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You're right up to about 4). The iPhone had more power than 95-era computers and definitely could render buttons with bezels. It's just a design fad. iPhone re

by anon4 11y ago

You're right up to about 4). The iPhone had more power than 95-era computers and definitely could render buttons with bezels. It's just a design fad. iPhone removed a few decorations from the GUI to make it fit better on a small screen, then people just had to out-minimalise Apple and it all culminates in Windows 10's display settings dialog where resolution settings is hidden behind a clickable "advanced settings" label typeset with tiny font in grey on grey background.

jasode 11y ago
>You're right up to about 4). The iPhone had more power than 95-era computers Well, Win95 computers got never-ending electricity from a wall-outlet. Mobile phones expending cpu cycles on "unnecessary" GUI styling wastes battery power. You're right about the other justification: a mobile phone's "UI buttons" shouldn't waste pixels on boundaries (e.g. bounding rectangles). It just needs to be spaced far apart enough for fingertip width. Unfortunately, this design makes it impossible to distinguish between text that's just a "status" as opposed to a button that executes an "action".
- anon4 11y ago
  Those pixels are always drawn anyway. And a phone's biggest battery killer is the screen which... is on if you're looking at it. So, either your biggest power draw is already on, or there's no reason for you to put any pixels on screen.
  - jasode 11y ago
    >Those pixels are always drawn anyway. In terms of LCD being "on" vs "off", yes, they are always "on". However, the pixels for extra GUI effects must still be "computed". For example, Apple recommends that the "parallax" feature can be turned off to help conserve battery power. Parallax requires cpu computation to "draw" even though those pixels are always "on". It's the same concept of disabling screensavers on the thousands of servers in datacenters. Even those those pixels are always on, computing the drawings in screensavers consume cpu. Multiply the waste that by thousands of servers and the company is paying extra electricity bills for no reason.

by anon4 11y ago

jasode 11y ago

>You're right up to about 4). The iPhone had more power than 95-era computers Well, Win95 computers got never-ending electricity from a wall-outlet. Mobile phones expending cpu cycles on "unnecessary" GUI styling wastes battery power. You're right about the other justification: a mobile phone's "UI buttons" shouldn't waste pixels on boundaries (e.g. bounding rectangles). It just needs to be spaced far apart enough for fingertip width. Unfortunately, this design makes it impossible to distinguish between text that's just a "status" as opposed to a button that executes an "action".

anon4 11y ago
Those pixels are always drawn anyway. And a phone's biggest battery killer is the screen which... is on if you're looking at it. So, either your biggest power draw is already on, or there's no reason for you to put any pixels on screen.
- jasode 11y ago
  >Those pixels are always drawn anyway. In terms of LCD being "on" vs "off", yes, they are always "on". However, the pixels for extra GUI effects must still be "computed". For example, Apple recommends that the "parallax" feature can be turned off to help conserve battery power. Parallax requires cpu computation to "draw" even though those pixels are always "on". It's the same concept of disabling screensavers on the thousands of servers in datacenters. Even those those pixels are always on, computing the drawings in screensavers consume cpu. Multiply the waste that by thousands of servers and the company is paying extra electricity bills for no reason.