6 ms·

Imo Googles new material design is not impressive. It does however help developers who are not good designers build a cookie cutter app.

blowski 9y ago
And it makes much of the internet look like it belongs to Google.
- nsebban 9y ago
  Not sure why your comment gets downvoted. It's a fair point, especially since non-geek people don't have a clue who produces the apps they have installed on their smartphone.
  - Dylan16807 9y ago
    > non-geek people don't have a clue who produces the apps Funny, that sounds to me like a counterargument to the idea that this makes things look like they come from google.
    - infogulch 9y ago
      In general people don't have a clue, but they obviously know the source of some Google apps like Gmail and search. But then they associate all apps with that design pattern with Google, since they do know Google apps.
- MikeAMartinez 9y ago
  I think this is the ultimate goal from Google's perspective at least
  - Griffinsauce 9y ago
    That's a very cynical view. I think their ultimate goal is getting nice looking and functioning apps on their platform. Material is an Interaction Design play first, a design play second and maaaaybe a branding play third but whatever. If it makes apps and the web a better place because every Joe Schmoe dev can focus on functionality instead of design (which a lot of people simply suck at) that's great.
    - andrewingram 9y ago
      But also not strictly on their platform. There's top-down "encouragement" from management to use Material Design in all their iOS apps too, which isn't really being a good citizen of the platform.
  - blowski 9y ago
    I'm not convinced it's their ultimate goal, or even one of their goals at all, since poor implementations could water down their branding. But it is definitely a side effect.
ehnto 9y ago
It's most impressive trait is that it is a holistic approach to UI and design. There aren't many "systems" out there for that. However I agree, there isn't much new and impressive in it and the evangelistic design chatter it created, much like the Flat Design trend, gets very stale and can stifle good conversation on the topic.
- Griffinsauce 9y ago
  What's sad is that people see it as an endpoint. While the thing is obviously meant to be a starting point, a baseline of "good design" that you can expand on if you wish, or stick to if you have better things to do. It moves the baseline from zero design to "good" .
  - ehnto 9y ago
    Which was the great thing about flat design too. It brought basic good design principles to the discussion. Whether you liked the asthetic or not, the core guiding principles were the real win. I feel like the creators of the Material Design site simply sought to formalize those principles and build upon them, which I think they have done a good job of.
cyberferret 9y ago
You can look at it in much the same way that the early versions of Windows enabled programmers to build applications that looked exactly alike. In much the same vein, Material's "paper" concepts are designed to minimise confusion for lay users - i.e. "What does clicking the '+' button do?". Once you standardise the symbols and appearance of certain widgets, it removes the "have to think about it" barrier. You could argue that EVERYONE who uses a Windows computer knows what the [x] on the top right corner of every window does. And like Windows, I think you will eventually see developers modify and extend Material to make applications stand apart from each other while maintaining some sort of consistency of the UI. But like windows, you will eventually get to the stage that developers corrupt simple things like checkboxes to operate in non logical ways (e.g. as radio buttons), or you end up with a screen where every conceivable square millimetre of the window is a 'hot point' that does something when you touch/click on it! (I/m looking at you Excel etc.)
- Illniyar 9y ago
  Well, frankly there are tons of apps where I have no idea what the + button do until I click it. Many times, it's not what I would think it would do.
  - Larrikin 9y ago
    How down the button and it'll say what it does.
- ocdtrekkie 9y ago
  As someone who helps seniors use their computers, if Material is designed to minimize confusion for lay users, Material is a complete failure. I once tried to help someone through the new Material Google Contacts app, and eventually gave up and sent them back to Comcast.net. Simple is not necessarily better when making UI. A '+' symbol will always be worse than 'Add contact'.
duiker101 9y ago
I don't think it's as much a design for designers but a design for users. It's a guideline that all apps can follow so that the user doesn't have to relearn every single app and is more likely to know where to find stuff. As far as aesthetics go it's not the greatest yes, but it doesn't have to be. Having a good looking foundation on which to base your app is great. If you really want it can always be innovated. There's plenty of nice changes you can find in different apps and it's always evolving.
- maaaats 9y ago
  As a user it's super un-intuitive, though. At least how gmail, calendar, maps and other google apps are on Android at the moment. I mostly click and pray.
  - DanBC 9y ago
    It's interesting that lots of people on HN say the same thing: I don't know how to perform an action; there are no affordances in the UI. But Google is a data driven company and they must, surely, have scads of data on this. They must know what their users are trying to do and how they're trying to do it, so why are Google interfaces so hard to use?
    - stuaxo 9y ago
      They can't get data on what goes through peoples heads before clicking an action, only if it was clicked or not.
    - welcomebrand 9y ago
      They still use their mighty data to show me ads for things I've literally just bought, I do sometimes wonder if all data is even.
    - ocdtrekkie 9y ago
      As a tech enthusiast, I occasionally get surveys to possibly sign up to try out a new version of a Google UI. I've never actually done it because the time windows don't usually work out, but signing up for these user studies is definitely something I ended up in by being in the tech crowd. But I also have done a lot of tech support for senior citizens, who don't have the innate ability to stumble through bad UI like a lot of us millenial-types do. I feel like Google is talking to the wrong people. I suspect that if Google UI designers spent some time in senior citizen communities watching people use their email, almost everything about how Google designs web pages would be thrown away.
sangnoir 9y ago
> Imo Googles new material design is not impressive. Agreed. I will add that I have seen some impressive designs that used the material design framework.
- weego 9y ago
  This is the thing. You need to invest not only in completely understanding how every aspect of material design works, you also have to understand that visual languages enforce strong opinion and aren't an expression of creative freedom. So if you understand it well enough and if you have enough weight to ensure what you are designing fits into it then it might work for you and your users. It seems to mostly be used like bootstrap thought and ends up being tedious and inconsistent. The worst kind of inconsistent as well, the one where you are mislead by familiarity that then doesn't turn out to be real.
colmvp 9y ago
I think what's interesting is they canonized the bottom navigation (https://material.io/guidelines/components/bottom-navigation.html https://material.io/guidelines/components/bottom-navigation....), a notable move given that many popular Android apps have historically opted to design the navigation of their app around the navigation drawer(https://material.io/guidelines/patterns/navigation-drawer.html https://material.io/guidelines/patterns/navigation-drawer.ht...), a philosophy that made the Android platform UI a bit distinct from iOS. Personally, I find a bottom navigation of primary functionality to be far more pleasing than having to tap twice. For example, on iOS Spotify was quite arduous to navigate when they tried simplifying the aesthetic by having all the navigation within side menus. Their later re-design to move content back into the bottom navigation was met with a lot of praise amongst users.
mhd 9y ago
I think that's the main issue: We're talking about"apps" here, where a unified HCI guide always was an important goal. Material design is basically using the Android's platform's UI in the browser. This application POV clashes with "web pages" being more a domain of print designers gone digital. Tschichold or Tognazzini...

blowski 9y ago

And it makes much of the internet look like it belongs to Google.

nsebban 9y ago
Not sure why your comment gets downvoted. It's a fair point, especially since non-geek people don't have a clue who produces the apps they have installed on their smartphone.
- Dylan16807 9y ago
  > non-geek people don't have a clue who produces the apps Funny, that sounds to me like a counterargument to the idea that this makes things look like they come from google.
  - infogulch 9y ago
    In general people don't have a clue, but they obviously know the source of some Google apps like Gmail and search. But then they associate all apps with that design pattern with Google, since they do know Google apps.
MikeAMartinez 9y ago
I think this is the ultimate goal from Google's perspective at least
- Griffinsauce 9y ago
  That's a very cynical view. I think their ultimate goal is getting nice looking and functioning apps on their platform. Material is an Interaction Design play first, a design play second and maaaaybe a branding play third but whatever. If it makes apps and the web a better place because every Joe Schmoe dev can focus on functionality instead of design (which a lot of people simply suck at) that's great.
  - andrewingram 9y ago
    But also not strictly on their platform. There's top-down "encouragement" from management to use Material Design in all their iOS apps too, which isn't really being a good citizen of the platform.
- blowski 9y ago
  I'm not convinced it's their ultimate goal, or even one of their goals at all, since poor implementations could water down their branding. But it is definitely a side effect.

ehnto 9y ago

It's most impressive trait is that it is a holistic approach to UI and design. There aren't many "systems" out there for that. However I agree, there isn't much new and impressive in it and the evangelistic design chatter it created, much like the Flat Design trend, gets very stale and can stifle good conversation on the topic.

Griffinsauce 9y ago
What's sad is that people see it as an endpoint. While the thing is obviously meant to be a starting point, a baseline of "good design" that you can expand on if you wish, or stick to if you have better things to do. It moves the baseline from zero design to "good" .
- ehnto 9y ago
  Which was the great thing about flat design too. It brought basic good design principles to the discussion. Whether you liked the asthetic or not, the core guiding principles were the real win. I feel like the creators of the Material Design site simply sought to formalize those principles and build upon them, which I think they have done a good job of.

cyberferret 9y ago

You can look at it in much the same way that the early versions of Windows enabled programmers to build applications that looked exactly alike. In much the same vein, Material's "paper" concepts are designed to minimise confusion for lay users - i.e. "What does clicking the '+' button do?". Once you standardise the symbols and appearance of certain widgets, it removes the "have to think about it" barrier. You could argue that EVERYONE who uses a Windows computer knows what the [x] on the top right corner of every window does. And like Windows, I think you will eventually see developers modify and extend Material to make applications stand apart from each other while maintaining some sort of consistency of the UI. But like windows, you will eventually get to the stage that developers corrupt simple things like checkboxes to operate in non logical ways (e.g. as radio buttons), or you end up with a screen where every conceivable square millimetre of the window is a 'hot point' that does something when you touch/click on it! (I/m looking at you Excel etc.)

Illniyar 9y ago
Well, frankly there are tons of apps where I have no idea what the + button do until I click it. Many times, it's not what I would think it would do.
- Larrikin 9y ago
  How down the button and it'll say what it does.
ocdtrekkie 9y ago
As someone who helps seniors use their computers, if Material is designed to minimize confusion for lay users, Material is a complete failure. I once tried to help someone through the new Material Google Contacts app, and eventually gave up and sent them back to Comcast.net. Simple is not necessarily better when making UI. A '+' symbol will always be worse than 'Add contact'.

duiker101 9y ago

I don't think it's as much a design for designers but a design for users. It's a guideline that all apps can follow so that the user doesn't have to relearn every single app and is more likely to know where to find stuff. As far as aesthetics go it's not the greatest yes, but it doesn't have to be. Having a good looking foundation on which to base your app is great. If you really want it can always be innovated. There's plenty of nice changes you can find in different apps and it's always evolving.

maaaats 9y ago
As a user it's super un-intuitive, though. At least how gmail, calendar, maps and other google apps are on Android at the moment. I mostly click and pray.
- DanBC 9y ago
  It's interesting that lots of people on HN say the same thing: I don't know how to perform an action; there are no affordances in the UI. But Google is a data driven company and they must, surely, have scads of data on this. They must know what their users are trying to do and how they're trying to do it, so why are Google interfaces so hard to use?
  - stuaxo 9y ago
    They can't get data on what goes through peoples heads before clicking an action, only if it was clicked or not.
  - welcomebrand 9y ago
    They still use their mighty data to show me ads for things I've literally just bought, I do sometimes wonder if all data is even.
  - ocdtrekkie 9y ago
    As a tech enthusiast, I occasionally get surveys to possibly sign up to try out a new version of a Google UI. I've never actually done it because the time windows don't usually work out, but signing up for these user studies is definitely something I ended up in by being in the tech crowd. But I also have done a lot of tech support for senior citizens, who don't have the innate ability to stumble through bad UI like a lot of us millenial-types do. I feel like Google is talking to the wrong people. I suspect that if Google UI designers spent some time in senior citizen communities watching people use their email, almost everything about how Google designs web pages would be thrown away.

sangnoir 9y ago

> Imo Googles new material design is not impressive. Agreed. I will add that I have seen some impressive designs that used the material design framework.

weego 9y ago
This is the thing. You need to invest not only in completely understanding how every aspect of material design works, you also have to understand that visual languages enforce strong opinion and aren't an expression of creative freedom. So if you understand it well enough and if you have enough weight to ensure what you are designing fits into it then it might work for you and your users. It seems to mostly be used like bootstrap thought and ends up being tedious and inconsistent. The worst kind of inconsistent as well, the one where you are mislead by familiarity that then doesn't turn out to be real.

colmvp 9y ago

I think what's interesting is they canonized the bottom navigation (https://material.io/guidelines/components/bottom-navigation.html https://material.io/guidelines/components/bottom-navigation....), a notable move given that many popular Android apps have historically opted to design the navigation of their app around the navigation drawer(https://material.io/guidelines/patterns/navigation-drawer.html https://material.io/guidelines/patterns/navigation-drawer.ht...), a philosophy that made the Android platform UI a bit distinct from iOS. Personally, I find a bottom navigation of primary functionality to be far more pleasing than having to tap twice. For example, on iOS Spotify was quite arduous to navigate when they tried simplifying the aesthetic by having all the navigation within side menus. Their later re-design to move content back into the bottom navigation was met with a lot of praise amongst users.

mhd 9y ago

I think that's the main issue: We're talking about"apps" here, where a unified HCI guide always was an important goal. Material design is basically using the Android's platform's UI in the browser. This application POV clashes with "web pages" being more a domain of print designers gone digital. Tschichold or Tognazzini...