The benefits of “low tech” user interfaces

Post by vel0city » Wed, May 25, 2022, 4:26 PM UTC

eddieroger wrote: post #101

analog31 wrote: post #97

A few days ago in these very pages, I dissed the UI of an oscilloscope. But using one yesterday, I realized an advantage: I could operate it with one hand while holding the probe with the other. Even software interfaces for instrumentation, that use the keyboard and mouse, are physically awkward and your computer has to be positioned just right. A couple more advantages: * A small interface makes small things small.…

I have a 2017 Honda Civic. That particular model year, they chose to remove the volume knob for a capacitive little slider thing (in addition to the buttons on the wheel). The very next year, they put it back. Turns out it's pretty useful to be able to control the volume of your stereo without taking your eyes off the road when operating a car. They did a similar thing for the air controls, except they left some of t…

Post by sfink » Wed, May 25, 2022, 4:29 PM UTC

rob74 wrote: post #169

nkrisc wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The touch screens are the only thing keeping me on dino juice cars. I want to go electric, but they all have these awful touchscreens! I don’t want to navigate a menu to change the temperature or turn on a seat warmer. I’m just not buying an EV until there’s one that doesn’t rely on a giant touch screen for everything or I can’t buy an ICE vehicle anymore.

I think that's true only as long as the only electric cars you have driven are Teslas. The BMW i3 has pretty much resisted this tendency. Ok, it's already a pretty old design at this point and getting phased out, but it has lots of physical buttons (even for the seat warmer!). And I don't think electric cars that are variants of existing petrol cars (which are more and more common) will eliminate the physical control…

Post by dmitriid » Wed, May 25, 2022, 4:32 PM UTC

marssaxman wrote: post #120

NikolaNovak wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of my friends say their stove touch buttons are great. They are not just unintuitive, most implementations are painfully slow. (my own pet peeve though are microwaves - they are a positive monstrosity of horrible interface bearing no connection to actual typical usage. I'd like one with a massive "add 30s and start button", and anything else is a nice optional extra for me :-D

The best microwave I've ever used lived in the break room at my last job. It had one big knob, which worked like a standard kitchen timer: you would just twist it right until it pointed at the amount of time you want, then let it tick back down to the left until cooking was done. Want more? Just twist it right a little more, and let it keep ticking. I have no idea why domestic microwaves come with a maze of buttons w…

Post by fzzzy » Wed, May 25, 2022, 4:34 PM UTC

CliffyA wrote: post #246

corrral wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really wonder if the possibility of updates alone can make software worse. Absolutely does. You see this in console video games. As soon as online updates became possible, game-breaking bugs at launch became practically the norm, instead of incredibly rare ( minor bugs were common enough before ["I AM ERROR"], sure, but game-breaking ones, while not unheard of, were rare). Charging $60 for a late-alpha-quality pr…

I agree with what you are saying, except that "I AM ERROR" isn't actually a bug. The character is intentionally named that in Zelda II, even in the original Japanese.

Post by bobthepanda » Wed, May 25, 2022, 4:36 PM UTC

speedgoose wrote: post #256

woopwoop wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My toyota Corolla has a touch screen for interacting with audio. It has the following delightful features: - latency - it has a boot procedure when you turn the car on. While this happens, the controls have quite substantial latency. However the first thing that happens is it begins playing audio. - there is a knob for adjusting volume, but it's still part of the same system as the rest of it. There is still substant…

I understand your critics against touchscreens and they are justified. Your car doesn’t have a good touchscreen interface from what you say and also from my experience when I drove the corollas from the car pool. However it’s not because many cars are bad that the technology is bad. A touchscreen from an 20 years old Archos MP3 player is extremely bad while an iPad Pro M1 is very good.