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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]

#81

Post by sam1714 »

mrgoldenbrown wrote: post #65
sam1714 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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-...

You don't have it "now" unless you didn't upgrade to 26.3.

But yes. The only way you can resize windows through System 7 is the resize widget. You cannot grab anywhere else and drag. They couldn't afford the extra chrome pixels, again, on a 512 x 342 screen.

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

#82

Post by tapoxi »

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.

they still, to this day, pretend the concept of a system tray doesn't exist. unfortunately applications expect one, so they put it behind a menu in a dropdown with a picture of a ghost so you know an app is hiding somewhere

it's insane

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

#83

Post by aquova »

Ars did a retrospective on the Palm line-up that I occasionally go back and re-read. I never got into the ecosystem, although my dad had a Palm III(?) when I was younger. Had I been a decade older I think I would've been infatuated with them.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/04/palm-os-and-the-devi...

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

#84

Post by DANmode »

mghackerlady wrote: post #20
klaussilveira wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't use modern Windows as a good reference in user interface and user experience. If anything, is an experiment in user hostility.

Certainly not a reference, rather I'm looking at what each platform does good and trying to combine them in a way that empowers the user rather than fearing them

Where can I follow your progress?

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

#85

Post by DANmode »

WillAdams wrote: post #50
mghackerlady wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

1. I'll start looking 2. Yes, I was a charter member (who unfortunately, was broke when they offered the chance to buy stock), and it's easy to remember, and everything online account-wise is tied to it, and if I could still be paying for it and having my member FTP/webspace, I would.

- Does the webmail client load in 800x600?

- When you load it, and there’s unread mail…does it still tell you in the most glorious way?

- Do they comply with modern encryption? I haven’t exchanged email with an AOL or AIM address in 15 years, it seems!

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

#87

Post by rrix2 »

My first personal computer was a Palm and my earliest programming experiences came with reading these docs, how fun. For a young person whose parents' custody arrangement led to almost every night of sleep under a different roof, a wifi enabled OS with a great applicaton library that was always with me was really powerful and ended up being quite impactful on the arc of my life.

By high school I was writing apps that followed this hig with a fold up keyboard, designing the ui and compiling code on board the device. PalmOS 4 and 5 could be tricked out to be a whole computer, capable of working offline for a week and also could get you up all night on IRC and ebooks. it's hard to imagine using my smartphone offline for a week now....

and most of the apps implemented this hig and were straightforward to use because it was the defeult builtin toolkit largely the same its entire life, progressively enhanced GUIs from 1bit 160x160 to full color 320x480 responsive design... nowadays I'm building a Material3 app in my evenings and i know some day google is gonna make a material4 so that my app looks scuffed up

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

#88

Post by Ylpertnodi »

jcalvinowens wrote: post #33

I didn't know the impetus for the graffiti writing was actually hardware limitations, that's fascinating: > Gaffiti power writing software was another design decision affected by the battery selection. During the design of the first Palm handhelds, users were clamoring for natural handwriting recognition. However, natural handwriting recognition would require a more powerful processor and more memory, which together…

I still do my 'v's backwards.

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

#89

Post by Wowfunhappy »

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 think the "somehow" is the extremely integrated app store. Previously, if there were any app stores, they didn't really matter. It didn't hurt you not to be in them because hardly any users were either. But today it's basically just a technicality to say that you don't have to be in the official app store, and not even theoretically/technically true in many cases.

I don't think this in itself is the cause. Basically every Linux distribution has an "official repository" which is really just an app store by another name, but the system is still open. Having an integrated distribution channel is really useful!

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

#90

Post by cyrc »

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…

For user interface designers. A sincere request to consider these old interfaces like Palm OS, IBM CUA, Mac System 6 for a modern Linux GUI.

The simple black and white interface reduces cognitive load and decision fatigue. Modern UI like skeumorphic, material, drop shadows, 3d interface, aero, glass etc are high cognitive load for some individuals.

A text heavy interface and GUIs that are explicit, not implicit and learnt through discovery is easier for me.

A link to the an article. The picture shows that the IBM CUA works for both terminal and Windows 2.0 type GUI in simple black and white.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/from-cua-today-enduring-legac...

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