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A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

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Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#51

Post by hillel »

magicalist wrote: post #45

I feel like this whole comments section just fell out of a time machine, which isn't surprising, as this article does as well. This would fit in well with all the 2011 "UX guy roughs it with Android" stories, but it feels weirdly archaic today. In today's world, it's like writing a story about the time you went to Kmart instead of Target and barely lived to tell about it. They didn't even have price scanners on the e…

I would have thought this experience to be anachronistic as well as I thought Android had plenty of time to polish their experience since those stories 2-3 years ago. That's part of the reason I jumped into trying Android. I thought it would be a good experience - just different from iOS, which I welcomed.

As for doing good UX for apps on Android, i think that's almost no different than doing good UX for apps on any smartphone platform. Aside from dealing with the back button and a few other platform specific issues, it's the same set of challenges around touch-based devices and limited screen real estate.

Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#52

Post by blinkingled »

mfish wrote: post #49
blinkingled wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unreasonable expectations - Buying an unlocked, generic, carrier unspecific phone and expecting it to work great out of box on T-Mobile. Little knowledge or inclination - not sure which one, but of course he had either little knowledge not to buy unlocked phone OR little inclination to find out that TMobile Voicemail app in Play store. What's wrong about what I said? And people can be that way - I am hardly insulting…

>He wanted T-Mobile VoiceMail app to be bundled no, he wanted voicemail. T-Mobile decided to require a different app.

> It took me forever to realize that I had to download the T-Mobile voicemail app to get my voicemail

That's all he says. Nowhere in the post he says voicemail didn't work - he implies he wanted an app to get his Voicemail like iOS. The regular voicemail stuff just works on any stock Android GSM phone - you get a notification for new ones and you can tap that or long press 1 to go to carrier voice mail box for your old VMEs.

Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#53

Post by blinkingled »

hillel wrote: post #50
blinkingled wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unreasonable expectations - Buying an unlocked, generic, carrier unspecific phone and expecting it to work great out of box on T-Mobile. Little knowledge or inclination - not sure which one, but of course he had either little knowledge not to buy unlocked phone OR little inclination to find out that TMobile Voicemail app in Play store. What's wrong about what I said? And people can be that way - I am hardly insulting…

Voicemail shouldn't be a carrier specific experience. Is there something so differentiated about the t-mobile voicemail experience vs. the verizon voice mail experience? Shouldn't there just bean android voice mail experience that the carrier can direct at their back end as appropriate? I don't think it's unreasonable to expect that a core feature (like voice mail) should work out of the box with no additional instal…

The author implies he wanted an app to get his Voicemail like iOS. Nowhere does he say VoiceMail didn't work. The regular voicemail stuff just works on any stock Android GSM phone - you get a notification for new ones and you can tap that or long press 1 to go to carrier voice mail box for your old VMEs. I have that working on 5 different unlocked phones at the least on 3 different carriers. If you want an app - yeah you gotta find it in app store if your phone wasn't a carrier branded version - the app needs to do carrier specific things to get your voice messages and present you a list.

Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#54

Post by ssmoot »

magicalist wrote: post #45

I feel like this whole comments section just fell out of a time machine, which isn't surprising, as this article does as well. This would fit in well with all the 2011 "UX guy roughs it with Android" stories, but it feels weirdly archaic today. In today's world, it's like writing a story about the time you went to Kmart instead of Target and barely lived to tell about it. They didn't even have price scanners on the e…

This doesn't actually address any of his points. I feel like you could change the "4" in your comment to a "5" in a couple years and feel equally justified.

If anything, it's a bigger sin today now that Android has been a player for so long. Things have improved. I guess. But the biggest issues (back button, notifications, messaging, the half-baked shovel-ware app store) seem pretty persistent.

Battery life is marginally better. Most of the benefits eaten up by bigger screens (I'm not complaining much as long as it gets me through a whole day: I just bought a 6.4" Android). Getting rid of the dedicated Search button was a step in the right direction. Swapping the "Options/Menu" or whatever button for an "Open Apps" button was definitely a win. Some wins in some of the OTB apps (Camera). But some noteworthy losses as well (Messages).

It should feel like an alternative. Not a compromise. And too often that's not the case IME.

Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#55

Post by hillel »

MBCook wrote: post #37
smrtinsert wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because I don’t really know the difference between my choices. I have no real idea what the tradeoffs are in picking one app over the other. nd if the difference is so negligible, why do they even offer both. It's clear he's referring to the apps themselves, and he views the choice iteself as intrinsically worthless. So yeah, he completely missed the point.

Shipping a phone with two photo management apps just seems like a mistake to me in the first place. I thought he was arguing a consequence of that (and the interface) and not the intrinsic value of Intents, but that may be my reading.

@MBCook you are correct. I have no problem with being able to make a choice. I have a problem having to make that choice out of the box between two pieces of software shipped by the same company. It's like they couldn't be bothered to settle it so they just punted the decision to me.

Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#56

Post by MBCook »

ssmoot wrote: post #47
MBCook wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the share screen, and it's quite different from intents. There is simply no way on iOS to choose another app to be your default web browser, mail client, SMS client, central photo repository, etc. Apps can say "You can send photos here" but there is no way for one app to advertise to another "You can ask me for photos".

Ah. You're right. I stand corrected. I could see how that could be useful if I were, for example, an Instagram user.

That's the kind of place where it really bugs people. They use Instagram for everything but still have to deal with Photos.

It's similar for people using Chrome or a 3rd party calendar or mail client. Any link anywhere in the OS, unless specially setup by the app developer, will open the Apple app. There is no way to tap on someone's email address in Address Book and have it open Mailbox or Sparrow.

Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#57

Post by fleitz »

ssmoot wrote: post #30
blinkingled wrote: post #12

[Unreasonable expectations and little knowledge or inclination to try things out] Please don't read the previous bracketed sentence as snarky or insulting - it reflects the fact that he bought an unlocked phone and expected it to work great out of box with T-Mobile (including WiFi calling!) and he wasn't inclined to search the Play Store for TMobile Voicemail - so there is definitely substance to that sentence. But I…

4. The MotoX lock screen sometimes unlocked with a swipe of a dot, and sometimes up from the bottom depending on wether there was an unaddressed notification. Incredibly annoying. You can unlock an iPhone 100% of the time blindly while pulling it out of your pocket. Not so Android. 5. No, it doesn't really. Because on iOS the convention is top-left. If it's not there, then you don't have that functionality in that ap…

Just keep in mind that the people who are downvoting you are the people who have been proclaiming the year of the linux desktop since 1998.

You're never going to convince them that the cut and paste mechanism in X is borderline mental, it's awesome cuz it's open and you could fix it if you wanted to, but it's now 2014 and no one has, but we have 8 more broken ways to do it since 1998.

Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#58

Post by wcfields »

izzydata wrote: post #7

Almost all of this guys problems are the result of giving the user options that simply don't exist in iOS. If you really need your OS to tell you how YOU want to do things then I guess you really should go back to the locked down iOS. Choices are hard. Apparently even choosing what phone was too hard.

Is there a vetted list of "good" apps for Android for basic tasks?

Like let's say I'm coming from iOS and now I have a million choices of EVERYTHING that used to be stock, like what SMS App do I go with?

Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#59

Post by ssmoot »

blinkingled wrote: post #29
MBCook wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Insulting iOS users is not a productive way to start a discussion. 1) It's fair to let people choose a different app (I know many people really want this on iOS), but I think his complaint is valid. There are many situations where it's completely unclear to a new user why they should use app X over Y for photo management/SMS/etc. To ask them before they've even used the app the first time nearly ensures they're not r…

Insulting iOS users? Where do you get that from? Users are users - they have preferences. Some prefer simple and not having to think and some prefer tweaking, suprises and flexibility. If I had said "stupid" iOS users then it would be an insult. 1) No his complaint isn't valid. There are sensible defaults - it only becomes a choice if you install another app that does the same things. In this case Gallery is built in…

> You don't go buy an $699 unlocked phone and use it as a Specifically Optimized for Carrier X phone.

The point is you don't need to with an iPhone. I bought my 5C used and unlocked. No problems hopping onto AT&T with it. It's not "optimized" because it shouldn't be. The carrier is just "a series of tubes". I don't want to buy an AIO, TMobile or AT&T phone. I bought a MotoX because I wanted a MotoX.

Re: A User Experience Designer Switches from iOS to Android

#60

Post by mfish »

blinkingled wrote: post #52
mfish wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>He wanted T-Mobile VoiceMail app to be bundled no, he wanted voicemail. T-Mobile decided to require a different app.

> It took me forever to realize that I had to download the T-Mobile voicemail app to get my voicemail That's all he says. Nowhere in the post he says voicemail didn't work - he implies he wanted an app to get his Voicemail like iOS. The regular voicemail stuff just works on any stock Android GSM phone - you get a notification for new ones and you can tap that or long press 1 to go to carrier voice mail box for your o…

He never says like iOS. you are inserting that. he says he never realized that, in order to get his voicemail (and i read that as to get it in any way shape or form), he had to download t mobiles app.
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