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Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

cs.uml.edu

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Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#61

Post by ErroneousBosh »

mghackerlady wrote: post #4

I'm adding this to my repertoire of HIGs to study for a new desktop environment project I'm working on. I'm trying to synthesize the best parts of every computer interaction method, primarily focusing on desktops but looking at mobile designs as well. There are 2 principle reasons for this project: 1. UNIX desktops objectively suck compared to their Mac and Windows cousins, either being too complex to learn and bomba…

> or being so dumbed down and rigid to be actually usable (GNOME, to a lesser extend CDE)

What do you find "dumbed down" and unusable about it?

Press ctrl-alt-T, and a terminal appears. Begin typing.

Press the flag key and a kind of menu thing you can type the name of apps into appears. Type "firefox" or "vscode" as appropriate, begin typing.

It could hardly be made any more straightforward.

Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#62

Post by a1o »

mghackerlady wrote: post #4

I'm adding this to my repertoire of HIGs to study for a new desktop environment project I'm working on. I'm trying to synthesize the best parts of every computer interaction method, primarily focusing on desktops but looking at mobile designs as well. There are 2 principle reasons for this project: 1. UNIX desktops objectively suck compared to their Mac and Windows cousins, either being too complex to learn and bomba…

If you want some cool unusual UI, check out the HP Logic Analyzers (like the 16500A but there were others). It had a touch interface even though it had a CRT, and it had a knob for scrolling and for some alternative uses too - I think it used an encoder instead of a potentiometer but I may be misremembering. It was a really cool interface, I used it in early 2000s but it was old already by then, but it was really cool. There is a small website that documents its UI but I forgot the url.

Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#63

Post by msephton »

Lammy wrote: post #31
mghackerlady wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's on my list as well. I really appreciate the MacOS handles progressive disclosure, something most environments either get wrong or misunderstand ( caugh caugh GNOME caugh caugh ) ETA: One thing I forgot to mention is how playful MacOS was (and to an extent still is). They recognised that the easiest way to learn something is by messing with it and seeing what happens. It also caused it to be very approachable thr…

Needs moar Copland (R.I.P.) https://bitsavers.org/pdf/apple/mac/developer/Copland/D11E4_...

All* the HIG at https://github.com/gingerbeardman/apple-human-interface-guid...

*as many as we have found

Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#64

Post by WillAdams »

mghackerlady wrote: post #45
WillAdams wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want a photocopy of the Go Corp. PenPoint UI guidelines let me know and I'll see if I can dig out a copy from a binder which I got w/ an SDK I purchased years ago --- I really miss PenPoint, and always thought it was one of the better UI environments. contact info is my user name here at aol.com

1) I'll be sure to reach out 2) You still use AOL? Is it just you've had it long enough to not want to switch or do you actively choose to use it for some reason I might've missed?

Actually, looks like we can save a bit of postage --- looks like Archive.org has it:

https://archive.org/details/bitsavers_goPenPointeb91_1197014...

Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#65

Post by mrgoldenbrown »

sam1714 wrote: post #55
DaanDL wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much of their own guidelines they violated with MacOS Tahoe.

As they should. There are fundamental differences in hardware and capability between 1992 and 2026. The most immediate are pull-down menus at the top of the screen. They work good on a 9 inch screen, they are awful with 27 inch displays. Another related change are modal dialog boxes. When you have a 9 inch screen you're fundamentally looking at one document in one app at a time. When you got 2 27's that's not true an…

I'm assuming/hoping those original guidelines would have prevented the window resizing frustration we have now, along with the other usability downgrades in the support of eyecandy. https://noheger.at/blog/2026/01/11/the-struggle-of-resizing-...

Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#66

Post by andrewf »

Brian_K_White wrote: post #54

I miss the whole Palm ecosystem. I have noted many times that I had a slab phone with full screen color icon grid general purpose os with internet and countless 3rd party apps for every conceivable purpose,... 7 full years before the iphone. 8 years before the iphone had 3rd party apps. And it wasn't Android it was a Samsung SPH-i300 running PalmOS. It was great that there was not really much of an app store, you got…

I worked for a company that published a PalmOS app. Palmgear.com was a very important distribution channel, but so was our own website, I forget the exact ratios.

Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#67

Post by mghackerlady »

wao0uuno wrote: post #60
jimmaswell wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is KDE like that? If you don't go out of your way to change options, you aren't "bombarded" with anything, it just works.

I love KDE, especially since Plasma 6 release but oh man is the Settings program poorly designed and littered with settings 99% of users will never need. So many options placed seemingly at random. Similar options like lockscreen, login screen and desktop background settings spread out over 3 different main categories. Customization options so extensive and granular one can only wonder about their purpose. Even in th…

I actually really like KDEs other software, pretty much the only non-kde thing I use when I'm on plasma is firefox (despite actually liking falkon)

Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#68

Post by mghackerlady »

ErroneousBosh wrote: post #61
mghackerlady wrote: post #4

I'm adding this to my repertoire of HIGs to study for a new desktop environment project I'm working on. I'm trying to synthesize the best parts of every computer interaction method, primarily focusing on desktops but looking at mobile designs as well. There are 2 principle reasons for this project: 1. UNIX desktops objectively suck compared to their Mac and Windows cousins, either being too complex to learn and bomba…

> or being so dumbed down and rigid to be actually usable (GNOME, to a lesser extend CDE) What do you find "dumbed down" and unusable about it? Press ctrl-alt-T, and a terminal appears. Begin typing. Press the flag key and a kind of menu thing you can type the name of apps into appears. Type "firefox" or "vscode" as appropriate, begin typing. It could hardly be made any more straightforward.

Its not that (thats actually really good) its the application design being unsuitable for complex tasks

Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#69

Post by internet101010 »

mghackerlady wrote: post #4

I'm adding this to my repertoire of HIGs to study for a new desktop environment project I'm working on. I'm trying to synthesize the best parts of every computer interaction method, primarily focusing on desktops but looking at mobile designs as well. There are 2 principle reasons for this project: 1. UNIX desktops objectively suck compared to their Mac and Windows cousins, either being too complex to learn and bomba…

Not sure if you have experimented with it yet but COSMIC is a DE made by System76 (creators of Pop!_OS) and manages to get pretty close to what I have been seeking, which is essentially MacOS with tiling. They basically gave up on GNOME and built it in Rust from scratch. Still a few major things like HDR missing but overall it's solid.

You get the tiling without the config that comes with Hyprland, with the added option of toggling between tiled or floating. Settings are minimal but they are slowly adding more when there is enough demand. IDE-style theming is done at system-level so that applications match.

Re: Palm OS User Interface Guidelines (2003) [pdf]

#70

Post by felixding »

I can’t recommend another excellent free ebook enough: Zen of Palm.

It accurately describes the key differences between designing for desktop and mobile, which explains why PalmOS was so much easier to use than the various Windows-based mobile formats from Microsoft at the time. I even wrote a whole blog series about this book two decades ago (https://dingyu.me/blog/zen-of-palm-1).

I switched from a Dell Pocket PC to a Treo 650, and it was such a revelation. IMHO, this little phone is still one of the best in terms of simplicity, even today.

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