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Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

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Re: Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

#51

Post by mamcx »

izacus wrote: post #13

I'm sure they'll do it since it saves money. I had a horrible time teaching my grandparents to use the gesture navigation on their new iPad (they still hate it, they still get regularly anxious because they can't reliably make the "home" gesture instead of clear feedback of a hardware button and there's many gestures they accidentally trigger which cannot be disabled in A11y or MDM settings) - but they saved money an…

Wait... Exist a "home" gesture????

Checking...

Oh!!!!

---

I move to a iPhone 13 mini from iPhone SE 1st and the lack of a home button is the singles most stupid thing in the world....

Re: Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

#52

Post by TMWNN »

jmyeet wrote: post #10

I still miss the home button on the iPhone. I know it takes up what otherwise would be screen space. I know it's been years. But the UX of what we have now is so much worse. Touch ID is significantly better than Face ID. Way less false positives. Way less false failures that force you to enter your passcode. You can use it in the dark. You can use it in your pocket. I ditched my iPad Pro for an iPad Air specifically…

>Why can't apple put Touch ID on the back? Or on the sides?

Yes, please!

iPhone 13 is my first one without Touch ID since 5S back in 2013. I hate Face ID, and the additions within the past year to accommodate masks and glasses only help a little.

I also have an inexpensive Android phone, a year older than the 13, with a touch ID sensor on the back. Why can't Apple do the same with iPhone?

Re: Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

#53

Post by robocat »

delecti wrote: post #2

I've seen enough people be astonished to learn that their laptop's touchpad is just using haptic trickery to simulate a button that I think their anecdata really just isn't representative. I've seen people who know that it's using haptic trickery use the depth rod of a set of calipers because they just don't believe it. I think that a poorly engineered power button (one which can become inoperative if the OS freezes)…

> I think that a poorly engineered power button (one which can become inoperative if the OS freezes) is a terrible idea

And a standard “clicky” button that physically fails after a few years use is better? I have seen more than one old iPhone with the accessibility icon on screen, because the physical hardware of the button has failed. Even worse: buttons that go intermittent failure on you - grrrrr.

Disclaimer: I dislike the haptic home button on my SE 2022, so I am somewhat on both sides of the argument. Good engineering is good compromises.

Re: Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

#54

Post by dagmx »

mamcx wrote: post #51
izacus wrote: post #13

I'm sure they'll do it since it saves money. I had a horrible time teaching my grandparents to use the gesture navigation on their new iPad (they still hate it, they still get regularly anxious because they can't reliably make the "home" gesture instead of clear feedback of a hardware button and there's many gestures they accidentally trigger which cannot be disabled in A11y or MDM settings) - but they saved money an…

Wait... Exist a "home" gesture???? Checking... Oh!!!! --- I move to a iPhone 13 mini from iPhone SE 1st and the lack of a home button is the singles most stupid thing in the world....

How have you been using your phone without knowing the home gesture? It’s the only way to multitask or exit apps or unlock your phone

Re: Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

#55

Post by bsder »

samwillis wrote: post #23
izacus wrote: post #13

I'm sure they'll do it since it saves money. I had a horrible time teaching my grandparents to use the gesture navigation on their new iPad (they still hate it, they still get regularly anxious because they can't reliably make the "home" gesture instead of clear feedback of a hardware button and there's many gestures they accidentally trigger which cannot be disabled in A11y or MDM settings) - but they saved money an…

I'm not sure a touch sensitive button is a lower cost component than a physical button, you need an IC to drive a touch button. I can't see this being driven by cost savings. I'm not even convinced there would be a cost saving when you take into account buttons failing and needing to be replaced. Reducing the number of buttons and replacing them with on screen-only (say move to on screen-only volume) would be a clear…

Removing anything "mechanical" is a huge cost saver and a massive reliability improver.

Those buttons require special drilling and machining steps on the case. Removing those speeds up the production of cases by a lot which equals cost.

Mechanical switches are way more expensive than huge areas of silicon chip. It's not even close.

Finally, solid-state touch sensitive stuff effectively never fails. It never gets dirty. It never wears out.

Does it have Heisenbugs and screwball failure modes? Oh, yeah. I imagine triggering them with gloves on will be a nightmare, for example.

But, it's okay, people will wear special Apple gloves in order to use the advanced feature of their new phone. When something on an iPhone fails, it's obviously always the fault of the end user, no?

Re: Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

#56

Post by dagmx »

flenserboy wrote: post #45

The elimination of buttons is not just a hardware issue; it goes hand-in-hand with the elimination of visual cues on websites & in apps. We're getting close to needing some sort of WordPerfect function-key guide attached to our phones & tablets to know what to click on so we don't have to stab randomly around our device (due to missing buttons) or screen (due to lack of cues) to know what is a link, button, or action…

The post doesn’t actually say the button is going away. It says the button mechanism is changing.

Re: Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

#57

Post by frosted-flakes »

morsch wrote: post #12

The extra physical button on my Samsung S10 is my favorite thing about it. Ordinarily it launches Samsung's voice assistant, which naturally is completely pointless, but you can patch it to do whatever you want. I've set mine to play pause on long press, toggle the flashlight on double press and act as a secondary lock button. I toggle podcast playback without taking my phone out of my pocket dozens of times a day, t…

That button is one of the main reasons I still use an S10e to this day. I also have my volume buttons set to skip tracks on long press, which was something that BlackBerry phones had back in the day, and is something I find extremely useful. On Android I use a sideloaded app that uses a hidden API to get this functionality:

https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/app-8-0-skip-track-by-vol...

Re: Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

#58

Post by alphabettsy »

karmelapple wrote: post #39
abledon wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

reason I still use my IphoneSE version 1. still has the actual button on the front face. Hoping they release another model in the next 3-4 years with an actual front-facing button

I don’t quite follow - what is the reason? That you wish there was a haptic home button? iPhones never had haptic buttons on the front face - only real physical press buttons.

iPhones had haptics home buttons from iPhone 7 and up, so if you’ve used even an old iPhone at this point it wasn’t a “real” button. Same as the MacBook trackpads, people can’t tell the difference.

Re: Apple, please don’t take all of the buttons away

#59

Post by robocat »

The haptic home button does not work when wearing gloves on iPhone SE 2022 (I just tested it).

With haptic side buttons, a 3rd party case couldn’t use plastic over the buttons (my iPhone SE 2022 case has molded button covers as part of the plastic surround).

Aside: Apple’s usability feels like it is going downhill. As a very recent Android -> iPhone convert, I keep bumping into obvious and serious usability flaws, even with my years of prior experience with an iPad. Watching my 80 year old mum trying to learn how to use an iPad was a real eye opener for usability and accessibility failures (weirdly enough, she used to use a Windows laptop a few years ago with less problems, probably due to familiarity).

I’m guessing Apple can make a haptic button that is more reliable and more waterproof than a physically clicky button. We all know of old iPhones with a physical home button where the home button stopped working reliable (or at all). Preventing failure in objects that physically move is very difficult.

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