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I absolutely love the Next aesthetics and its hardware. Everything from the Logo (Paul Rand) to the industrial design of Next machines was top. I can't say much

I absolutely love the Next aesthetics and its hardware. Everything from the Logo (Paul Rand) to the industrial design of Next machines was top. I can't say much about the software since I have never used it.

tambourine_man 9y ago
I know it's not a popular opinion, but I find the icons hideous and all over the place (lacking a standard cohesive vision). The window elements layout, a menu that disregards Fitts's law completely, that heavy grey… just poor taste all in all. I'm amazed it was Steve's creation. Thankfully they took another route designing OS X. That logo is great though.
- abrowne 9y ago
  AIUI the menu appears under the mouse when you right (or middle?) click. > The NEXTSTEP operating system further developed the idea, incorporating a feature whereby the right or middle mouse button brought the main menu (which was vertical and automatically changed depending on context) to the location of the mouse, thereby eliminating the need to move the mouse pointer all the way across the large (for the time) NextStep screen. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Context_menu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Context_menu
  - sedachv 9y ago
    I just edited that Wikipedia article. Interlisp on Xerox Daybreaks (and maybe Viewpoint; I've only used Interlisp) had left/middle-click context menus under cursor in the mid-1980s, so I imagine it was present on the earlier D* Xerox systems and maybe the Star. Definitely predates Nextstep though.
  - tambourine_man 9y ago
    Ah, that makes sense, didn’t know it, thanks. Always saw people moving the menus around as the big differentiating factor. Never thought it would first pop under the cursor.
- fermienrico 9y ago
  I agree, software is pretty ugly with skeuomorphism in full effect just short of actually using pictures of stuff as icons.
  - tambourine_man 9y ago
    OS X went the skeuomorphic route as well for many icons, but by then we could accurately represent objects on screen, at least.

tambourine_man 9y ago

I know it's not a popular opinion, but I find the icons hideous and all over the place (lacking a standard cohesive vision). The window elements layout, a menu that disregards Fitts's law completely, that heavy grey… just poor taste all in all. I'm amazed it was Steve's creation. Thankfully they took another route designing OS X. That logo is great though.

abrowne 9y ago
AIUI the menu appears under the mouse when you right (or middle?) click. > The NEXTSTEP operating system further developed the idea, incorporating a feature whereby the right or middle mouse button brought the main menu (which was vertical and automatically changed depending on context) to the location of the mouse, thereby eliminating the need to move the mouse pointer all the way across the large (for the time) NextStep screen. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Context_menu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Context_menu
- sedachv 9y ago
  I just edited that Wikipedia article. Interlisp on Xerox Daybreaks (and maybe Viewpoint; I've only used Interlisp) had left/middle-click context menus under cursor in the mid-1980s, so I imagine it was present on the earlier D* Xerox systems and maybe the Star. Definitely predates Nextstep though.
- tambourine_man 9y ago
  Ah, that makes sense, didn’t know it, thanks. Always saw people moving the menus around as the big differentiating factor. Never thought it would first pop under the cursor.
fermienrico 9y ago
I agree, software is pretty ugly with skeuomorphism in full effect just short of actually using pictures of stuff as icons.
- tambourine_man 9y ago
  OS X went the skeuomorphic route as well for many icons, but by then we could accurately represent objects on screen, at least.