181–190 of 443 posts
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> Why does a coffee maker even need a touchscreen? There are literally three options! What’s the option besides on and off, keep warm?
Coffee, Cappuccino, Latte, Frappe All of the above multiplied by small, medium, large. All of the above multiplied by weak, normal, strong, and double shot. All of the above multiplied by zone defense, man to coverage, and missile command.
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I don’t trust anyone except Apple to do touch screen experiences well.
Go buy a fancy Apple Watch and jump in a pool. You won't be able to start or stop the timer with wet fingers.
Incidentally, you can press both the crown and the side button at the same time to pause and resume a workout even when the display is water-locked.
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Go buy a fancy Apple Watch and jump in a pool. You won't be able to start or stop the timer with wet fingers.
Now imagine that another company designs that experience.
(Never got the point of a touchscreen on a smartwatch. The surface is too small to be useful.)
I've been thinking the same about power switches lately. If I turn a flashlight, or an old radio on or off, I flip a switch and get the result I want. With my 65 EUR gamepad, or 300 EUR headphones, I hold a button and wait several seconds for the result. Why has UX regressed so much in these areas?
My rented apartment has switches that presumably use radio to turn on and off the lights. There is no further integration, or smart app etc. I can't see which light switch is on or off, so even after years living here I mix up some of the switches. Sometimes the radio pulse doesn't register, so I have to go back to the switch and press it again. After pressing the switch, there's a perceivable, variable delay for the…
I've been thinking the same about power switches lately. If I turn a flashlight, or an old radio on or off, I flip a switch and get the result I want. With my 65 EUR gamepad, or 300 EUR headphones, I hold a button and wait several seconds for the result. Why has UX regressed so much in these areas?
And even if there is a physical switch, it is not clear what that switch is doing. My bluetooth headset has a hardware on/off switch. However, when the switch is turned off, it plays a sound to say the words "power off". If it were a physical switch across the battery, then I would expect the power to be immediately cut, and it shouldn't have the power to say that the power has been cut.
like a knob to adjust the shower temperature or a knob/button to adjust the car volume (in some cases these avoid accidents too).. I know where those keys are, eyes closed!!!
Physical buttons are becoming a luxury now a days :( , and don't shove in the "hey its software age / touch screen age/minimalistic age" here :|
Minimalism doesn't mean , remove ultra necessary stuff..
I can continue this rant for making physical buttons mandatory in many places, MAINLY because they do only one thing(mostly) but they do it pretty damn well AND its reliable as hell! like a knob to adjust the shower temperature or a knob/button to adjust the car volume (in some cases these avoid accidents too).. I know where those keys are, eyes closed!!! Physical buttons are becoming a luxury now a days :( , and don…
If that's what you need in your life, you already have brand-name options (like Behringer and Mackie). But most people, of course, don't.
(I would venture a guess and say neither you nor I are most people, which is why I have an NI Komplete Audio 6 sitting under my monitor right now for that purpose)
I let my spouse, who likes the novelty of a touchscreen, talk me into a Whirlpool oven a couple years ago that is controlled by touchscreen. I had no idea it was possible to hate an oven so much. The only saving grace is that the stovetop elements are still controlled by knobs.
I don't understand why people find novelty of touchscreens appealing. We've got to do a better job of educating consumers. The marketing behind touchscreens is so powerful that it is unanimously considered as a feature, something you must have. I get angry just thinking about the amount of marketing bullshit around touchscreens. Just go to Garmin Aviation website and now a lot of operation in airplane cockpits is off…
>This is a cost saving measure disguised as a feature.
Cost saving is not bad. Cost saving allows thousands of new aviators to enter into a field they otherwise would be price locked out of, and enables them to have a safe and enjoyable experience. Consider the AV-20 and AV-30 touch screen instruments:
https://youtu.be/hhRrNQsBl2w https://uavionix.com/product/av-30-exp/
For $1600 they provide in one instrument what you usually would need 10-13 instruments for. These instruments are not cheap; they all cost multi-hundred dollars to buy on top of drilling the holes in the cockpit and the associated maintenance to keep them all airworthy. If one component of your AV-20 fails? Who cares; throw it away and install a new one. It's dead simple.
As for UX, physical interfaces are not immune either. There have even been fatal crashes attributed to putting a lever in a stupid place, labeling a button incorrectly, not flipping a switch on time, etc. Just because you may see some horrible touchscreen interfaces out there does not mean that touchscreens are horrible.
The difference is that the touchscreen can receive software updates. At any point you can completely rearrange menus and control to address shortcomings in the interface. Doing this is practically free; the only downtime is waiting for the firmware update to complete. Addressing shortcomings in physical interfaces? You're looking at dozens to hundreds of man hours on top of buying the new equipment to replace the old.
It costs Tesla $0 per vehicle to add a new button to their cars. It costs millions for everyone else. This is not a useless capability; it makes a difference every single day.
My old IBM ThinkPads operate exactly as he described, the embedded controller immediately instructs the hardware amplifier to adjust its volume or power down. My slightly less old Lenovo X201t does everything in software, and while my computer is still groggy after waking from suspend it often takes 10-15 seconds for volume changes to take effect.
Edit: forgot to mention, it has a physical microphone button too. It's just amazing for Discord and Zoom calls.
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I don't understand why people find novelty of touchscreens appealing. We've got to do a better job of educating consumers. The marketing behind touchscreens is so powerful that it is unanimously considered as a feature, something you must have. I get angry just thinking about the amount of marketing bullshit around touchscreens. Just go to Garmin Aviation website and now a lot of operation in airplane cockpits is off…
Touch controls are only warranted when you need to support a large number of varied interactions which can't be supported by physical controls, or if you have to support arbitrary gesture-based input (like a drawing tablet for example). If that's not the case, physical controls are always better. If you're operating a vehicle, or can't look at the display for any reason, tactile controls are leagues better.
My car has tactile controls but they control a cursor on a non-touch screen. In this case touch screen controls would be superior because it would be faster and there would be less time looking at the display.
An argument could be made for more controls to get away from the need for a cursor/menu at all, and while I largely agree, at some point you’re likely to have so many controls you end up looking at the controls anyway, even with tactile hints.
Even if not, in this case the major controls are basically shortcuts and they’re the most commonly used and important shortcuts. Adding more buttons and knobs for things used less frequently or of lesser importance would muddy the waters and make these controls more difficult to use.
To muddy the waters further, some controls can do double duty with things like cycling through functions, double clicks, contextual presses, etc.