7 ms·

You know what I hate? I hate the fact that every time I open an app (most of which I use relatively rarely), I get a bunch of popups trying to introduce me to a

You know what I hate? I hate the fact that every time I open an app (most of which I use relatively rarely), I get a bunch of popups trying to introduce me to a variety of features I never needed in the first place. That goes beyond iOS, but also websites including Slack. E.g. Why does iOS, instead of silently allowing me to use it's new version, feeds me this gamified introduction to "what's new in 13.x.y.z?". What I want is a piece of software that doesn't change. Or when it changes, it doesn't notify me of it - it just keeps working until I find enough time to actually go on my own journey of discovery. I am not-so-subtly exhausted by every single half-capable developer spoon-feeding me their "new features". I've downloaded your app because of the features it _had_ - I mostly don't care about what you add later on.

Wowfunhappy 7y ago
I could not agree more. This is also what really bothers me about Windows 10. Notably in that case, Microsoft makes an enterprise version of Windows 10 called LTSC/LTSB, where you get security updates but never feature updates. Unless you're a huge enterprise, they'll refuse to sell to you.
- fortran77 7y ago
  1. You can buy LTSC with as few as 5 licenses. And they don't all have to be for Windows. If you need 5 MS licenses of anything you can get it. Don't spread misinformation https://www.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/bbof9s/windows_10_enterprise_ltsc_what_are_the_purchase/ https://www.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/bbof9s/windows_10... 2. You really don't want LTSC on your desktop.
  - Wowfunhappy 7y ago
    The link you gave makes it sound like it's a huge hassle to get LTSC as an individual, which is what I'd read in the past. You need to go through a reseller and provide details about your business. > You really don't want LTSC on your desktop. Because why? I have used LTSC, and it is in fact exactly what I want on all my Windows computers. It's just normal Windows 10 except without the Windows Store†, and with a Debian-esque update model. † And there are ways to add the Windows Store back in, if you really want it.
lostmsu 7y ago
A contrary indie developer perspective: some features are just really hard to discover even when you know what are you looking for. I don't have time for making those introductions, and end up getting feedback requests for some features my app already has.
- m11a 7y ago
  Problem: Half of the time I'm not even familiar enough with the core features of the app, never mind learning the new niche features they just added in the latest version. And since many apps believe in updating a lot and often I see this "What's New" stuff way too frequently. I imagine frequent users of the app would appreciate knowing what's new more than users that aren't so familiar with the app. I like to know what's new in iOS/macOS, since they update once a year and I'm familiar with it, and they make it brief.
- CamperBob2 7y ago
  A contrary indie developer perspective: some features are just really hard to discover Maybe tackle this problem first, then fall back to exposition. One suggestion might be to start by removing hieroglyphic icons, or at least augmenting them with text labels.
  - lostmsu 7y ago
    > Maybe tackle this problem first, then fall back to exposition. You assume it can be tackled. Here's a concrete example: The tool automatically snaps new windows to where user wants them to be. Rarely the user wants to undo that. The core functionality (autosnap) does not require any visible interface whatsoever. If I want user to see the undo button, I have to place it somewhere over his app's window, which bloats the interface (the undo is uncommon), or outright impossible, since some windows have custom titlebars. So there's a hotkey, configurable in settings. How can you make it more discoverable?
    - saagarjha 7y ago
      Does it show up when you hold down the Command key?
m11a 7y ago
It wouldn't bother me if it was one or two apps that I use frequently. It does bother me when it's every single one, and as you say, most of which are used rarely. Then it gets annoying on all of them. It's less annoying with Apple since they only update apps/OS once a year. But it seems like every software jumps onto the bandwagon and now you see a changelog opening up an app every other day.
- eloisant 7y ago
  That's the thing, each developer thinks their app is the most important one on your device.
auraham 7y ago
I feel the same. Recently, I updated Spark just for the dark theme option. I don't mind the short introduction of new features. However, I hate when the app dramatically changes, as Spark did. Now, the UI of this version is significantly different to the previous one. I experienced the same issue on Pocket. They removed the "Open with Firefox" option when sharing an URL. I don't like these kind of updates.
- saagarjha 7y ago
  > They removed the "Open with Firefox" option when sharing an URL. Surely Firefox exports an action to open the URL in the app?
drusepth 7y ago
Your opinion here is completely valid and probably pretty widespread, but I feel almost entirely the opposite. Every time I get one of those "what's new" pop-ups in an app I already enjoy, it feels like Christmas morning for me and I almost always immediately go try out the new feature(s). I don't think I would find most of them (or wouldn't find them as quickly) for most apps without a nudge saying what to look for.
- heavenlyblue 7y ago
  I constantly use: Slack, Datadog, Gmail, Sentry, JIRA, Confluence, Google Cal, IDEA. And that’s excluding the apps. CityMapper, Google Maps, Amazon, WhatsApp. Every day there’s something new released in one of those apps. I can barely keep up with my email stream - you are either not using enough apps or you have too much free time on your hands.
  - cdubzzz 7y ago
    OP literally started with, “your opinion here is completely valid” and shared a valid opinion and you responded with, basically, “you’re doing it wrong”.
    - Erlich_Bachman 7y ago
      Or they just indicated why the opinions differ, ie what might be the different usage patterns that lead to different opinions.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- anoncake 7y ago
  There are better solutions for that such as an ordinary notification.
  - fcarraldo 7y ago
    Personally, I don't want apps that I'm not using to send a disruptive notification that there's something new in the app. I'd prefer that the app let me know the next time I launch it, as being described by OP.
code_duck 7y ago
It's much like how the design of Facebook constantly changes without adding any sort of benefits. I think that they have large design teams who have nothing to do because the product is already perfectly adequate, so they invent work for themselves.
- ljm 7y ago
  I think it keeps more than the designers in a job. Half of these changes come with some exaggerated prose from a marketing or design consultant, explaining how their new logo or colour scheme or layout really speaks to the fundamental nature of the universe and our place within it, and how suitable that is for a chat client or an analytics platform. Throw a custom font in there too for good measure.
darkteflon 7y ago
Agree. Catalina was what ended it for me. I understand that mobile OSes need to change somewhat generation to generation as we’re still scratching around to figure out what works and what doesn’t. I don’t want or need that for my workstation though. I built a tower, installed kubuntu 18 LTS and don’t intend to upgrade until they stop supporting it. It made sense for my workflow and I’m happy with how it’s worked out.
- Wowfunhappy 7y ago
  > I understand that mobile OSes need to change somewhat generation to generation as we’re still scratching around to figure out what works and what doesn’t. ...do we though? The iPhone came out more than a decade ago now, and I feel like we got it pretty darn figured out around 2015 or so. Newer versions of iOS have brought some improvements, but also a lot of miss-steps, and performance decreases on older devices (the only place you'd notice).
  - wang_li 7y ago
    The current versions of iOS 13 and iPadOS 13 having obvious and frequently encountered rendering bugs in safari. If they let this out to users your expectation that they’ll allow the user experience to interfere with their awesomeness is surely going to be unfulfilled. Not to mention those stupid flashlight and camera buttons on the iPhone lock screen whose only explanation is some manager somewhere wanted to make their mark.
    - dangus 7y ago
      I agree with everything you said until you dissed the flashlight and camera buttons. I use those all the time, via muscle memory. Getting to the camera and flashlight ASAP is critical.
      - wang_li 7y ago
        On my xr it's much quicker to get to either of them through control center than holding the button for two seconds. And the way that they are placed, about 15% of the time when I pick up my phone gripping it front-back rather than side-side I activate one of those two things unintentionally. Plus the trailing edge triggered nature of them is annoying. It's also anti-user that they can't be disabled/removed per the user's preference.
mihaaly 7y ago
Very true!! I stopped visiting certain websites because of those useless junk blocking nonsense and iOS is very close to follow, very very close.
gnicholas 7y ago
This is one of the reasons I disabled app auto updates. There are only a few apps that need to be updated regularly, like uber and some banking apps. The rest can wait until I decide to update them. Also saves space on my device by not always having the latest version.
- saagarjha 7y ago
  > Also saves space on my device by not always having the latest version. How so?
  - anoncake 7y ago
    Bloat?
    - saagarjha 7y ago
      Many recent updates have actually reduced bloat. One of my apps shrunk by more than half as Swift libraries moved into the system.
      - gnicholas 7y ago
        Yeah after app thinning was enabled, most apps became much smaller because you weren’t forced to download assets meant for other device sizes. But these days I think most app updates are bigger than previous versions. Would be interested to hear about exceptions to this hypothesis, and reasons why!
anoncake 7y ago
I agree. When I open an app, it's because I want to do something. That something is not "reading release notes". This kind of bullshit is why people don't read warnings but reflexively close pop-ups to get the damn machine to shut up and obey their orders.
oneplane 7y ago
At the same time, people comment about 'hidden' features nobody tells them about. I support there is no 'one size fits all' scenario here.
wwweston 7y ago
On one hand, yes, tour pop-ups are often an admission that discoverability has been neglected, and every time a product discussion goes the orientation-popup direction it should trigger some reflection on that. On the other hand... well, for example, I have a puzzle game concept I’ve worked up a prototype for and everyone I show it to needs some things explained that I haven’t been able to figure out how to just make a discoverable part of the UI. Outright replacing visible affordances with gestures is wrong 9 times out of 10, reorganizing UX in a way that needs a walkthrough is annoying... but sometimes I don’t see another way to get certain things across?
abandonliberty 7y ago
I think this is related to the other issue that functionality changes are often not readily visible; everything needs an explanation. At the other end of the spectrum several times I thought Google maps had removed a feature, only to find they had hidden it somewhere else.
Erlich_Bachman 7y ago
> What I want is a piece of software that doesn't change. Or when it changes, it doesn't notify me of it - it just keeps working until I find enough time to actually go on my own journey of discovery. Use one of the stable desktop environments on Linux.
- pimeys 7y ago
  This is the reason I've been using i3 and sway together over ten years already. My work environment never changes.

Wowfunhappy 7y ago

I could not agree more. This is also what really bothers me about Windows 10. Notably in that case, Microsoft makes an enterprise version of Windows 10 called LTSC/LTSB, where you get security updates but never feature updates. Unless you're a huge enterprise, they'll refuse to sell to you.

fortran77 7y ago
1. You can buy LTSC with as few as 5 licenses. And they don't all have to be for Windows. If you need 5 MS licenses of anything you can get it. Don't spread misinformation https://www.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/bbof9s/windows_10_enterprise_ltsc_what_are_the_purchase/ https://www.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/bbof9s/windows_10... 2. You really don't want LTSC on your desktop.
- Wowfunhappy 7y ago
  The link you gave makes it sound like it's a huge hassle to get LTSC as an individual, which is what I'd read in the past. You need to go through a reseller and provide details about your business. > You really don't want LTSC on your desktop. Because why? I have used LTSC, and it is in fact exactly what I want on all my Windows computers. It's just normal Windows 10 except without the Windows Store†, and with a Debian-esque update model. † And there are ways to add the Windows Store back in, if you really want it.

lostmsu 7y ago

A contrary indie developer perspective: some features are just really hard to discover even when you know what are you looking for. I don't have time for making those introductions, and end up getting feedback requests for some features my app already has.

m11a 7y ago
Problem: Half of the time I'm not even familiar enough with the core features of the app, never mind learning the new niche features they just added in the latest version. And since many apps believe in updating a lot and often I see this "What's New" stuff way too frequently. I imagine frequent users of the app would appreciate knowing what's new more than users that aren't so familiar with the app. I like to know what's new in iOS/macOS, since they update once a year and I'm familiar with it, and they make it brief.
CamperBob2 7y ago
A contrary indie developer perspective: some features are just really hard to discover Maybe tackle this problem first, then fall back to exposition. One suggestion might be to start by removing hieroglyphic icons, or at least augmenting them with text labels.
- lostmsu 7y ago
  > Maybe tackle this problem first, then fall back to exposition. You assume it can be tackled. Here's a concrete example: The tool automatically snaps new windows to where user wants them to be. Rarely the user wants to undo that. The core functionality (autosnap) does not require any visible interface whatsoever. If I want user to see the undo button, I have to place it somewhere over his app's window, which bloats the interface (the undo is uncommon), or outright impossible, since some windows have custom titlebars. So there's a hotkey, configurable in settings. How can you make it more discoverable?
  - saagarjha 7y ago
    Does it show up when you hold down the Command key?

m11a 7y ago

It wouldn't bother me if it was one or two apps that I use frequently. It does bother me when it's every single one, and as you say, most of which are used rarely. Then it gets annoying on all of them. It's less annoying with Apple since they only update apps/OS once a year. But it seems like every software jumps onto the bandwagon and now you see a changelog opening up an app every other day.

eloisant 7y ago
That's the thing, each developer thinks their app is the most important one on your device.

auraham 7y ago

I feel the same. Recently, I updated Spark just for the dark theme option. I don't mind the short introduction of new features. However, I hate when the app dramatically changes, as Spark did. Now, the UI of this version is significantly different to the previous one. I experienced the same issue on Pocket. They removed the "Open with Firefox" option when sharing an URL. I don't like these kind of updates.

saagarjha 7y ago
> They removed the "Open with Firefox" option when sharing an URL. Surely Firefox exports an action to open the URL in the app?

drusepth 7y ago

Your opinion here is completely valid and probably pretty widespread, but I feel almost entirely the opposite. Every time I get one of those "what's new" pop-ups in an app I already enjoy, it feels like Christmas morning for me and I almost always immediately go try out the new feature(s). I don't think I would find most of them (or wouldn't find them as quickly) for most apps without a nudge saying what to look for.

heavenlyblue 7y ago
I constantly use: Slack, Datadog, Gmail, Sentry, JIRA, Confluence, Google Cal, IDEA. And that’s excluding the apps. CityMapper, Google Maps, Amazon, WhatsApp. Every day there’s something new released in one of those apps. I can barely keep up with my email stream - you are either not using enough apps or you have too much free time on your hands.
- cdubzzz 7y ago
  OP literally started with, “your opinion here is completely valid” and shared a valid opinion and you responded with, basically, “you’re doing it wrong”.
  - Erlich_Bachman 7y ago
    Or they just indicated why the opinions differ, ie what might be the different usage patterns that lead to different opinions.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
anoncake 7y ago
There are better solutions for that such as an ordinary notification.
- fcarraldo 7y ago
  Personally, I don't want apps that I'm not using to send a disruptive notification that there's something new in the app. I'd prefer that the app let me know the next time I launch it, as being described by OP.

code_duck 7y ago

It's much like how the design of Facebook constantly changes without adding any sort of benefits. I think that they have large design teams who have nothing to do because the product is already perfectly adequate, so they invent work for themselves.

ljm 7y ago
I think it keeps more than the designers in a job. Half of these changes come with some exaggerated prose from a marketing or design consultant, explaining how their new logo or colour scheme or layout really speaks to the fundamental nature of the universe and our place within it, and how suitable that is for a chat client or an analytics platform. Throw a custom font in there too for good measure.

darkteflon 7y ago

Agree. Catalina was what ended it for me. I understand that mobile OSes need to change somewhat generation to generation as we’re still scratching around to figure out what works and what doesn’t. I don’t want or need that for my workstation though. I built a tower, installed kubuntu 18 LTS and don’t intend to upgrade until they stop supporting it. It made sense for my workflow and I’m happy with how it’s worked out.

Wowfunhappy 7y ago
> I understand that mobile OSes need to change somewhat generation to generation as we’re still scratching around to figure out what works and what doesn’t. ...do we though? The iPhone came out more than a decade ago now, and I feel like we got it pretty darn figured out around 2015 or so. Newer versions of iOS have brought some improvements, but also a lot of miss-steps, and performance decreases on older devices (the only place you'd notice).
- wang_li 7y ago
  The current versions of iOS 13 and iPadOS 13 having obvious and frequently encountered rendering bugs in safari. If they let this out to users your expectation that they’ll allow the user experience to interfere with their awesomeness is surely going to be unfulfilled. Not to mention those stupid flashlight and camera buttons on the iPhone lock screen whose only explanation is some manager somewhere wanted to make their mark.
  - dangus 7y ago
    I agree with everything you said until you dissed the flashlight and camera buttons. I use those all the time, via muscle memory. Getting to the camera and flashlight ASAP is critical.
    - wang_li 7y ago
      On my xr it's much quicker to get to either of them through control center than holding the button for two seconds. And the way that they are placed, about 15% of the time when I pick up my phone gripping it front-back rather than side-side I activate one of those two things unintentionally. Plus the trailing edge triggered nature of them is annoying. It's also anti-user that they can't be disabled/removed per the user's preference.

mihaaly 7y ago

Very true!! I stopped visiting certain websites because of those useless junk blocking nonsense and iOS is very close to follow, very very close.

gnicholas 7y ago

This is one of the reasons I disabled app auto updates. There are only a few apps that need to be updated regularly, like uber and some banking apps. The rest can wait until I decide to update them. Also saves space on my device by not always having the latest version.

saagarjha 7y ago
> Also saves space on my device by not always having the latest version. How so?
- anoncake 7y ago
  Bloat?
  - saagarjha 7y ago
    Many recent updates have actually reduced bloat. One of my apps shrunk by more than half as Swift libraries moved into the system.
    - gnicholas 7y ago
      Yeah after app thinning was enabled, most apps became much smaller because you weren’t forced to download assets meant for other device sizes. But these days I think most app updates are bigger than previous versions. Would be interested to hear about exceptions to this hypothesis, and reasons why!

anoncake 7y ago

I agree. When I open an app, it's because I want to do something. That something is not "reading release notes". This kind of bullshit is why people don't read warnings but reflexively close pop-ups to get the damn machine to shut up and obey their orders.

oneplane 7y ago

At the same time, people comment about 'hidden' features nobody tells them about. I support there is no 'one size fits all' scenario here.

wwweston 7y ago

On one hand, yes, tour pop-ups are often an admission that discoverability has been neglected, and every time a product discussion goes the orientation-popup direction it should trigger some reflection on that. On the other hand... well, for example, I have a puzzle game concept I’ve worked up a prototype for and everyone I show it to needs some things explained that I haven’t been able to figure out how to just make a discoverable part of the UI. Outright replacing visible affordances with gestures is wrong 9 times out of 10, reorganizing UX in a way that needs a walkthrough is annoying... but sometimes I don’t see another way to get certain things across?

abandonliberty 7y ago

I think this is related to the other issue that functionality changes are often not readily visible; everything needs an explanation. At the other end of the spectrum several times I thought Google maps had removed a feature, only to find they had hidden it somewhere else.

Erlich_Bachman 7y ago

> What I want is a piece of software that doesn't change. Or when it changes, it doesn't notify me of it - it just keeps working until I find enough time to actually go on my own journey of discovery. Use one of the stable desktop environments on Linux.

pimeys 7y ago
This is the reason I've been using i3 and sway together over ten years already. My work environment never changes.