7 ms·

How Not to Design a Microwave

36 points by jordansmithnz 9y ago

johnsnow0 9y ago
On not reinventing the wheel and consistency, this is where all "Electron Desktop" apps are at now, UI tends to be "fancy" and alien to the host operating system.
avian 9y ago
I don't understand the "You are Not the User" mantra. In the past I've worked in teams where we were actively using the product we were developing. Dogfooding is a pretty established practice these days. For most purposes, I was The User - the user finding bugs, performance problems, etc. - but not user interface problems. For the UI I was Not The User. The Users for UI were these hypothetical beings only UI experts could came up with.
- ivan_gammel 9y ago
  Developers actively using their product always have expert bias and may not represent the target audience of the product. Also, in most cases it's a wrong assumption that you use something exactly in the same ways as others, so decisions based on developer or designer own experience are usually not optimal and may actually harm the users that would purchase the product or service.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    Part of the "expert bias" is that you want the tool let you do the job as efficiently as possible, which is also something the users want. It's, however, not what the marketing department wants.
    - ivan_gammel 9y ago
      There are two wrong assumptions you are making here. First of all, "Doing the job as efficiently as possible" is not a user's desire. Users always want concrete things and developer's opinion on what that could be or how that will be achieved by a particular user is very often quite far from reality. Second, it's not a developer's job to create a tool that will help users to solve some problem in the way he thinks it is right. It is not what developer is paid for. His job is to work together with marketing department to deliver a product that is always a compromise between the business and the user, a product, that is just good enough, in a deal, which is good only then, when noone is happy with it, but everyone can accept it.
      - TeMPOraL 9y ago
        > a product, that is just good enough, in a deal, which is good only then, when noone is happy with it, but everyone can accept it. I refuse to accept that is right, even though it is what seems to be happening everywhere. That's probably the root of my opinion. I'm a believer in the concept of making money through providing value to the customer.
exikyut 9y ago
I don't like that this doesn't provide any sort of suggestion for how to design a microwave oven UI, nor a video of the demonstrated model in action.
- roryisok 9y ago
  The best microwave UI has just two dials. Temperature and time. For years my microwave experience involved mostly just twisting the latter and walking away. I've gone out of my way to find microwaves with this control set. Unfortunately the most recent one I bought has buttons and settings, and I hate it. I want the dials back.
  - xxxdarrenxxx 9y ago
    But that's for a microwave and I agree. An advanced one has extra options that are functionally valid, like blowing more air as opposed to wave radiation/convection heat, or adding more moisture surrounding it to keep that chicken moist, adding some top grill heat to give more caramelisation on the skin etc. These things requires a brain puzzle if you only use 2 buttons (think oldskool micro devices or configuring digital watches), and adding more buttons for these options offers arguably a more direct and simple user experience if you rtfm.
Svenstaro 9y ago
But how do you actually use the shown microwave then?
- wyufro 9y ago
  He really should've told near the end. Anyway, I assume you press the power button, because that is the established standard for microwaves in the last 10 years or so. Probably there might be a timeout and then it starts automatically. This is indeed something you have to learn though, first time I encountered this kind of microwave it baffled me as well.
- tenryuu 9y ago
  The instruction manual is 44 pages long https://www.fisherpaykel.com/download/user-guide/Kitchen/Cook/Microwave%20Ovens/590262d-nz-au-gb-ie-microwave-om36ndxb-guide.pdf https://www.fisherpaykel.com/download/user-guide/Kitchen/Coo...
  - rootlocus 9y ago
    Took me 10s to find page 18 which has everything needed to use it as a microwave. Sometimes I think users are getting too spoiled and simply refuse to RTFM. Not to mention the article complains about the UI for an oven, confuses the oven with a microwave and then gives advice for designing iphone apps.
    - kyberias 9y ago
      Do you really think that it's reasonable to require users to read user manual in order to use a _microwave_?
      - rootlocus 9y ago
        It's a multipurpose oven, not a microwave.
- christoph 9y ago
  Where the article seems to go wrong is with the very idea that this is a microwave. It's not. It's a combination of microwave and grill hence the hinging of the door not matching a typical microwave.
sebazzz 9y ago
I have a microwave from the Etna brand that has a big flaw in the UI. I believe the software is reused in many microwaves because the cheap ass microwave from the Lidl my parents have has the same interface. The flaw: In the first step you need to select the amount of heating. Not in absolute numbers but in the percentage of total power (100, 80, 50, etc). So every time you need to calculate how much power each percentage represents.
electic 9y ago
The article doesn't really go into what the perfect UI would look like. It is more of a buzz feed type article. That being said, my microwave just broke down and I headed to the store to buy a new one. I was really disappointed at the new models. The UI seems to be getting worse on them. I have a feeling they are not even trying to innovate because it has become a low margin device. People are still trying if you are interested. Articles: https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/28006/why-do-microwave-oven-uis-fail https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/28006/why-do-microwav... https://medium.com/@bn/this-is-how-a-microwave-should-work-4e33b5c38b68 https://medium.com/@bn/this-is-how-a-microwave-should-work-4... Art Mockups: https://www.behance.net/gallery/15102955/Microwave-Redesign-Touch-screen-interface-design https://www.behance.net/gallery/15102955/Microwave-Redesign-... https://dribbble.com/shots/1309476-Microwave-UX-Concept https://dribbble.com/shots/1309476-Microwave-UX-Concept https://dribbble.com/shots/1449210-Microwave-Concept-PSD https://dribbble.com/shots/1449210-Microwave-Concept-PSD https://dribbble.com/shots/3249355-Smart-microwave-UI-concept https://dribbble.com/shots/3249355-Smart-microwave-UI-concep... If you have others, feel free to comment! Appliance UX/UI is a very neglected area.
- dmitriid 9y ago
  While the StackExchange link is awesome, the rest are just horrible. As with all these wannabe designers they go for the wow effect. It takes about half a second of rational thought to see why. All these art mockups are just that: art mockups. "How do I make a thing look pretty". A tired mantra of programming smays: make it work, make it fast, and only then make it pretty. Touch screens in the kitchen. In the effing kitchen! When you are often up to your eyebrows in grease, oil, flour, vegetable juices etc. Oh, look, you have to turn the knob to set the time. To set the power you have to touch some other area and then turn the nob again. To set the time, you have to touch that area again to switch modes, and then set the time. BUT WHY? This is solved with just having two knobs! https://johnlewis.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/233182566?$prod_exlrg$ https://johnlewis.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/233182566?$p... Oh, look. As it starts, it shows you time remaining, and a stop button. Because you never ever in your entire life would want to, say, adjust time. Nope? The thought never even occured to the designer. Oh, look, there are still multiple small buttons (that are already awkward on a vertical pane), but let's make them touch buttons! Oh, and let's leave them exactly the same as they are now, because the only reason why people don't understand how they work is because they are not touch buttons. Make them touch buttons! They will immediately become intuitive! Oh, look, the iOS time scroller! Because that's exactly what I need: to be able to set 23h 29m 31s by scrolling through infinite lists of numbers. I wonder why is it that the vast majority of microwave uses are around 30s to 5min range on max power? I could go on
homero 9y ago
Only button I ever use is the add 30 seconds button. Keep pushing until desired and it'll start on its own. A big frustration is not being able to turn off the damn reminder tone though so I have to wait around to clear it when done.
- prawn 9y ago
  Same. Any microwave that can't start with one button push is a time waster IMO. That and Cancel are the only buttons I typically use.
  - mavhc 9y ago
    Why bother with Cancel when you can just open the door? I prefer 0-9 buttons, and lots of memories, mine has 3.
    - prawn 9y ago
      Cancel time-remaining if you quit cooking early. Leaving 12 seconds on the clock won't fly with OCD types, surely? If you wanted a minimalist microwave though, you could have it reset each time the door is opened or after a minute or two of inactivity.
    - homero 9y ago
      I never open the door, scared of the radiation
tobr 9y ago
In my experience almost every microwave oven has terrible usability. It’s as if the design problem is so simple and the “correct” design (two independent, labeled, mechanical dials for time and power) is so obvious that everyone has to make their own version of it to look cool or sophisticated or something. I guess they never user test these things, because that doesn’t help sell more of them. There really ought to be a usability certification for products like these, a verification by an independent organization that a typical user is able to operate the most important functionality with few or no errors.
- Johnny555 9y ago
  The button I use the most on my Microwave is "add 30 seconds", I use it for almost everything, hitting it repeatedly to get more than 30 seconds. I rarely want more than a few minutes of heating time, and I rarely need more than 30 seconds of granularity so that one button handles most of my microwaving needs. Though I agree that dials would be better -- I wish cars weren't moving toward touchscreens, in my old car I could adjust pretty much everything in the car - radio, climate control, etc without looking. In my current car, there's a touch screen for pretty much everything except radio volume which is on the steering wheel.
  - Thlom 9y ago
    Yeah, I have a gazillion buttons on my microwave, but the only button I really use is the Start/add 30 sec button. If I want to adjust power I can adjust from 150 to 600, and then there's a "Jet" function, but I have no idea what that is. More than 600? 750 maybe? Who knows.
- Grue3 9y ago
  Dial is a bad design for time, because most of the time people want to heat something up for a short time: 15, 30 or 60 seconds. On many microwaves this involves slightly turning a dial and then counting the required number of seconds in your head (because the exact angle is too small to select right away). A log scale dial would solve this problem, but then it makes adding another 30 seconds a non-trivial operation, because the angle is no longer constant.
nateguchi 9y ago
Most microwaves I've seen now seem to have the same (annoying) interface/software where you have to first select the power (always 100%), press start (it doesn't start), then select then time and press start (actually starts then). What ever happened to the microwaves where you could key in a time and just press start?
drblast 9y ago
My ideal: Ten number buttons, 0-9, but each also corresponds to a useful time. 0 10 sec 1 15 sec 2 20 sec 3 30 sec 4 45 sec 5 1 min ... Etc Pressing any of those would auto start immediately with the corresponding time. If you want an exact time like 34 seconds, hit the cook time button and now the ten buttons act as digits. Then hit start. Pressing any of these while the microwave is running would add that corresponding amout of time. I guess you'd also need a power level button and a clock set button. There, all done.
- wikibob 9y ago
  FYI this is precisely how commercial kitchen microwaves work. Next time you’re at a fast food restaurant have a look and you’ll probably spot one. https://www.webstaurantstore.com/panasonic-ne-17521-stainless-steel-commercial-microwave-oven-208-230-240v-1700w/609NE17521.html https://www.webstaurantstore.com/panasonic-ne-17521-stainles...
  - nnq 9y ago
    It works, and it's fast to use. But it's for commercial/professional usage, where doing a set of standard common tasks with fewer number of actions is best. Having home/office-use microwaves work like this is basically akin to forcing an average office user expecting something like Microsoft Word, to write Markdown in Vim instead...
    - TeMPOraL 9y ago
      > Having home/office-use microwaves work like this is basically akin to forcing an average office user expecting something like Microsoft Word, to write Markdown in Vim instead... If that average office user is going to write something (or use a microwave) more than a few times in their lives, it's worth to force them, because the (very small) cost of additional learning is almost immediately offset by gained efficiency. Alas, what matters is short-time thinking, so UIs are designed for sellability instead of helping people do their tasks correctly and efficiently.
XorNot 9y ago
I remember a Linuxconf AU presentation on building a better microwave - the idea being to use a low-res automotive thermal sensor array to watch the turntable, and be able to set it to "heat this to 100 degrees" and have it actually do exactly that. There were other things you got "for free" after that - like defrost-without-cooking by ensuring all pixels remained below a target temp, but got above some other temp. Hope that guy builds it.
- panic 9y ago
  The problem is that this forces you to make a confusing decision right at the start. You almost never know what temperature to heat something to -- you just want to put it in the oven for 30 seconds, see if it's good enough, and then repeat.
  - XorNot 9y ago
    Or a problem solved by sane defaults: i.e. 65ish degrees is quite hot, whereas 55 is about the upper limit of long-term bearable on the skin. Put that option as the heating default, with literally what I just wrote explaining it next to it, and problem solved.
- ivan_gammel 9y ago
  Typical UX design by an engineer as it is, with wrong assumptions about user expectations. The users of microwaves do not want to heat something to 100 degrees. They either want warm food or they want to cook. Warming means, that not only surface temperature measured by sensors has to be comfortable, but the temperature of the whole meal, which depends on thermal conductivity and penetration depth of microwaves for specific food and cannot be controlled by a sensor array alone. People will just hit "start" again, if they feel it's not ready. For cooking people will either use recipe from a book provided with microwave and thus they need just a selection of a program, or they will use more advanced microwave with oven and will want to set temperature of the oven to something like 200 degrees for 40 minutes. In this case sensor would be useful, but it's already not a microwave story.
  - 9y ago
hpaavola 9y ago
https://johnlewis.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/233182566?$prod_exlrg$ https://johnlewis.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/233182566?$p... One knob for time, other for power. All other UIs feel just wrong after using this. Microwaves usea to have this kind of UI when those came to market.
- BoppreH 9y ago
  I find it interesting it's time per gram. Does it have a scale inside? Combined with the easy-to-understand knobs, this does sound much better.
  - mrob 9y ago
    It's not "per gram", it's an dual function dial, used for both time and weight. If the lower dial is switched to defrost mode (2nd position) then the upper dial is switched to weight input. There is no scale inside.
  - ThePadawan 9y ago
    The label means "time or grams", where "grams" only applies for defrosting. Defrosting x grams typically takes y seconds, which is just a table lookup. As defrosting most typically involves leftovers (rather than pre-packaged meals or ingredients), you will probably only know their weight, not how long it will take to defrost off the top of your head.
    - panic 9y ago
      I think a small improvement to the design would be to use words (COOK TIME / DEFROST GRAMS), with the "DEFROST GRAMS" text colored to match the defrost option on the bottom (which should also use the word, "DEFROST"). This would let you figure out what the dial does without having to think as much about it. You could also change the screen backlight color in DEFROST mode to reinforce the mode change.
    - TeMPOraL 9y ago
      > As defrosting most typically involves leftovers (rather than pre-packaged meals or ingredients), you will probably only know their weight, not how long it will take to defrost off the top of your head. How would one know that? Do people routinely put leftovers on a scale before putting them into a microwave?
dredmorbius 9y ago
The point is not the microwave. It's UI. Though perhaps a metastory might be "how not to write a UI essay". (I actually rather liked this one. The off-the-rails discussion suggests either I'm an exception or the point isn't being clearly communicated.)
bcoates 9y ago
I would put up with a hieroglyphic based UI ten times weirder than the one depicted if it meant the microwave didn't beep. Seriously, what is it with embedded digital electronics designers and beeping? Nothing else has a gratuitous noisemaker. I swear if the home refrigerator was invented after the cheap piezo buzzer it would emit an ear-piercing bleep every time the door opened, or maybe when the compressor cycled on or off. Is there some sort of strange subsidy or tax consequence so that adding a beeper has negative net cost?
- napsterbr 9y ago
  I feel you. My microwave oven makes 4 lousy beeps once it's done... And will be more than happy to repeat those 4 beeps every 30 seconds until you open the damn door
- jgtrosh 9y ago
  I'm sure that without that feedback mistakes can happen that might be blamed on UI (didn't press the start/reheat/&c. button all the way through). Similar thought process to most touchscreen keyboards which have feedback (sound or haptic) by default because it's probably going to be a hurdle for users. Reminds me of the first time I installed a Linux distro which didn't disable the system beep (Debian w/o X)… surprising how this vastly and immediately changes UX. It's actually an interesting way to practice making fewer mistakes but it's a good thing that no UI relies on system beep any more. A big ol' beep/nobeep switch on ovens would be a nice thing.
- SAI_Peregrinus 9y ago
  I opened my microwave up and desoldered the peizo buzzer. Glorious silence.
sytelus 9y ago
That Microwave UX is certainly bad. But the design of traditional microwaves is also not defensible. If you had never seen microwave before and tried to use it, you would be quite dumbfounded. Just pressing 1 key starts heating for 1 minute but how do you do 30 seconds? Just press the start key! That's quite unintutive if you ask me. The reason people don't feel that way because most people have learned how to use microwave from their parents or friends and knowledge keeps getting passed on. On those lines, I know of no one who knows how to use other "advanced" features that most microwaves have today like thawing and food type specific heating.
- wyufro 9y ago
  I think the key thing that makes my microwave easier to use is that it has a big dial to choose the function. No clicking through menus, you just turn the dial to the function you want, then the second dial to adjust the settings, or press start to start and add time.
dmitriid 9y ago
Can anyone tell me ,why modern microwaves all have the same useless interface with a gazillion of buttons and nobs that no one in the world uses? There's basically just one microwave I'm aware of that is actually proper design, mentioned here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16090081 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16090081
xxxdarrenxxx 9y ago
I think you have all valid points, but I think one should take a step backwards. If you look at a plane's cockpit controls, not being a pilot one has absolutely 100% zero clue to what each button does. They should place a monitor screen, and every time u press a button it should do a pseudo unix man command and output all the options on screen. We don't think this is bad UI, because we expect someone (a pilot in this case) to have implicit knowledge beforehand . If the picture in the article is the actual oven, well.. Like a piano not having each actual note name written on it, aesthetics often minimize straightforward information. While ambiguous perhaps, I think this oven is meant for someone who is desigining his own Swedish getaway and is meant to be minimalist to fit in with the rest off the kitchen design. 99% off the time when buying appliances they come with a manual in a dozen languages. This is because one buys it for consumer usage, which as an office (random) user you can't expect guaranteed access to the manual. What if this manual has 8 pseudo chapters, 1 to describe each button. With some graphical examples of press sequences of common dishes. It might be that simple (and I can tell you that manuals do come simple like this owning a hybrid myself). Its 10 serious minutes in the manual for 10 years not-even-think-what-you-press experience. TLDR One who never made coffee in his life, present him this: https://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/0e/7f/0a/6b/sofia-coffee-machine.jpg https://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/0e/7f/0a/6b/... And one likely wouldn't get coffee in 30 seconds. Present them this: http://outwestcoffee.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Necta-Brio-3.jpg http://outwestcoffee.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Necta... And my granny can do it in 10. Different instances off the same appliance for different environments.
ProxCoques 9y ago
UI designer here. This guy's advice is OK-ish as far as it goes. However, he fails to exhibit the one thing that sets an actual UI designer apart from somebody with just some opinions about the practice: observational research. The FIRST thing you do is observe. Watch people in relation to the problem you are trying to solve. Listen to them. Ask them WHY they do what you observe. If at all possible, work out what motivates them and what problems they really have (which they often will not articulate to you). Only then start designing solutions. I'm not saying his ideas about the design of the oven are invalid. But the fact that so few people in design roles even attempt the work of exploratory research is fundamentally the reason why so much of stuff is shit. This isn't surprising though. Observational research is often frustrating, confusing or difficult to interpret. But above all it takes a lot of time. This is also the reason why, if you have another job like coding or marketing or whatever then you will not have enough hours in the day to do effective design.
Doxin 9y ago
I'd give a kidney for a microwave with at most two dials and a button, and no rotary encoders. I'd give both kidneys if it could then also ping me on my phone when it's done without involving external servers.

36 points by jordansmithnz 9y ago

On not reinventing the wheel and consistency, this is where all "Electron Desktop" apps are at now, UI tends to be "fancy" and alien to the host operating system.

avian 9y ago

I don't understand the "You are Not the User" mantra. In the past I've worked in teams where we were actively using the product we were developing. Dogfooding is a pretty established practice these days. For most purposes, I was The User - the user finding bugs, performance problems, etc. - but not user interface problems. For the UI I was Not The User. The Users for UI were these hypothetical beings only UI experts could came up with.

ivan_gammel 9y ago
Developers actively using their product always have expert bias and may not represent the target audience of the product. Also, in most cases it's a wrong assumption that you use something exactly in the same ways as others, so decisions based on developer or designer own experience are usually not optimal and may actually harm the users that would purchase the product or service.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  Part of the "expert bias" is that you want the tool let you do the job as efficiently as possible, which is also something the users want. It's, however, not what the marketing department wants.
  - ivan_gammel 9y ago
    There are two wrong assumptions you are making here. First of all, "Doing the job as efficiently as possible" is not a user's desire. Users always want concrete things and developer's opinion on what that could be or how that will be achieved by a particular user is very often quite far from reality. Second, it's not a developer's job to create a tool that will help users to solve some problem in the way he thinks it is right. It is not what developer is paid for. His job is to work together with marketing department to deliver a product that is always a compromise between the business and the user, a product, that is just good enough, in a deal, which is good only then, when noone is happy with it, but everyone can accept it.
    - TeMPOraL 9y ago
      > a product, that is just good enough, in a deal, which is good only then, when noone is happy with it, but everyone can accept it. I refuse to accept that is right, even though it is what seems to be happening everywhere. That's probably the root of my opinion. I'm a believer in the concept of making money through providing value to the customer.

exikyut 9y ago

I don't like that this doesn't provide any sort of suggestion for how to design a microwave oven UI, nor a video of the demonstrated model in action.

roryisok 9y ago
The best microwave UI has just two dials. Temperature and time. For years my microwave experience involved mostly just twisting the latter and walking away. I've gone out of my way to find microwaves with this control set. Unfortunately the most recent one I bought has buttons and settings, and I hate it. I want the dials back.
- xxxdarrenxxx 9y ago
  But that's for a microwave and I agree. An advanced one has extra options that are functionally valid, like blowing more air as opposed to wave radiation/convection heat, or adding more moisture surrounding it to keep that chicken moist, adding some top grill heat to give more caramelisation on the skin etc. These things requires a brain puzzle if you only use 2 buttons (think oldskool micro devices or configuring digital watches), and adding more buttons for these options offers arguably a more direct and simple user experience if you rtfm.

Svenstaro 9y ago

But how do you actually use the shown microwave then?

wyufro 9y ago
He really should've told near the end. Anyway, I assume you press the power button, because that is the established standard for microwaves in the last 10 years or so. Probably there might be a timeout and then it starts automatically. This is indeed something you have to learn though, first time I encountered this kind of microwave it baffled me as well.
tenryuu 9y ago
The instruction manual is 44 pages long https://www.fisherpaykel.com/download/user-guide/Kitchen/Cook/Microwave%20Ovens/590262d-nz-au-gb-ie-microwave-om36ndxb-guide.pdf https://www.fisherpaykel.com/download/user-guide/Kitchen/Coo...
- rootlocus 9y ago
  Took me 10s to find page 18 which has everything needed to use it as a microwave. Sometimes I think users are getting too spoiled and simply refuse to RTFM. Not to mention the article complains about the UI for an oven, confuses the oven with a microwave and then gives advice for designing iphone apps.
  - kyberias 9y ago
    Do you really think that it's reasonable to require users to read user manual in order to use a _microwave_?
    - rootlocus 9y ago
      It's a multipurpose oven, not a microwave.
christoph 9y ago
Where the article seems to go wrong is with the very idea that this is a microwave. It's not. It's a combination of microwave and grill hence the hinging of the door not matching a typical microwave.

sebazzz 9y ago

I have a microwave from the Etna brand that has a big flaw in the UI. I believe the software is reused in many microwaves because the cheap ass microwave from the Lidl my parents have has the same interface. The flaw: In the first step you need to select the amount of heating. Not in absolute numbers but in the percentage of total power (100, 80, 50, etc). So every time you need to calculate how much power each percentage represents.

electic 9y ago

The article doesn't really go into what the perfect UI would look like. It is more of a buzz feed type article. That being said, my microwave just broke down and I headed to the store to buy a new one. I was really disappointed at the new models. The UI seems to be getting worse on them. I have a feeling they are not even trying to innovate because it has become a low margin device. People are still trying if you are interested. Articles: https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/28006/why-do-microwave-oven-uis-fail https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/28006/why-do-microwav... https://medium.com/@bn/this-is-how-a-microwave-should-work-4e33b5c38b68 https://medium.com/@bn/this-is-how-a-microwave-should-work-4... Art Mockups: https://www.behance.net/gallery/15102955/Microwave-Redesign-Touch-screen-interface-design https://www.behance.net/gallery/15102955/Microwave-Redesign-... https://dribbble.com/shots/1309476-Microwave-UX-Concept https://dribbble.com/shots/1309476-Microwave-UX-Concept https://dribbble.com/shots/1449210-Microwave-Concept-PSD https://dribbble.com/shots/1449210-Microwave-Concept-PSD https://dribbble.com/shots/3249355-Smart-microwave-UI-concept https://dribbble.com/shots/3249355-Smart-microwave-UI-concep... If you have others, feel free to comment! Appliance UX/UI is a very neglected area.

dmitriid 9y ago
While the StackExchange link is awesome, the rest are just horrible. As with all these wannabe designers they go for the wow effect. It takes about half a second of rational thought to see why. All these art mockups are just that: art mockups. "How do I make a thing look pretty". A tired mantra of programming smays: make it work, make it fast, and only then make it pretty. Touch screens in the kitchen. In the effing kitchen! When you are often up to your eyebrows in grease, oil, flour, vegetable juices etc. Oh, look, you have to turn the knob to set the time. To set the power you have to touch some other area and then turn the nob again. To set the time, you have to touch that area again to switch modes, and then set the time. BUT WHY? This is solved with just having two knobs! https://johnlewis.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/233182566?$prod_exlrg$ https://johnlewis.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/233182566?$p... Oh, look. As it starts, it shows you time remaining, and a stop button. Because you never ever in your entire life would want to, say, adjust time. Nope? The thought never even occured to the designer. Oh, look, there are still multiple small buttons (that are already awkward on a vertical pane), but let's make them touch buttons! Oh, and let's leave them exactly the same as they are now, because the only reason why people don't understand how they work is because they are not touch buttons. Make them touch buttons! They will immediately become intuitive! Oh, look, the iOS time scroller! Because that's exactly what I need: to be able to set 23h 29m 31s by scrolling through infinite lists of numbers. I wonder why is it that the vast majority of microwave uses are around 30s to 5min range on max power? I could go on

homero 9y ago

Only button I ever use is the add 30 seconds button. Keep pushing until desired and it'll start on its own. A big frustration is not being able to turn off the damn reminder tone though so I have to wait around to clear it when done.

prawn 9y ago
Same. Any microwave that can't start with one button push is a time waster IMO. That and Cancel are the only buttons I typically use.
- mavhc 9y ago
  Why bother with Cancel when you can just open the door? I prefer 0-9 buttons, and lots of memories, mine has 3.
  - prawn 9y ago
    Cancel time-remaining if you quit cooking early. Leaving 12 seconds on the clock won't fly with OCD types, surely? If you wanted a minimalist microwave though, you could have it reset each time the door is opened or after a minute or two of inactivity.
  - homero 9y ago
    I never open the door, scared of the radiation

tobr 9y ago

In my experience almost every microwave oven has terrible usability. It’s as if the design problem is so simple and the “correct” design (two independent, labeled, mechanical dials for time and power) is so obvious that everyone has to make their own version of it to look cool or sophisticated or something. I guess they never user test these things, because that doesn’t help sell more of them. There really ought to be a usability certification for products like these, a verification by an independent organization that a typical user is able to operate the most important functionality with few or no errors.

Johnny555 9y ago
The button I use the most on my Microwave is "add 30 seconds", I use it for almost everything, hitting it repeatedly to get more than 30 seconds. I rarely want more than a few minutes of heating time, and I rarely need more than 30 seconds of granularity so that one button handles most of my microwaving needs. Though I agree that dials would be better -- I wish cars weren't moving toward touchscreens, in my old car I could adjust pretty much everything in the car - radio, climate control, etc without looking. In my current car, there's a touch screen for pretty much everything except radio volume which is on the steering wheel.
- Thlom 9y ago
  Yeah, I have a gazillion buttons on my microwave, but the only button I really use is the Start/add 30 sec button. If I want to adjust power I can adjust from 150 to 600, and then there's a "Jet" function, but I have no idea what that is. More than 600? 750 maybe? Who knows.
Grue3 9y ago
Dial is a bad design for time, because most of the time people want to heat something up for a short time: 15, 30 or 60 seconds. On many microwaves this involves slightly turning a dial and then counting the required number of seconds in your head (because the exact angle is too small to select right away). A log scale dial would solve this problem, but then it makes adding another 30 seconds a non-trivial operation, because the angle is no longer constant.

nateguchi 9y ago

Most microwaves I've seen now seem to have the same (annoying) interface/software where you have to first select the power (always 100%), press start (it doesn't start), then select then time and press start (actually starts then). What ever happened to the microwaves where you could key in a time and just press start?

drblast 9y ago

My ideal: Ten number buttons, 0-9, but each also corresponds to a useful time. 0 10 sec 1 15 sec 2 20 sec 3 30 sec 4 45 sec 5 1 min ... Etc Pressing any of those would auto start immediately with the corresponding time. If you want an exact time like 34 seconds, hit the cook time button and now the ten buttons act as digits. Then hit start. Pressing any of these while the microwave is running would add that corresponding amout of time. I guess you'd also need a power level button and a clock set button. There, all done.

wikibob 9y ago
FYI this is precisely how commercial kitchen microwaves work. Next time you’re at a fast food restaurant have a look and you’ll probably spot one. https://www.webstaurantstore.com/panasonic-ne-17521-stainless-steel-commercial-microwave-oven-208-230-240v-1700w/609NE17521.html https://www.webstaurantstore.com/panasonic-ne-17521-stainles...
- nnq 9y ago
  It works, and it's fast to use. But it's for commercial/professional usage, where doing a set of standard common tasks with fewer number of actions is best. Having home/office-use microwaves work like this is basically akin to forcing an average office user expecting something like Microsoft Word, to write Markdown in Vim instead...
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    > Having home/office-use microwaves work like this is basically akin to forcing an average office user expecting something like Microsoft Word, to write Markdown in Vim instead... If that average office user is going to write something (or use a microwave) more than a few times in their lives, it's worth to force them, because the (very small) cost of additional learning is almost immediately offset by gained efficiency. Alas, what matters is short-time thinking, so UIs are designed for sellability instead of helping people do their tasks correctly and efficiently.

XorNot 9y ago

I remember a Linuxconf AU presentation on building a better microwave - the idea being to use a low-res automotive thermal sensor array to watch the turntable, and be able to set it to "heat this to 100 degrees" and have it actually do exactly that. There were other things you got "for free" after that - like defrost-without-cooking by ensuring all pixels remained below a target temp, but got above some other temp. Hope that guy builds it.

panic 9y ago
The problem is that this forces you to make a confusing decision right at the start. You almost never know what temperature to heat something to -- you just want to put it in the oven for 30 seconds, see if it's good enough, and then repeat.
- XorNot 9y ago
  Or a problem solved by sane defaults: i.e. 65ish degrees is quite hot, whereas 55 is about the upper limit of long-term bearable on the skin. Put that option as the heating default, with literally what I just wrote explaining it next to it, and problem solved.
ivan_gammel 9y ago
Typical UX design by an engineer as it is, with wrong assumptions about user expectations. The users of microwaves do not want to heat something to 100 degrees. They either want warm food or they want to cook. Warming means, that not only surface temperature measured by sensors has to be comfortable, but the temperature of the whole meal, which depends on thermal conductivity and penetration depth of microwaves for specific food and cannot be controlled by a sensor array alone. People will just hit "start" again, if they feel it's not ready. For cooking people will either use recipe from a book provided with microwave and thus they need just a selection of a program, or they will use more advanced microwave with oven and will want to set temperature of the oven to something like 200 degrees for 40 minutes. In this case sensor would be useful, but it's already not a microwave story.
- 9y ago

hpaavola 9y ago

https://johnlewis.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/233182566?$prod_exlrg$ https://johnlewis.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/233182566?$p... One knob for time, other for power. All other UIs feel just wrong after using this. Microwaves usea to have this kind of UI when those came to market.

BoppreH 9y ago
I find it interesting it's time per gram. Does it have a scale inside? Combined with the easy-to-understand knobs, this does sound much better.
- mrob 9y ago
  It's not "per gram", it's an dual function dial, used for both time and weight. If the lower dial is switched to defrost mode (2nd position) then the upper dial is switched to weight input. There is no scale inside.
- ThePadawan 9y ago
  The label means "time or grams", where "grams" only applies for defrosting. Defrosting x grams typically takes y seconds, which is just a table lookup. As defrosting most typically involves leftovers (rather than pre-packaged meals or ingredients), you will probably only know their weight, not how long it will take to defrost off the top of your head.
  - panic 9y ago
    I think a small improvement to the design would be to use words (COOK TIME / DEFROST GRAMS), with the "DEFROST GRAMS" text colored to match the defrost option on the bottom (which should also use the word, "DEFROST"). This would let you figure out what the dial does without having to think as much about it. You could also change the screen backlight color in DEFROST mode to reinforce the mode change.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    > As defrosting most typically involves leftovers (rather than pre-packaged meals or ingredients), you will probably only know their weight, not how long it will take to defrost off the top of your head. How would one know that? Do people routinely put leftovers on a scale before putting them into a microwave?

dredmorbius 9y ago

The point is not the microwave. It's UI. Though perhaps a metastory might be "how not to write a UI essay". (I actually rather liked this one. The off-the-rails discussion suggests either I'm an exception or the point isn't being clearly communicated.)

bcoates 9y ago

I would put up with a hieroglyphic based UI ten times weirder than the one depicted if it meant the microwave didn't beep. Seriously, what is it with embedded digital electronics designers and beeping? Nothing else has a gratuitous noisemaker. I swear if the home refrigerator was invented after the cheap piezo buzzer it would emit an ear-piercing bleep every time the door opened, or maybe when the compressor cycled on or off. Is there some sort of strange subsidy or tax consequence so that adding a beeper has negative net cost?

napsterbr 9y ago
I feel you. My microwave oven makes 4 lousy beeps once it's done... And will be more than happy to repeat those 4 beeps every 30 seconds until you open the damn door
jgtrosh 9y ago
I'm sure that without that feedback mistakes can happen that might be blamed on UI (didn't press the start/reheat/&c. button all the way through). Similar thought process to most touchscreen keyboards which have feedback (sound or haptic) by default because it's probably going to be a hurdle for users. Reminds me of the first time I installed a Linux distro which didn't disable the system beep (Debian w/o X)… surprising how this vastly and immediately changes UX. It's actually an interesting way to practice making fewer mistakes but it's a good thing that no UI relies on system beep any more. A big ol' beep/nobeep switch on ovens would be a nice thing.
SAI_Peregrinus 9y ago
I opened my microwave up and desoldered the peizo buzzer. Glorious silence.

sytelus 9y ago

That Microwave UX is certainly bad. But the design of traditional microwaves is also not defensible. If you had never seen microwave before and tried to use it, you would be quite dumbfounded. Just pressing 1 key starts heating for 1 minute but how do you do 30 seconds? Just press the start key! That's quite unintutive if you ask me. The reason people don't feel that way because most people have learned how to use microwave from their parents or friends and knowledge keeps getting passed on. On those lines, I know of no one who knows how to use other "advanced" features that most microwaves have today like thawing and food type specific heating.

wyufro 9y ago
I think the key thing that makes my microwave easier to use is that it has a big dial to choose the function. No clicking through menus, you just turn the dial to the function you want, then the second dial to adjust the settings, or press start to start and add time.

dmitriid 9y ago

Can anyone tell me ,why modern microwaves all have the same useless interface with a gazillion of buttons and nobs that no one in the world uses? There's basically just one microwave I'm aware of that is actually proper design, mentioned here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16090081 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16090081

xxxdarrenxxx 9y ago

I think you have all valid points, but I think one should take a step backwards. If you look at a plane's cockpit controls, not being a pilot one has absolutely 100% zero clue to what each button does. They should place a monitor screen, and every time u press a button it should do a pseudo unix man command and output all the options on screen. We don't think this is bad UI, because we expect someone (a pilot in this case) to have implicit knowledge beforehand . If the picture in the article is the actual oven, well.. Like a piano not having each actual note name written on it, aesthetics often minimize straightforward information. While ambiguous perhaps, I think this oven is meant for someone who is desigining his own Swedish getaway and is meant to be minimalist to fit in with the rest off the kitchen design. 99% off the time when buying appliances they come with a manual in a dozen languages. This is because one buys it for consumer usage, which as an office (random) user you can't expect guaranteed access to the manual. What if this manual has 8 pseudo chapters, 1 to describe each button. With some graphical examples of press sequences of common dishes. It might be that simple (and I can tell you that manuals do come simple like this owning a hybrid myself). Its 10 serious minutes in the manual for 10 years not-even-think-what-you-press experience. TLDR One who never made coffee in his life, present him this: https://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/0e/7f/0a/6b/sofia-coffee-machine.jpg https://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/0e/7f/0a/6b/... And one likely wouldn't get coffee in 30 seconds. Present them this: http://outwestcoffee.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Necta-Brio-3.jpg http://outwestcoffee.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Necta... And my granny can do it in 10. Different instances off the same appliance for different environments.

ProxCoques 9y ago

UI designer here. This guy's advice is OK-ish as far as it goes. However, he fails to exhibit the one thing that sets an actual UI designer apart from somebody with just some opinions about the practice: observational research. The FIRST thing you do is observe. Watch people in relation to the problem you are trying to solve. Listen to them. Ask them WHY they do what you observe. If at all possible, work out what motivates them and what problems they really have (which they often will not articulate to you). Only then start designing solutions. I'm not saying his ideas about the design of the oven are invalid. But the fact that so few people in design roles even attempt the work of exploratory research is fundamentally the reason why so much of stuff is shit. This isn't surprising though. Observational research is often frustrating, confusing or difficult to interpret. But above all it takes a lot of time. This is also the reason why, if you have another job like coding or marketing or whatever then you will not have enough hours in the day to do effective design.

Doxin 9y ago

I'd give a kidney for a microwave with at most two dials and a button, and no rotary encoders. I'd give both kidneys if it could then also ping me on my phone when it's done without involving external servers.