Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Forms in modals: UX case

user-interface.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 51 posts

Re: Forms in modals: UX case

#31

Post by chomp »

Akcium wrote: post #13
Akcium wrote: post #9

It's my article. I just got a traffic spike, so I noticed it's here. I guess the person who posted it checked out the URL that I have, and previously I indeed called it something like stop using modals. The thing is that they are really OVERused. And right now I'm working on a project where we have modals inside modals and sometime even popup as a third layer. I cannot influence these decisions, but it's TOO much.

I even remember I made a tweet for fun https://twitter.com/vponamariov/status/1528758532182515714 when I started working on a project that had up to 3(!!) modals inside. It's not only hard for users, it's hard for developers, when they have scroll issues, when they should update each other, when you should keep track of URL (what if user hits F5 or wants to share these...modal hell)

I personally also find it hard getting accessibility to work right. Depending on the modal and js library used to generate it, getting aria tags to work right always feels difficult.

Re: Forms in modals: UX case

#32

Post by 1-more »

If you do modals MAKE SURE you capture focus correctly. You should not be able to tab to controls behind the backdrop. There is so much you have to do for modal controls.

Re: Forms in modals: UX case

#33

Post by dang »

Akcium wrote: post #9

It's my article. I just got a traffic spike, so I noticed it's here. I guess the person who posted it checked out the URL that I have, and previously I indeed called it something like stop using modals. The thing is that they are really OVERused. And right now I'm working on a project where we have modals inside modals and sometime even popup as a third layer. I cannot influence these decisions, but it's TOO much.

(The submitted title was "You Shouldn’t Use Modals" but we changed it to the article title, which is less baity, per https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

Re: Forms in modals: UX case

#35

Post by jjoonathan »

Akcium wrote: post #9

It's my article. I just got a traffic spike, so I noticed it's here. I guess the person who posted it checked out the URL that I have, and previously I indeed called it something like stop using modals. The thing is that they are really OVERused. And right now I'm working on a project where we have modals inside modals and sometime even popup as a third layer. I cannot influence these decisions, but it's TOO much.

Who turned the Ubuntu save dialog into a full screen modal? Is there a way to fix it?

It's so painful that I might even get of my ass and contribute, but knowing open source, it's equally likely that this is a politics problem, not a code problem.

Re: Forms in modals: UX case

#36

Post by athenot »

That was a point I remembered from Apple's Human Interface guidelines. From the 1987 edition, on modal dialog boxes:

Because it restricts the user's freedom of action, you should use this type of dialog box sparingly. In particular, the user can't choose a menu item while a modal dialog box is up and therefore can do only the simplest kinds of text editing. For these reasons, the main use of a modal dialog box is when it's important for the user to complete an operation before doing anything else.

Source: https://andymatuschak.org/files/papers/Apple%20Human%20Inter... p.59

Re: Forms in modals: UX case

#37

Post by msdrigg »

micromacrofoot wrote: post #22
debacle wrote: post #17

I hate modals. I think they're bad UX. I think they're antiquated. I think they have all the problems outlined in this essay. If Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest use modals, I'm going to use modals. "What users expect" will almost always be the best UX.

Users don't care if it's a modal or not, they just want it to work.

Exactly.

Google calendar modals: excellent.

Outlook web modals: gross

Re: Forms in modals: UX case

#39

Post by encoderer »

It might be better now but for years forms in modals were a huge pain in the ass on tablets. Basically the modal pops up, focuses the form, which opens the keyboard, which pushes half your modal off screen.

Re: Forms in modals: UX case

#40

Post by derefr »

tshaddox wrote: post #28
derefr wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't suggest that they're never useful. It says you that you shouldn't use them — i.e. that using them is bad. There are lots of things that you generally shouldn't do, but sometimes must do under certain circumstances. Doing something you shouldn't because you must, doesn't excuse you from the fact that you're doing something "bad"; it just means that "doing something bad" is the best/only option you have at t…

That’s a wild misuse of language. It’s semantic nonsense to say there’s something you must do but should not do.

A general "should" statement in English — e.g. "you shouldn't use modals" — recommends (assigns utility weight to) a concept; it's not an imperative command to do (or not do) that thing, right now, in the specific situation you're in.

This is in contrast to "it would be best to do X" when used in equivalent contexts. While "you should" conveys an absolute judgement on the general / global / context-free utility of an action, "it would be best to" conveys a relative utility-ranking of actions presented as (perhaps implicit) options.

Something can be the best option in some scenarios (= relative contextual ranking), but still a bad option in global static ranking (= absolute judgement), and so would be something you "shouldn't" do.

You shouldn't climb over an electrified fence. You might have to — it might be best to do so — if you're being chased by a bear. But it's still anti-recommended as a course of action. You should avoid any series of choices that results in you having to climb an electrified fence, because even when it's the best course of action, any future where you have chosen to climb an electrified fence, is going to suck compared to one where you didn't have to do so.

You should brush your teeth before sleeping. In the situation where you're hiding up a tree from the aforementioned bear, it would be best to not do so. But that doesn't remove the general recommendation that you "should" be brushing your teeth; and doesn't remove the twinge of regret you get for not being able to do the thing you "should" be doing.

(I think you might be confusing "should" for the similar word "shall" — a thing you must do but shall not do would indeed be semantic nonsense.)

Alternately, if your argument is that you need the words "in general" in the statement to make it true — no, you don't. "In general" is the default context for "should" statements, and especially ones not addressed to a specific speaker. If a "should" statement is made without reference to/knowledge of you or your specific context, how could that statement possibly be in reference to what you specifically should do in your situation — vs. being a generally-agreed-upon context-free absolute value-judgement of the concept?

Post reply on HN