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

New Google+ is beautiful?

alexdong.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 82 posts

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#31

Post by k-mcgrady »

>> "First, images are out-of-proportionally big. They steal the attention away from the texts... You eyes will inevitably look at Larry’s face and the new Android Studio but did you notice much of the text at all?"

I think this is the point. I can immediately tell what these posts are about via the image without having to read anything. I can then read the details if I want. Also, If G+ is anything like Facebook one of the most shared content types is photos so it makes sense to prioritise them.

>> Third problem, the lack of discipline in using the whitespace. Whitespace is one of the most powerful, visually pleasing and least intrusive way to bring orders and visual hierarchies to a design. Yet what do you think of the whitespace in this Best of #Python page?"

This seems like a bad example. Normally that whitespace (the link) would contain an image and some text previewing the link. They just couldn't parse it from the webpage. In this case the OP just picked an example to fit his complaint.

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#32

Post by thebear »

k-mcgrady wrote: post #26
thebear wrote: post #25

I commented earlier that I had a hard time figuring out the chronological order of the posts in the stream. I've learned since that Google doesn't want us to care about that. Fine, that's their prerogative. But now I have a new problem: I don't know how to read this thing at all. I can't read it "by column," that is, one column after the other, because it's infinite scroll. But I can't read it "by line" either, becau…

You can switchback to one column in the 'more' menu. >> "How do you read this, particularly in three-column mode, and be reasonably sure not to miss a post?" I think that might be your problem. Maybe Google doesn't think many people want to see every post in their stream. Personally I just skim through it and see what catches my eye. I much prefer this design (2 column, my 15" monitor apparently isn't large enough fo…

Given the fact that I can switch to one-column layout, I should probably shut up now. But just for the sake of a lively debate, let me say this: if I can't read the thing, I can't skim it either. I just don't know how to move my eyes around. Instead of skimming for the posts that I find important, I would end up making a random choice between things I see and things I overlook. But then perhaps that's fully intended with any kind of social media: you can never be sure if you missed anything or not.

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#33

Post by mmuro »

The main problem I see with these types of layouts is that if you are displaying reverse chronological content, it needs to be in a single column.

Items that have no bearing on when it was posted, i.e. Pintrest, can adapt just fine to this multi-column layout.

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#34

Post by [deleted] »

k-mcgrady wrote: post #29
jack-r-abbit wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mine is. They do reset the sort order back to "top stories" once in awhile which is annoying but I always just set it back to sort by date

Yes but the majority or people just use the top stories sort and are happy with it. I think people who want everything in chronological order are the type of people who don't want to miss a post - even though most posts on Facebook/Google + aren't important enough to matter if you miss them.

[deleted]

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#35

Post by dragonwriter »

thebear wrote: post #32
k-mcgrady wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can switchback to one column in the 'more' menu. >> "How do you read this, particularly in three-column mode, and be reasonably sure not to miss a post?" I think that might be your problem. Maybe Google doesn't think many people want to see every post in their stream. Personally I just skim through it and see what catches my eye. I much prefer this design (2 column, my 15" monitor apparently isn't large enough fo…

Given the fact that I can switch to one-column layout, I should probably shut up now. But just for the sake of a lively debate, let me say this: if I can't read the thing, I can't skim it either. I just don't know how to move my eyes around. Instead of skimming for the posts that I find important, I would end up making a random choice between things I see and things I overlook. But then perhaps that's fully intended…

I don't see the problem, sweeping left-to-right-to-left while scrolling seems to work for me to skim it (the icons and text identifying the source at the top of items and the pictures are the main visual points of interest and I use them to decide if I want to read more of an article.)

But I suppose its one of those things that's likely to be highly subjective.

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#36

Post by tomkarlo »

jack-r-abbit wrote: post #20
tomkarlo wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook's stream hasn't been chronological (for most users) in a long time - I think years, and it doesn't seem to bother most users.

Mine is. They do reset the sort order back to "top stories" once in awhile which is annoying but I always just set it back to sort by date

Don't take a sample size of one and extrapolate to everyone.

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#37

Post by thebear »

dragonwriter wrote: post #35
thebear wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the fact that I can switch to one-column layout, I should probably shut up now. But just for the sake of a lively debate, let me say this: if I can't read the thing, I can't skim it either. I just don't know how to move my eyes around. Instead of skimming for the posts that I find important, I would end up making a random choice between things I see and things I overlook. But then perhaps that's fully intended…

I don't see the problem, sweeping left-to-right-to-left while scrolling seems to work for me to skim it (the icons and text identifying the source at the top of items and the pictures are the main visual points of interest and I use them to decide if I want to read more of an article.) But I suppose its one of those things that's likely to be highly subjective.

>> But I suppose its one of those things that's likely to be highly subjective.

Words of wisdom. Thanks.

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#38

Post by jack-r-abbit »

tomkarlo wrote: post #36
jack-r-abbit wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mine is. They do reset the sort order back to "top stories" once in awhile which is annoying but I always just set it back to sort by date

Don't take a sample size of one and extrapolate to everyone.

I did no such thing. I said mine is. Don't put words in my mouth, please.

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#39

Post by jack-r-abbit »

k-mcgrady wrote: post #29
jack-r-abbit wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mine is. They do reset the sort order back to "top stories" once in awhile which is annoying but I always just set it back to sort by date

Yes but the majority or people just use the top stories sort and are happy with it. I think people who want everything in chronological order are the type of people who don't want to miss a post - even though most posts on Facebook/Google + aren't important enough to matter if you miss them.

I want things in chronological order so I can tell if I have missed any post. But that doesn't mean I need to read every post. I do want to be able to decide for myself from the list what I view as a "top story". So I have them sort by date. and when I've scrolled back to something I know I've seen then I don't need to keep scrolling back. When things are random, I get stuff I've already seen mixed in with new stuff. That is not a very good user experience IMO.

Re: New Google+ is beautiful?

#40

Post by mindcrime »

thebear wrote: post #25

I commented earlier that I had a hard time figuring out the chronological order of the posts in the stream. I've learned since that Google doesn't want us to care about that. Fine, that's their prerogative. But now I have a new problem: I don't know how to read this thing at all. I can't read it "by column," that is, one column after the other, because it's infinite scroll. But I can't read it "by line" either, becau…

You just summed up my reaction to this as well. Except I'd probably word my opinion a bit more strongly. I'm really, really, not a fan of this particular redesign.
Post reply on HN