent. (internal knowledge)

This makes me wonder - who at Apple decided it was necessary to make their own maps app?

It's easy to blame Forstall for a crappy product. But if someone else was responsible for mandating the change, assigning him the project, and pushing an impossible deadline, maybe it's more their fault.

Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#173

Post by TillE »

mlchild wrote: post #52

People's reactions to this announcement are overly focused on Forstall's assumed support for heavy skeumorphism (and their excitement at his departure as lead proponent). I think his record as head of iOS since its inception is a much more salient issue. Forstall led development of the fastest-growing, most popular computing platform of the past decade or so with, to be sure, a few notable screw-ups, but mostly incre…

When iOS was new, it was incredible. But it's mostly failed to evolve since then. There have been a few minor improvements over the years, but Springboard in particular feels really old, especially for the iPad. And many of the first-party apps are poor.

Apple has succeeded in the mobile market largely because of their excellent hardware and their app ecosystem. But iOS itself is a little disappointing. It's due for a major evolution, not just more incremental tweaking.

Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#174

Post by watmough »

Geee wrote: post #150
apike wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's unusual for Apple to hype something like this, but in that note they mention Mansfield's semiconductor team "have ambitious plans for the future". I doubt that simply refers to making the A7 faster and more power-efficient.

ARM on desktop, perhaps? No one has ever designed a desktop-class chip with ARM architecture, so that's one 'ambitious' direction one could take.

Hahahaha.

So you've never heard about what the ARM was originally designed for?

http://acorn.chriswhy.co.uk/Computers/A500.html

I guess that was a while ago! And it certainly was desktop-class. It beat the pants off a 12 MHz 286.

Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#175

Post by chj »

apike wrote: post #18

> Scott Forstall will be leaving Apple next year > Jony Ive will provide leadership and direction for Human Interface (HI) across the company And thus ended the reign of skeuomorphism at Apple. Or, at least, the reign of hyper-realism and hyper-whimsy in UI design. Jobs or Forstall always seemed to favour it, but could you imagine Jony Ive signing off on a Podcasts app where half the screen is a reel-to-reel tape tha…

That Podcasts app is really really a piece of "work". whoever designed it should be fired.

Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#176

Post by chj »

WiseWeasel wrote: post #104
brudgers wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they aren't staying skeuomorphic, then Metro might give you a preview.

Metro is defined by flat background colors, square corners and no shading. You can have a non-skeumorphic interface without any of those features, and given Apple's history of interface design, it would surprise me if they adopted any of them. Apple loves rounded rectangles, gradient backgrounds and shading to indicate depth, though shine and real-like textures may be on the way out.

Yes, rounded corner is in Apple's DNA.

Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#177

Post by Apocryphon »

ok_craig wrote: post #172
mukaiji wrote: post #33

Just to be clear, he's not "leaving." He got fired. He got fired because after the map fiasco became apparent, he refused to send out an apology or sign his name to the one Tim Cook sent. (internal knowledge)

This makes me wonder - who at Apple decided it was necessary to make their own maps app? It's easy to blame Forstall for a crappy product. But if someone else was responsible for mandating the change, assigning him the project, and pushing an impossible deadline, maybe it's more their fault.

It was a decision that was forced by a number of factors. Google wouldn't agree to providing directions for turn-by-turn navigation, so Apple had to seek other solutions.

Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#178

Post by sigzero »

ececconi wrote: post #90
brudgers wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they aren't staying skeuomorphic, then Metro might give you a preview.

Do you really think that they would radically redesign the next version of iOS?

No. I see each new version tweaking it to be better and better. iOS has stagnated a bit and I suspect Ives is going to change that.

Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#179

Post by sigzero »

ricardobeat wrote: post #58
xer0x wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It will be interesting to see how Apple approaches a minimalistic Jony style. Will it they make similar choices to Microsoft's Metro interface?

Probably not, considering their long history in "candy" UI. OSX's chrome style already strikes a good balance, I think they will keep it that way and just phase out the hyper-realistic apps.

That and I see Ives pushing for consistency.

Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple

#180

Post by sigzero »

pdenya wrote: post #73
mukaiji wrote: post #30

So... can we now all agree that Tim Cook is a good CEO?

I don't know if anyone ever doubted Tim Cook as a good/credible CEO. The only issue is whether or not he can be jobs-level which is unlikely but remains to be seen.

I think jobs-level is unattainable really. I am just hoping Cook is a consistently great CEO.
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