3 ms·

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.

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.
  - nnq 9y ago
    You're ignoring the "cognitive load" and "attention requirements" of the mythical "correct and efficient" interface. Sometimes I want to use 99.999% of my brain for something else and I want to mindlessly use that microwave with the 0.0001% left. My desired thought process is "woo, woo, monkey-wuga, up-turny-power, down-turny-time, woo, woop, warmy my banana woop, woop!" or something simpler than that. And I also don't use it in a regular/predictable pattern, so auto-pressing one button for one of the "regular" time intervals might be useless for me since what I do is always irregular and sometimes irrational ("hmm, I wanna see some fireworks to light up my mood, let's microwave my colleague's USB stick labeled "bitcoins" for the lulz!"). The problem is not designing for sellability. Is not acknowledging that (1) some people don't want to RTFM! and (2) other people are OK with RTFM but want serious efficiency and correctness gains for it, "I pain, now you gimme gain!". So you figure out who your users are and design for your users. Now, the absolute worst is the parent article's example, where someone managed to "design for no possible user" by both forcing people to RTFM and providing zero efficiency and correctness benefits in return. But designing for the wrong user is also bad.

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.
- nnq 9y ago
  You're ignoring the "cognitive load" and "attention requirements" of the mythical "correct and efficient" interface. Sometimes I want to use 99.999% of my brain for something else and I want to mindlessly use that microwave with the 0.0001% left. My desired thought process is "woo, woo, monkey-wuga, up-turny-power, down-turny-time, woo, woop, warmy my banana woop, woop!" or something simpler than that. And I also don't use it in a regular/predictable pattern, so auto-pressing one button for one of the "regular" time intervals might be useless for me since what I do is always irregular and sometimes irrational ("hmm, I wanna see some fireworks to light up my mood, let's microwave my colleague's USB stick labeled "bitcoins" for the lulz!"). The problem is not designing for sellability. Is not acknowledging that (1) some people don't want to RTFM! and (2) other people are OK with RTFM but want serious efficiency and correctness gains for it, "I pain, now you gimme gain!". So you figure out who your users are and design for your users. Now, the absolute worst is the parent article's example, where someone managed to "design for no possible user" by both forcing people to RTFM and providing zero efficiency and correctness benefits in return. But designing for the wrong user is also bad.