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Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

drive.com.au

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Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#481

Post by lb1lf »

bonestamp2 wrote: post #374
lb1lf wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where Siemens really shines, is in their fanatical devotion to after sales. I rely on Siemens automation products at work. They give me end-of-life warnings a couple of years ahead - and maintain a spares inventory for a decade and change after EoL. That basically ensures I am never caught out, and makes me more than happy to (grudgingly) accept all their ideosyncracies...

I assume it makes you a loyal customer when upgrading/replacing equipment too... knowing what to expect and that you're going to have all of that support. So many product companies fail to think about that -- they're all thinking about this quarter and very few take a long term approach and really try to have customers for life. They all say that want that of course, but too few are really committed to it. There are…

Of course; I will jump through just about any hoop in order to keep buying their products precisely as I know that will buy both me and the end customer long term peace of mind.

Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#482

Post by gmueckl »

lb1lf wrote: post #162
Archelaos wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And to the haters: Show me any company or product from Germany in IT that is Top 100 globally. Also I wouldn’t want to disagree with you outright, there are still a few important German companies in the IT sector (or related): Siemens, Infineon, Deutsche Telekom, Bechtle, TeamViewer come to my mind. What Siemens exemplifies is that the strength of German industry is not pure software, but high-tech machinery. While…

Where Siemens really shines, is in their fanatical devotion to after sales. I rely on Siemens automation products at work. They give me end-of-life warnings a couple of years ahead - and maintain a spares inventory for a decade and change after EoL. That basically ensures I am never caught out, and makes me more than happy to (grudgingly) accept all their ideosyncracies...

Industrial automation as a market is like that. Those products are expected to be long lived and supported for decades because the machinery they are attached to often has a similarly long lifespan. A company I worked at was still supporting 20 to 30 products and in some cases building new hardware from 30 year old designs (including the exact same electronics).

Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#483

Post by sayamqazi »

aenis wrote: post #47

'He also explained that "I'm a big believer in screens, because I really believe if you want to connect, you have to make the magic work behind the screen." ' I am a big believer in keeping "product people" away from UI design for dangerous machinery. The eyes and the attention of the driver should be on the road. All the audio visual noise from the car is just plain dangerous. I don't want my car to draw my attentio…

they are using the "reusable" thats why it looks the same, which is a good practice /s

Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#484

Post by ahartmetz »

binkHN wrote: post #358
ahartmetz wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess it is possible that customers - the ones that they asked anyway - were also caught up in the touchscreen hype. There was a lot of hype in the first few years of iPhone and iPad.

It's not hype; touch screens won for mobile devices and that's why they all work this way.

Oh yes, there was an enormous hype. Things like tablets are going to displace all PC-type computers and such. I like to point out this article as an example of the mindless enthusiasm - I was rolling my eyes very hard at the time: https://www.techeblog.com/worlds-first-ipad-dj/

Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#485

Post by [deleted] »

lb1lf wrote: post #162
Archelaos wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And to the haters: Show me any company or product from Germany in IT that is Top 100 globally. Also I wouldn’t want to disagree with you outright, there are still a few important German companies in the IT sector (or related): Siemens, Infineon, Deutsche Telekom, Bechtle, TeamViewer come to my mind. What Siemens exemplifies is that the strength of German industry is not pure software, but high-tech machinery. While…

Where Siemens really shines, is in their fanatical devotion to after sales. I rely on Siemens automation products at work. They give me end-of-life warnings a couple of years ahead - and maintain a spares inventory for a decade and change after EoL. That basically ensures I am never caught out, and makes me more than happy to (grudgingly) accept all their ideosyncracies...

[deleted]

Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#486

Post by torginus »

joe_mamba wrote: post #479
torginus wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>and outsource everything they perceive ads no value. In their defense, if they know they have no inhouse competence and their existing org structure is not good for building software, then doesn't it make sense to contract people who do and can? Also, if Germans admittedly are not great at building good UX, and/or software, there are countries/companies who definitely don't suffer from that shortcoming. And I'm not…

> then doesn't it make sense to contract people who do and can? Except they don't. They contract it out to the cheapest bidder because they optimize for cost over innovation.

Do you have sources on this? I interviewed for a company that built software for high-end German cars, and their compensation wasn't bad.

Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#487

Post by andrewaylett »

throwawayk7h wrote: post #351
m463 wrote: post #275

I think they should distinguish between controls and settings. Settings are great on a touchscreen. A wide variety of options, easily navigated to and explained. They suck on physical buttons, it ends up being like setting the time on a VCR. Controls on the other hand deserve physical buttons. Or levers. or dials/knobs/spinners. It should depend on muscle memory, and the type of control. I also thing driving status s…

this is an incomplete picture though. Would Google Maps be considered a control or setting?

You probably don't want to be setting up Maps on either a touch screen or a with keys while driving. But navigation and media selection are the two functions I'm generally happy to interact with via voice.

Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#488

Post by Night_Thastus »

Animats wrote: post #362

But do you have to look at the display to tell what the buttons and knobs are doing. If you have, say, a HVAC fan speed knob with mechanical stops at the low and high end, and a detent, you never have to look at it. If you have an increase/decrease switch, you may need to look at the display to find out what you're doing. In a car, this means head-down time, eyes off the road. I have a Black and Decker branded humidi…

Just so you know, no normal filter can actually remove anything dissolved in the water - like minerals or salt. The only way to remove those is either ion exchange (ie: water softening, replace the hard minerals with salt) or reverse osmosis.

There's no way it's either of those, because both would be bulky. And if it was RO, you'd have a separate wastewater tank you would need to empty very often.

All that to say, that humidifier is still blasting minerals all over the surrounding area (and into carpet if you have any), which will leave deposits on everything. And if it's near electronics, it can fry them given enough time. Be warned.

Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#489

Post by ofrzeta »

torginus wrote: post #472
wongarsu wrote: post #448

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And fittingly SAP is successful despite horrible UX

SAP is basically the core of the German compliance machine. Most of the time, people get onto SAP not because its good, but there's a bunch of compliance regs, which basically say 'use SAP'. Noncompliance results in firms basically not doing business with you. You could try to be boneheaded and comply with whatever standards they need your own way, but that would mean your business partners would need to do more due…

Is this based on actual experience? Because at a place I worked in the past we did business with BMW, Allianz, Siemens, Munich Re and others and never had to use SAP. Maybe it depends on what part of the delivery chain you are.

For instance with Munich Re you have to "pass" their compliance gate which is comprehensive but still has a lot of leeway.

Re: Mercedes-Benz commits to bringing back physical buttons

#490

Post by badpun »

nkmnz wrote: post #404
croemer wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What matters is where the headquarters and key employees are. SE can be based anywhere in EU and even then legal entity stuff isn't what matters. Origin: German, HQ: German, Accounting regime: German, Main stock listing: German, Executive board: 5/6 German

In fact, you can run any form of European legal entity from any country. I.e., I can create an spółka z ograniczoną odpowiedzialnością (sp. z o.o.) in Poland, but run the business in Germany. It would be complicated and stupid, but legal.

You can't hire people cross-border though. That sp. z o.o. would need a German subsidiary if it wanted to employ people in Germany.
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