8 ms·

Eye Candy vs. Bare-Bones in UI Design

19 points by nreece 17y ago

pedalpete 17y ago
This article makes some good points about the balance of design & graphics, but with the first image being of the windows 'ribbon' interface, I wish the author would have used that as an example, and am curious if the author would use that as an example of bad design. Personally, i still can't adjust to the ribbon, too much going on, and lacks direction. At the same time it is great to hear Donald Norman perspective 'prettier things are actually easier to use, or are at least are perceived to be.' This is my opinion of Mac's (which I am typing this on now). Pretty, but I think most people confuse that with easier to use.
- iamcalledrob 17y ago
  I would argue that the Mac is easier to use not because it is pretty, but because it feels considered from the ground up to be a pleasure to use, rather than an afterthought. Things people mistake for "pretty", such as the genie minimising effect are actually cues that show clearly what your action has done. Similarly, having a single menu bar at the top of the screen gives the menu items infinite height, so they're much easier to target than the menus on Windows (this is especially important on laptops with trackpads). ..of course, some of it is just pretty. damn pretty.
  - Qz 17y ago
    At the same time, the single top menu makes it harder to access menu items of two programs simultaneously. If you have two different programs side by side, in windows you can just click the menus on either one, but in mac you have to click the window you want to use, then move up to the top to click the menu, then back and so on. I'm a bit biased, I have double display set up so I constantly switch between 4-5 windows at a time. If I had to click on the top menu all the time as on a mac I would go a little more insane. Personally I think both the mac and windows setups are junk, which is why I'm making my own desktop shell.
    - brehaut 17y ago
      Purely anecdotally, i have found that applications that are native to the mac are not as reliant on the menu bar for the most of their tasks than their windows counterparts. As a result i don't find having to switch applications to access a menu particularly onerous.
      - Qz 17y ago
        I think menu bars in general are a relic and should be done away with entirely. I can't count how many applications have the obligatory File/Edit/Tools/Help menus when the application has absolutely no need for them. Some of the newer microsoft apps have been moving away from them, which is a good sign, but they're obviously not the king of innovation. I have an idea for how to shake things up, which is what I'm working on.
  - pedalpete 17y ago
    if I understand what you are saying about the top menu, you're stating that the ability to have unlimited menu items in a single menu is great??? You have to be kidding! When have you ever run out of space for a menu? If your menu has that many items in it, I suspect there is something very wrong. I may have completely misunderstood what you meant (I hope I did). On the other hand, having the single menu at the top means that the menu is not explicitly linked to the program window. In Mac it is possible (though I haven't done it yet) to save a file, from the wrong window, as it is easy to get confused as to which is the 'active' window. I think the top menu bar is exactly the kind of thing I'm referring to when I say it keeps the mac pretty, but not necessarily functional. It keeps the menus in a highly ignored location so the features of a program don't mess with the clean look of the window.
    - brehaut 17y ago
      You have misunderstood. With regard to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fittss_law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fittss_law (a law that tells you how likely you are to successfully 'click' a control on screen based on its size and the distance to travel), the target are for the menu click is infinitely high because you can just ram your mouse vertically as it will not move past the 0th row of pxs thus always leaving you in the vertical bounds of the control, all that is left for the user to concern themselves with is x coordinate position. Additionally the 4 corners of the screen are sweet spots for controls as they have infinity x * infinity y target size.
      - pbz 17y ago
        OK... then what do you say about having to aim for the bottom right corner in order to resize a window? Seems to me like whatever you gain from having an easy to aim menu system is negated by the difficulty of aiming the resize area. I'd argue that one resizes a window more often than access the menu (at least in my case).
        brehaut 17y ago
        Correct, it is finickity. I also probably resize my windows more than reach for the menu bar. On the other hand, putting a direct manipulation control in the corner of the screen where it would get maximum fitt's law benefits would mean it was no longer a direct manipulation control which would make it significantly more finickity to perform the actual resize once you have 'acquired' the control_and_ would take that piece of valuable screen real-estate away from more useful controls. Secondly, by attaching the menu bar to window you still have the same problem with a finickity resize control and you loose the advantage of the top anchored menu bar. Certainly window resizing in Windows is just as finickity (actually, possibly more so, windows in windows don't have to have the status bar resize thumb that is the norm in mac os x. I'm sure theres actual HCI research about windows vs mac os x resize interactions but I don't have any of it handy so wild speculation will have to do). [Strange aside regarding Chrome: the window itself doesn't have a resize thumb (only border resizing) yet the text areas do. On the other hand there is no visual feedback to indicate that you have acquired the resize thumb]
- shmichael 17y ago
  Several advantages of the ribbon: Allows a more "organic" grouping of functions, e.g. All the design-related items are grouped together, then there is a subgrouping of font, paragraph, etc. Similar items are closer, either horizontally or vertically. Multiple methods of communications: icons alongside text and color Allows manipulation of attributes in-place (no popups) Easy-to-find keyboard shortcuts (hold Alt for a whole second)
brehaut 17y ago
One factor of pretty that wasn't discussed is that a pretty (rather than just bling-fueled) interface is often one that has a lot of attention to detail paid to it, thus it is an indicator that other aspects may have received equivalent care.
- lsc 17y ago
  Really? I mean, I had one (potential) customer who checked out a rather nice (tier 3) data center and said he didn't like it because the paint on the doors was scratched up. "if they ignore that detail, what other details are they skimping on?" The guy ended up over at one of the cut-rate (tier 1) datacenters that skimped on cooling and power but paid extra attention to things like paint and free drinks. Now, I'm in no position to judge UIs, but I am in a position to judge datacenters, and picking the datacenter with the nicest paint is about as retarded as picking the programmer in the nicest suit. I suspect (though, of course, don't know) that a similar principle applies to UI design and eye candy.
  - brehaut 17y ago
    Firstly, I agree that its certainly not a definite signifier of quality, but it is an indication that care has been paid. Secondly, the floor on the data center to me sounds like its closer to the box the software came in than to the interface itself. From a users perspective the interface _is_ the software whereas the box (and the painted floor) are merely a nicity that you only see once. I can't stretch the analogue any further though because I don't know data centers.
    - lsc 17y ago
      I'm just railing against this idea that unrelated details are an indicator that care has been paid to important things. Now, not everything is like the programmer in a suit; I know so little about UI that it's possible that things I see as unrelated details are not, in fact, unrelated.
      - brehaut 17y ago
richcollins 17y ago
Eye candy is mostly about conspicuous consumption. It makes it look like you have resources to spare so you must be doing something right.
kentosi 17y ago
One opinion I do want to throw out there is with the screenshot the author has of the mac Coda application. What strikes me as completely out of place interms of visual asthetics is the mac vertical scroll bar. While the rest of the screenshot looks pretty consistent interms of colour (low-contract, grey(ish) shades, modest use of gradients), there's this bright, shiny, blue, bubble-shaped scroll bar wedged inside a heavily-gradiented scrollbar background. Whenever I see UI articles pointing to mac appeal, this is the first thing that strikes me as out of place. And I hope I'm not the only who thinks so.
- Groxx 17y ago
  You're most definitely not. Look to iTunes to see what Apple is experimenting with in terms of UI, it's typically a release or two ahead. Some things are retained, some things are lost, of course. I think the shiny-blue scroll bars are doomed fairly soon, and looking at iTunes suggests they are indeed. The scroll bars there are a much less obtrusive non-glossy, paler base with a blue-grey tone, all heavily anti-aliased. They're also narrower, which I hope is kept. I rarely use the scroll bar, and most Mac users I know don't either; the two-finger scroll is more than accurate enough, and any specific point is still accessible by clicking on a specific location. Having a large one is unnecessary space waste, and draws your eye away from the content of the application.

19 points by nreece 17y ago

This article makes some good points about the balance of design & graphics, but with the first image being of the windows 'ribbon' interface, I wish the author would have used that as an example, and am curious if the author would use that as an example of bad design. Personally, i still can't adjust to the ribbon, too much going on, and lacks direction. At the same time it is great to hear Donald Norman perspective 'prettier things are actually easier to use, or are at least are perceived to be.' This is my opinion of Mac's (which I am typing this on now). Pretty, but I think most people confuse that with easier to use.

iamcalledrob 17y ago
I would argue that the Mac is easier to use not because it is pretty, but because it feels considered from the ground up to be a pleasure to use, rather than an afterthought. Things people mistake for "pretty", such as the genie minimising effect are actually cues that show clearly what your action has done. Similarly, having a single menu bar at the top of the screen gives the menu items infinite height, so they're much easier to target than the menus on Windows (this is especially important on laptops with trackpads). ..of course, some of it is just pretty. damn pretty.
- Qz 17y ago
  At the same time, the single top menu makes it harder to access menu items of two programs simultaneously. If you have two different programs side by side, in windows you can just click the menus on either one, but in mac you have to click the window you want to use, then move up to the top to click the menu, then back and so on. I'm a bit biased, I have double display set up so I constantly switch between 4-5 windows at a time. If I had to click on the top menu all the time as on a mac I would go a little more insane. Personally I think both the mac and windows setups are junk, which is why I'm making my own desktop shell.
  - brehaut 17y ago
    Purely anecdotally, i have found that applications that are native to the mac are not as reliant on the menu bar for the most of their tasks than their windows counterparts. As a result i don't find having to switch applications to access a menu particularly onerous.
    - Qz 17y ago
      I think menu bars in general are a relic and should be done away with entirely. I can't count how many applications have the obligatory File/Edit/Tools/Help menus when the application has absolutely no need for them. Some of the newer microsoft apps have been moving away from them, which is a good sign, but they're obviously not the king of innovation. I have an idea for how to shake things up, which is what I'm working on.
- pedalpete 17y ago
  if I understand what you are saying about the top menu, you're stating that the ability to have unlimited menu items in a single menu is great??? You have to be kidding! When have you ever run out of space for a menu? If your menu has that many items in it, I suspect there is something very wrong. I may have completely misunderstood what you meant (I hope I did). On the other hand, having the single menu at the top means that the menu is not explicitly linked to the program window. In Mac it is possible (though I haven't done it yet) to save a file, from the wrong window, as it is easy to get confused as to which is the 'active' window. I think the top menu bar is exactly the kind of thing I'm referring to when I say it keeps the mac pretty, but not necessarily functional. It keeps the menus in a highly ignored location so the features of a program don't mess with the clean look of the window.
  - brehaut 17y ago
    You have misunderstood. With regard to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fittss_law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fittss_law (a law that tells you how likely you are to successfully 'click' a control on screen based on its size and the distance to travel), the target are for the menu click is infinitely high because you can just ram your mouse vertically as it will not move past the 0th row of pxs thus always leaving you in the vertical bounds of the control, all that is left for the user to concern themselves with is x coordinate position. Additionally the 4 corners of the screen are sweet spots for controls as they have infinity x * infinity y target size.
    - pbz 17y ago
      OK... then what do you say about having to aim for the bottom right corner in order to resize a window? Seems to me like whatever you gain from having an easy to aim menu system is negated by the difficulty of aiming the resize area. I'd argue that one resizes a window more often than access the menu (at least in my case).
      - brehaut 17y ago
        Correct, it is finickity. I also probably resize my windows more than reach for the menu bar. On the other hand, putting a direct manipulation control in the corner of the screen where it would get maximum fitt's law benefits would mean it was no longer a direct manipulation control which would make it significantly more finickity to perform the actual resize once you have 'acquired' the control_and_ would take that piece of valuable screen real-estate away from more useful controls. Secondly, by attaching the menu bar to window you still have the same problem with a finickity resize control and you loose the advantage of the top anchored menu bar. Certainly window resizing in Windows is just as finickity (actually, possibly more so, windows in windows don't have to have the status bar resize thumb that is the norm in mac os x. I'm sure theres actual HCI research about windows vs mac os x resize interactions but I don't have any of it handy so wild speculation will have to do). [Strange aside regarding Chrome: the window itself doesn't have a resize thumb (only border resizing) yet the text areas do. On the other hand there is no visual feedback to indicate that you have acquired the resize thumb]
shmichael 17y ago
Several advantages of the ribbon: Allows a more "organic" grouping of functions, e.g. All the design-related items are grouped together, then there is a subgrouping of font, paragraph, etc. Similar items are closer, either horizontally or vertically. Multiple methods of communications: icons alongside text and color Allows manipulation of attributes in-place (no popups) Easy-to-find keyboard shortcuts (hold Alt for a whole second)

brehaut 17y ago

One factor of pretty that wasn't discussed is that a pretty (rather than just bling-fueled) interface is often one that has a lot of attention to detail paid to it, thus it is an indicator that other aspects may have received equivalent care.

lsc 17y ago
Really? I mean, I had one (potential) customer who checked out a rather nice (tier 3) data center and said he didn't like it because the paint on the doors was scratched up. "if they ignore that detail, what other details are they skimping on?" The guy ended up over at one of the cut-rate (tier 1) datacenters that skimped on cooling and power but paid extra attention to things like paint and free drinks. Now, I'm in no position to judge UIs, but I am in a position to judge datacenters, and picking the datacenter with the nicest paint is about as retarded as picking the programmer in the nicest suit. I suspect (though, of course, don't know) that a similar principle applies to UI design and eye candy.
- brehaut 17y ago
  Firstly, I agree that its certainly not a definite signifier of quality, but it is an indication that care has been paid. Secondly, the floor on the data center to me sounds like its closer to the box the software came in than to the interface itself. From a users perspective the interface _is_ the software whereas the box (and the painted floor) are merely a nicity that you only see once. I can't stretch the analogue any further though because I don't know data centers.
  - lsc 17y ago
    I'm just railing against this idea that unrelated details are an indicator that care has been paid to important things. Now, not everything is like the programmer in a suit; I know so little about UI that it's possible that things I see as unrelated details are not, in fact, unrelated.
    - brehaut 17y ago

richcollins 17y ago

Eye candy is mostly about conspicuous consumption. It makes it look like you have resources to spare so you must be doing something right.

kentosi 17y ago

One opinion I do want to throw out there is with the screenshot the author has of the mac Coda application. What strikes me as completely out of place interms of visual asthetics is the mac vertical scroll bar. While the rest of the screenshot looks pretty consistent interms of colour (low-contract, grey(ish) shades, modest use of gradients), there's this bright, shiny, blue, bubble-shaped scroll bar wedged inside a heavily-gradiented scrollbar background. Whenever I see UI articles pointing to mac appeal, this is the first thing that strikes me as out of place. And I hope I'm not the only who thinks so.

Groxx 17y ago
You're most definitely not. Look to iTunes to see what Apple is experimenting with in terms of UI, it's typically a release or two ahead. Some things are retained, some things are lost, of course. I think the shiny-blue scroll bars are doomed fairly soon, and looking at iTunes suggests they are indeed. The scroll bars there are a much less obtrusive non-glossy, paler base with a blue-grey tone, all heavily anti-aliased. They're also narrower, which I hope is kept. I rarely use the scroll bar, and most Mac users I know don't either; the two-finger scroll is more than accurate enough, and any specific point is still accessible by clicking on a specific location. Having a large one is unnecessary space waste, and draws your eye away from the content of the application.