391–400 of 613 posts
If I turn off my iPhone, MacBook, or Google Pixel phone, are they really off?
What are the security implications of "modern standby" on laptops where the CPU and WiFi are always on even after I fold the lid down?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is such a weird take. First off, Norman wasn't schooled at Apple, he basically created the HCI guidelines with Nielsen. Apple's design guidelines have long been based o years what Norman worked on so you have it the other way around. In no part of the book does it say that engineers shouldn't be part of the design process. What the book advocates is that if engineers are entrusted with design, they should at lea…
See the "Acknowledgements" section of his book -- pp. 299-304. Yes, Norman had written "The Psychology of Everyday Things" prior to joining apple. But in his acknowledgements to this particular book (i.e. "The Design of Everyday Things" p. 301) he very heavily credits his experience at Apple: "I have learned a lot in the years that have passed since the first edition of this book ... The most important experience was…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Kitchen scales, bit more use, at least once a day but again 2 button cells a year I had a kitchen scale that would eat through its battery pretty quickly (within a month) even when not being used. I figured it could be an interesting project to open it up and try to figure out where the stray power draw was happening, but the obviously correct solution was just to leave the battery cover off and pop it in and out f…
I have Sony WH-1000X M3 noise cancelling fancy pancy wireless headphones and they can't charge and be used at the same time either! It is lunacy. Is there some cracy cheap charging chip that has this drawback? The headphones were very expansive still ...
> Oh, great, this debate again! I shall use this post as ammunition next time I am arguing with our stupid design team about why we need an off switch on the stupid product we are designing, because it is a giant pain to live with devices you cannot turn off. I increasingly subscribe to the thesis that many designers and design teams design primarily in an effort to impress other designers . They don't have to use th…
This used to be how I assumed that awful UX keeps coming about, repeating the same mistakes and then making new ones by removing existing conveniences for no clear reason. But surely, I thought, I must be assuming the worst of an assuredly more rational situation. I then heard more about the designers at Microsoft for Vista through Windows 11 which deeply confirmed most of my prior negative assumptions. It sometimes…
The default white title bars that blend seamlessly into any white content behind them is a perfect example of this and so many people don't even realize they can change it.
Windows usability has declined since Windows 7 which had a lot of things that seemed like the designers were trying to improve their own lives while using the software. My favorite was the thick borders that were easy to grab for resizing, etc., even on high DPI displays. Compare it to Linux UIs where you often have to grab a single pixel border on a 4k monitor to resize a window.
Thankfully Win 10 still has large targets for grabbing window edges even though the border is only 1px.
I'm thinking a lot about security aspects of this. If I turn off my iPhone, MacBook, or Google Pixel phone, are they really off? What are the security implications of "modern standby" on laptops where the CPU and WiFi are always on even after I fold the lid down?
In fact, even a non-nefarious company might do that so a sudden power loss doesn't cause data corruption.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's such a godawful book. In my view it epitomizes everything that is wrong with design today. And the worst part is that comments like these make it come off as the go-to reference to actually solving these problems. The reasons it's the worst design guidance out there is that it teaches: 1) that engineers should NOT be entrusted/involved with user design. 2) to conceptualize users as blissful idiots. 3) that obs…
This is such a weird take. First off, Norman wasn't schooled at Apple, he basically created the HCI guidelines with Nielsen. Apple's design guidelines have long been based o years what Norman worked on so you have it the other way around. In no part of the book does it say that engineers shouldn't be part of the design process. What the book advocates is that if engineers are entrusted with design, they should at lea…
And it gets much worse in "The Inmates are Running the Asylum", that says engineers shouldn't do design right in the title, on the most sensationalist way possible.
Later he toned down that message a lot. Nothing from his group will say that anymore, and you will get a clear message that making your engineers think about design is better than nobody thinking about it. It still carries a message that you should leave design to experts, but you won't find anything there saying that engineers can't be UX experts anymore.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh man, do I believe this. I think every profession does this, tbh, I saw a lot of developers try to do stuff just to impress the rest of the team, but designers are one of the most impactful because they don't do stuff that is _so obvious_ like this one
Yes, every profession does that to some degree. But most professionals are impressed by things that make the results of their work better, even if at completely unreasonable costs. Designers nowadays are in a fashion to get impressed by things that make the results of their work worse. That leads to completely different problems.
(Background: I work in product design/new product development, and conceivably might have designed this thing! If any of those were still designed in the Western world. Which they aren't. I have designed some stuff like it, though!) Oh, great, this debate again! I shall use this post as ammunition next time I am arguing with our stupid design team about why we need an off switch on the stupid product we are designing…
> This is because they, one, don't listen to anyone ever; and two, never use the products they design. Oh, sure, there might be a user study or two. But they never actually have to live with or work with the damn things. I wonder the percentage of consumer (and business - have you ever used a POS in a pub?!) electronics this applies to? It's gotta be high 90s. I've lost track of the number of times I've lamented "did…
Are you me? Lol. Sometimes I use software where I wonder "am I the only one that bought this and tried to use it?" I think part of the issue is that requirements get written by people who have no experience. They've never done the job the software will be used to augment and they don't know anything about software development. Then the requirements are used to outsource the actual design and development.
Using POS as an example (in a country with tipping culture). Imagine if a requirements document for the payment system said "must include an option to tip", but the design and development was done in a country where tipping culture isn't a thing. You'd likely end up with the "tip" option hidden away in a hard to reach place while everyone who uses the software knows it should be prominent and easy to use and could immediately tell you the design is poor.
>> (Our design team will never listen. This is because they, one, don't listen to anyone ever; and two, never use the products they design. Oh, sure, there might be a user study or two. But they never actually have to live with or work with the damn things.) This is so obvious from everyday life that someone really ought to write a paper about it and have it published in Nature. Because it will certainly be published…
I get that you're pissed, but there's plenty of technology that you seemingly forget about (being pissed off makes you a bit irrational) that works most of the time. Saying nothing ever fucking works is just a dumb take
Kind of like Yogi Bera says "nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded".