The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline • Hacker News Board

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#371

Post by rpgmaker » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 7:10 PM UTC

petilon wrote: post #310

EVERYTHING beautiful is skeuomorphic. The page turn in iOS 6 iBooks, page curl in maps, cover flow, the shred animation in older versions of Passbook, the date picker in iOS 6, rotating settings gear (when updating iOS 6), the Time Machine interface in older versions of OS X, photo borders and shadows in iWorks documents, etc. This is not surprising, because our sense of beauty comes from the physical world. So what…

Honestly, I know things can't stay the same forever, particularly in the design department, but to me Aqua still looks way better than current OSX (granted, I only use OSX very sporadically for educational purposes). I have to admit though that I'm not a huge fan of the flat designs that are currently "in" where you can't easily tell when one UI element ends and the other begins. I don't think that's very easy on the eyes generally but it seems that I'm the only one that sees it that way. Whatever.

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#372

Post by pmarreck » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 7:17 PM UTC

ludwik wrote: post #227

pmarreck wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

for anyone else non-US but curious: Photos of typical yellow pads: https://www.google.com/search?q=yellow+legal+pad&tbm=isch History of the yellow legal pad: http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/May-June-2005/scene_snide...

Wow, I've never seen those in real life (I live in Poland). I know most of the results are photos, but I always encountered those in the form of icons, so my brain is still telling me that I'm looking at icons. It's a weird feeling ;)

Certainly a peculiar regional difference, they are ubiquitous in the States. I might not have one in my house, but I grew up around them, they are usually clipped into a clipboard.

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#373

Post by tjl » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 7:22 PM UTC

emodendroket wrote: post #361

tjl wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Dock Preferences, click the box "Show indicators for open applications". You should get a black dot under (or to the side) of the app icon. I've used this setting for years.

Yeah, but why exactly is it off by default? I can't see the benefit.

Because they don't want people to worry about what is open. That's what I understand is their reasoning. I don't really agree with it, though.

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#374

Post by glennsl » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 7:22 PM UTC

leesalminen wrote: post #215

56k wrote: post #28

This article doesn't make any sense. The use of metaphors worked when people didn't know what a computer was, and the only way to make its UI make sense was to mimic real-world objects. Now, this is no longer necessary. It's been 40 years. While I agree that new macOS icons aren't great (see the Game Center icon), the old ones were silly. I'm 35 and I have probably seen an actual contact book only once when I was lit…

> I hate how Safari hides the full address in the address bar, for instance. This can be changed on MacOS from Safari -> Preferences -> Advanced -> Show full website address.

But even then the protocol is hidden, so still not the full website address. Much better though. Thanks for the tip!

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#375

Post by gutnor » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 8:00 PM UTC

eyelidlessness wrote: post #289

zeveb wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Previously: hhtpttpp://faceblablah.com/techmumbo/jumbo?not=h4ck3r. Now: facebooook.com.ru => "wow this really is not Facebook!". I basically witnessed such behaviour change first hand. Anyone who does that is uneducated and ignorant; the proper response to that is to educate, not to remove the ability of those who are educated to do other things.

Years of education have been horribly ineffective, which is why phishing continues to work. Meanwhile, the ignorant audience keeps growing. A whole lot of UX work is about making ambiguous things less ambiguous and making the "right" or "safe" choice the default. In those scenarios, the best UX will make the non-default choice available with some additional effort (changing settings, diving deeper), which this featur…

> Years of education have been horribly ineffective

It should be obvious by just looking how social engineering is working and have been using the same tricks for literally thousands of years. Classic children literature, before modernisation (like Disney), gives you a good idea on the same lessons needed to be taught then.

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#376

Post by Silhouette » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 8:01 PM UTC

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #290

Silhouette wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A beautiful interface can be better but I suspect it's better to have an uglier consistent and intuitive interface. I'm not sure why the parent comment was downvoted. If the above statement was intended to mean that being consistent and intuitive is more important than aesthetics then that is almost certainly true, in my experience designing and testing UIs. Of course, the ideal is to have it all by using the aesthet…

>Being attractive and being functional aren't mutually exclusive. // But being fashionable and being functional are often opposing forces. Seems to me flat web design was a reaction as the antithesis of an over-indulgence in skeuomorphism. We just appear to have thrown out a lot of affordance and visibility in that reaction.

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by "over-indulgence in skeuomorphism". However, if you're suggesting that the previous trend of almost photorealistic visual styles could sometimes become too detailed/cluttered/noisy or that UIs in that style sometimes lost cohesion because being photorealistic was about the only thing a lot of the iconography and window dressing had in common, then I would agree with both of those points.

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#377

Post by city41 » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 8:01 PM UTC

56k wrote: post #28

This article doesn't make any sense. The use of metaphors worked when people didn't know what a computer was, and the only way to make its UI make sense was to mimic real-world objects. Now, this is no longer necessary. It's been 40 years. While I agree that new macOS icons aren't great (see the Game Center icon), the old ones were silly. I'm 35 and I have probably seen an actual contact book only once when I was lit…

hiding the full URL is considered a security feature, to help people know what site they are actually on. Chrome has considered adopting the same feature for the same reason.

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#378

Post by skrowl » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 8:02 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #81

skrowl wrote: post #40

If you think this is a steep decline, wait until they report earnings after this market closes this evening. Another quarter of iPhone sales drops and they're expect to announce iWatch down by over 50% from last year.

> Another quarter of iPhone sales drops You mean, just a few months before the next model is announced? Who would have thought...

Year over year sales drop, not quarter over quarter. They sold less this quarter of this year than the same quarter last year.

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#379

Post by GFK_of_xmaspast » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 8:05 PM UTC

EliRivers wrote: post #52

56k wrote: post #28

This article doesn't make any sense. The use of metaphors worked when people didn't know what a computer was, and the only way to make its UI make sense was to mimic real-world objects. Now, this is no longer necessary. It's been 40 years. While I agree that new macOS icons aren't great (see the Game Center icon), the old ones were silly. I'm 35 and I have probably seen an actual contact book only once when I was lit…

"The use of metaphors worked when people didn't know what a computer was, and the only way to make its UI make sense was to mimic real-world objects. Now, this is no longer necessary. It's been 40 years." I disagree strongly. It is now more needed than ever. 40 years ago, the majority of people using computers knew what they were doing. Now, they're everywhere, and people interact with them every day. It's very commo…

You are greatly overestimating the ability of computer users in the 1976.

Re: The Apple Goes Mushy Part I: OS X's Interface Decline

#380

Post by arclyte » Tue, Jul 26, 2016, 8:08 PM UTC

jrockway wrote: post #207

56k wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's quicker to glance at icons and spot the app right away than not read each and every item in a list.

Anyway, I think the idea is to get some visual cue that you're about to tap the right icon. You know where you put your apps on your home screen, so the colors or wahtever lead you there faster. And the icon provides a large touch target. Going back to the original article, it doesn't really matter what the icon looks like, as long as it's unique. You're not looking at each icon and asking yourself "is this a camera?…

I'm surprised no one seems to have mentioned this earlier. Everyone's arguing about what image the icon contains and thinking of imaginary folks who are using computers for the first time after coming off a ship from a lonely desert island.

Back in 'teh day' when my icons were all cutesy skeuomorphs, my computer came with maybe a dozen apps and most of them were on my desktop. Now, I have over a hundred sitting in my global Apps folder alone - never mind user Apps, sub folders, etc.

This gets compounded even more on phones - on my iPhone, I've accidentally placed 1Password next to the Settings app - both have a grey background with a circular center. Settings' center is grey gears, 1Passwords is a blue ring with a keyhole. On examination, they're not similar at all, but I can't even begin to tell you how many times I clicked on when, meaning to click the other - even _knowing_ the differences and kicking myself each time.

I think a lot of what the designers are trying to do is create an icon that stands out visually, and is easily found from amongst a large set of other icons, rather than trying to impress upon us what its functionality is from a metaphor.