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One of the banks I used "updated" their iOS app and used Material Design. It's infuriating. The thing that bothers me the most is the "switches" (3rd example

One of the banks I used "updated" their iOS app and used Material Design. It's infuriating. The thing that bothers me the most is the "switches" (3rd example here[0]). My first thought upon updating the app was "Why did they reinvent the toggle switch when iOS has a perfectly good one built in?" Being bothered by this is irrational, yet I'm bothered by it all the same. I also find the ripple effect[1] when pressing things to be infuriating. Just do the action I've asked, don't do this animation and delay the action by half a second. Again, this is somewhat irrational, but it still bothers me. Perhaps the thing that bugs me the most is that it feels like I have a really well-designed Android app on my phone. The problem though is that I have an iPhone. If I wanted to use Android apps, I would have bought an Android phone. [0] https://material.io/design/components/selection-controls.html https://material.io/design/components/selection-controls.htm... [1] https://material.io/design/interaction/states.html#pressed https://material.io/design/interaction/states.html#pressed

bhauer 8y ago
> I also find the ripple effect[1] when pressing things to be infuriating. Just do the action I've asked, don't do this animation and delay the action by half a second. Again, this is somewhat irrational, but it still bothers me. It is not irrational to want your device and the software you use on it to be as high-performance as possible. In my opinion, unless we're talking about a game, software should always avoid wasting the user's time, no matter how briefly. Of course, if an animation is playing while something else is happening, that is acceptable. But in many cases, applications wait for the animations to complete (because it's "only" 300 milliseconds) before proceeding with the requested action. Disrespecting the user's time is disrespecting the user, full stop.
- themarkn 8y ago
  For me I'm ok with this in certain situations. If the time taken increases the clarity about what is going on or what has just happened (in the case of the ripple effect confirming a button was clicked or tapped), I don't find it disrespectful. I'm more irritated by flashes of loaders or messages that disappears before we can evaluate whether they are relevant. Different strokes, I guess.
  - Benjamin_Dobell 8y ago
    I agree, like most things, it's contextual. Making a user wait for a ripple effect every button press is ridiculous. Mind you, that most certainly isn't part of the Material Design spec. However, if I've performed a destructive action, that is perhaps only reversible temporarily, then I absolutely don't mind being briefly interrupted to see a "trash" animation.
- reaperducer 8y ago
  Yes, and no. While nobody likes excessive animation, it is very important to let the user know their input was received. It's why the cursor changes on mouseover. It's how you know if the app is crashed, or merely processing something you requested. I've seen a million times in UX testing where ordinary people go click... wait... click click click click click because they didn't receive any feedback to an action. At one time this was one of Apple's UI priorities — feedback. Unfortunately, Apple has gotten away from a lot of its core UI values without a strong personality to enforce them. >full stop In the real world, nothing is ever "full stop." You should purge that phrase from your lexicon.
  - WorldMaker 8y ago
    > In the real world, nothing is ever "full stop." You should purge that phrase from your lexicon. Not to get further off topic, but: Huh? "Full stop" just means "end of message". It's an amusing leftover from telegraph technologies that people sometimes use for emphasis, but it doesn't have a literal meaning more than just "end of message".
    - reaperducer 8y ago
      In this context, I took "full stop" to mean "end of discussion." As if to dismiss all dissenting opinions and stifle further discussion. As for the telegraph use, I'm aware of that. I have a background in amateur radio and in college a crusty old engineer taught me morse code to communicate over the maintenance department's secret building-to-building campus telegraph network.
    - kickopotomus 8y ago
      It is interesting how the phrase's meaning has transformed. Nowadays people generally use it to add emphasis such that the previous statement is an absolute truth with no valid argument to the contrary.
      - bhauer 8y ago
        Yep, it's a bit of verbal color to add emphasis to a statement. Much like declaring things that are actually quite ordinary and did not fill you with awe but are otherwise positive as "awesome."
- lawrenceong 8y ago
  Cannot agree more. one of the default settings I used to set my windows computers on is "adjust for best performance". that used to really remove all sorts of nonsensical animations. I would suggest UI designers include this option in their apps. the first 2 times the menu bar progressively shows its items may look cute, but after 500 times it's really an annoyance. Another pet peeve I have is when web pages shows very little content because: 1. the fonts are too big 2. there are too many sidebar (top/bottom/etc) items 3. the graphics or icons take too much room i have some ideas about optimization but will reserve that rant for another time.
- j45 8y ago
  Minimizing UI pageantry is critical when growing through the 1st to 1000th use of an interface. I'm not here to work for my device, it's here to work for me. Interface feedback on making a selection is possible in many ways.
- manigandham 8y ago
  Yes, this is why the iPhone keeps getting hardware that's double the speed but the actual UX has remains the same. My iPhone 8 still takes me just as frustratingly long to navigate apps as it did on my iPhone 4, because there's no way to skip the useless animations and effects.
sudhirj 8y ago
One way to give a user feedback that they’ve tapped something without wasting their time is a to start an effect onTouch, but don’t necessarily wait for it to finish all the way if the you get a touchComplete. That way the user knows what they’re tapping on, and if they’re making a mistake they’ll move their finger to a safer zone before lifting. And no extra time is wasted.
- Mister_Snuggles 8y ago
  The ripple effect doesn't end when I finish the touch though, the app waits for it to complete the animation before doing the thing that I asked. That's the infuriating part. Another thing that really bothers me: They've got all kinds of iOS-specific stuff in the app - Apple Pay, 3D Touch previews, Touch ID for login. They clearly went to a lot of effort to support stuff that's specific to Apple devices, why didn't they just go the extra mile and actually make it look and feel like an iOS application? This is one of the big five Canadian banks. Their net income is over $1B every quarter. Surely they can afford to hire an iOS dev to do the app natively.
bryanrasmussen 8y ago
I'm wondering if the dislike of animation an the delay by half a second thing is more specific to programmers/highly technical people. Meaning that if your app is tech focused it should avoid animation as much as possible.

bhauer 8y ago

> I also find the ripple effect[1] when pressing things to be infuriating. Just do the action I've asked, don't do this animation and delay the action by half a second. Again, this is somewhat irrational, but it still bothers me. It is not irrational to want your device and the software you use on it to be as high-performance as possible. In my opinion, unless we're talking about a game, software should always avoid wasting the user's time, no matter how briefly. Of course, if an animation is playing while something else is happening, that is acceptable. But in many cases, applications wait for the animations to complete (because it's "only" 300 milliseconds) before proceeding with the requested action. Disrespecting the user's time is disrespecting the user, full stop.

themarkn 8y ago
For me I'm ok with this in certain situations. If the time taken increases the clarity about what is going on or what has just happened (in the case of the ripple effect confirming a button was clicked or tapped), I don't find it disrespectful. I'm more irritated by flashes of loaders or messages that disappears before we can evaluate whether they are relevant. Different strokes, I guess.
- Benjamin_Dobell 8y ago
  I agree, like most things, it's contextual. Making a user wait for a ripple effect every button press is ridiculous. Mind you, that most certainly isn't part of the Material Design spec. However, if I've performed a destructive action, that is perhaps only reversible temporarily, then I absolutely don't mind being briefly interrupted to see a "trash" animation.
reaperducer 8y ago
Yes, and no. While nobody likes excessive animation, it is very important to let the user know their input was received. It's why the cursor changes on mouseover. It's how you know if the app is crashed, or merely processing something you requested. I've seen a million times in UX testing where ordinary people go click... wait... click click click click click because they didn't receive any feedback to an action. At one time this was one of Apple's UI priorities — feedback. Unfortunately, Apple has gotten away from a lot of its core UI values without a strong personality to enforce them. >full stop In the real world, nothing is ever "full stop." You should purge that phrase from your lexicon.
- WorldMaker 8y ago
  > In the real world, nothing is ever "full stop." You should purge that phrase from your lexicon. Not to get further off topic, but: Huh? "Full stop" just means "end of message". It's an amusing leftover from telegraph technologies that people sometimes use for emphasis, but it doesn't have a literal meaning more than just "end of message".
  - reaperducer 8y ago
    In this context, I took "full stop" to mean "end of discussion." As if to dismiss all dissenting opinions and stifle further discussion. As for the telegraph use, I'm aware of that. I have a background in amateur radio and in college a crusty old engineer taught me morse code to communicate over the maintenance department's secret building-to-building campus telegraph network.
  - kickopotomus 8y ago
    It is interesting how the phrase's meaning has transformed. Nowadays people generally use it to add emphasis such that the previous statement is an absolute truth with no valid argument to the contrary.
    - bhauer 8y ago
      Yep, it's a bit of verbal color to add emphasis to a statement. Much like declaring things that are actually quite ordinary and did not fill you with awe but are otherwise positive as "awesome."
lawrenceong 8y ago
Cannot agree more. one of the default settings I used to set my windows computers on is "adjust for best performance". that used to really remove all sorts of nonsensical animations. I would suggest UI designers include this option in their apps. the first 2 times the menu bar progressively shows its items may look cute, but after 500 times it's really an annoyance. Another pet peeve I have is when web pages shows very little content because: 1. the fonts are too big 2. there are too many sidebar (top/bottom/etc) items 3. the graphics or icons take too much room i have some ideas about optimization but will reserve that rant for another time.
j45 8y ago
Minimizing UI pageantry is critical when growing through the 1st to 1000th use of an interface. I'm not here to work for my device, it's here to work for me. Interface feedback on making a selection is possible in many ways.
manigandham 8y ago
Yes, this is why the iPhone keeps getting hardware that's double the speed but the actual UX has remains the same. My iPhone 8 still takes me just as frustratingly long to navigate apps as it did on my iPhone 4, because there's no way to skip the useless animations and effects.

sudhirj 8y ago

One way to give a user feedback that they’ve tapped something without wasting their time is a to start an effect onTouch, but don’t necessarily wait for it to finish all the way if the you get a touchComplete. That way the user knows what they’re tapping on, and if they’re making a mistake they’ll move their finger to a safer zone before lifting. And no extra time is wasted.

Mister_Snuggles 8y ago
The ripple effect doesn't end when I finish the touch though, the app waits for it to complete the animation before doing the thing that I asked. That's the infuriating part. Another thing that really bothers me: They've got all kinds of iOS-specific stuff in the app - Apple Pay, 3D Touch previews, Touch ID for login. They clearly went to a lot of effort to support stuff that's specific to Apple devices, why didn't they just go the extra mile and actually make it look and feel like an iOS application? This is one of the big five Canadian banks. Their net income is over $1B every quarter. Surely they can afford to hire an iOS dev to do the app natively.

bryanrasmussen 8y ago

I'm wondering if the dislike of animation an the delay by half a second thing is more specific to programmers/highly technical people. Meaning that if your app is tech focused it should avoid animation as much as possible.