8 ms·

that's really gorgeous. I find windows 95 aesthetics a master piece. I'm not gonna lie, I thought about windows 95 when I was creating FOS, my Fake Operational

by atum47 7y ago

that's really gorgeous. I find windows 95 aesthetics a master piece. I'm not gonna lie, I thought about windows 95 when I was creating FOS, my Fake Operational System "framework". I'm thinking about refactoring it and I'll may incorporate windows color scheme to it. Here's the link if you wanna see what I am talking about. https://github.com/victorqribeiro/fos https://github.com/victorqribeiro/fos

pazimzadeh 7y ago
I think it's really the NeXTSTEP aesthetic.
- LarvaFX 7y ago
  Yes it truly is. But Microsoft perfected it.
- sedatk 7y ago
  ...or OSF/Motif aesthetic.
cm2187 7y ago
Fashion is cyclical. At one point people will get bored of these ambiguous modern UI with hidden fields and gestures, and made of 50 shades of light grey that only a calibrated display can render with any discernable contrast. And we will rediscover the merit of clear and explicit UIs, and Apple will claim it just invented it!
- schrijver 7y ago
  I wouldn’t be surprised :) The Windows 95 aesthetic is already back into fashion, I see it a lot on flyers, web art… just not yet in computer applications! I guess that’s a matter of time. Check out the flyer for this party: https://highclouds.org/highclouds-online-antivirus-party-magdalena-bay-cobrah-dolly-bing-bing/ https://highclouds.org/highclouds-online-antivirus-party-mag... They used vectors, looks like the Windows 95 aesthetics that was so connected to pixel survives this transition quite well!
  - squiggleblaz 7y ago
    That's later than Windows 95 - maybe 98 or 2000. Windows 95 didn't support gradient titlebars.
    - xattt 7y ago
      Gradient titlebars were the killer feature for Windows 98.
    - nobleach 7y ago
      Some of us replaced our GDI.EXE, GDI32.DLL, SHELL.DLL, etc and installed TweakUI.exe to get those Windows 98 features a year or so earlier.... Then again, I was a Memphis beta tester (legitimately, not the "I found these rars on a warez site" variety of "beta tester") So I "enjoyed" some of those features pretty early on.
  - lucideer 7y ago
    > already back into fashion That seems more like retro/throwback fashion (which is always a thing, in every era) than the fundamental principles of that aesthetic being incorporated into modern design (which is what I would typically consider actually being "in fashion"). Still, nice to consider we're at the point where that's what we're framing as retro. No longer is it System 1 or CRT terminals.
  - bartread 7y ago
    > The Windows 95 aesthetic is already back into fashion It's certainly big in vaporwave and, to some extent, synthwave. Obviously both genres of music but also, and particularly the former, very strong aesthetics.
  - andrepd 7y ago
    That's vaporwave, a specific aesthetic style, and it's quite different from Win98 design making a mainstream comeback :p
- api 7y ago
  That will be really nice, since it will benefit from high DPI and of course much better displays.
- fstephany 7y ago
  Haiku OS and Gnome have such a different feeling when I use them. Haiku has this delightful vibe to it, I can't explain.
  - soulofmischief 7y ago
    Gnome evokes the feeling of shoving my eyes through a cheese-grater and then being gaslighted about the usefulness of every UI convenience I've come to take for granted.
Scapeghost 7y ago
I don't know, Windows 95 looked crude even during its day. Functional, but not pleasant. I guess Brutalist would be the term? As soon as there was the ability to skin it, people tried to veer away the default look, with Mac-like styles being a common alternative. People probably have rose-tinted nostalgia for the 95 era because of the nightmare that followed: Windows XP :)
- djsumdog 7y ago
  95 and XP both had good scroll bars. XP styling was pretty good for its era. Modern day scroll bars are atrocious on a lot of toolkits.
  - Scapeghost 7y ago
    > XP styling was pretty good for its era. XP was skinned like a very tacky Fischer Price toy, with garish colors and oversized elements that would have been more at home on a touchscreen. I don't think anyone called it a good theme unsarcastically. Why do we even need always visible scroll bars? They just take screen space and billions of people do fine without them on Macs and mobile OSes.
    - roelschroeven 7y ago
      > Why do we even need always visible scroll bars? They just take screen space and billions of people do fine without them on Macs and mobile OSes. Don't get me started. Pros of a proper always-present scrollbar with appropriately-styled thumb: - It indicates that the thing you're viewing even is scrollable. - You can see at once where you are in a document, and how large it is relative to your viewport. - It offers a convenient UI to scroll in both small or large amounts, or scroll to the very top or bottom. For lots of uses the scroll wheel on your mouse is a substitute, but certainly not for everything. Cons: - It takes a tiny bit of screen real estate - It offends some people's esthetics taste, I guess
    - orhmeh09 7y ago
      I have heard this criticism so many times since Luna, and almost every single time I’ve noticed that Fisher-Price is misspelled by the critic. How can you trust someone like that?

by atum47 7y ago

pazimzadeh 7y ago

I think it's really the NeXTSTEP aesthetic.

LarvaFX 7y ago
Yes it truly is. But Microsoft perfected it.
sedatk 7y ago
...or OSF/Motif aesthetic.

cm2187 7y ago

Fashion is cyclical. At one point people will get bored of these ambiguous modern UI with hidden fields and gestures, and made of 50 shades of light grey that only a calibrated display can render with any discernable contrast. And we will rediscover the merit of clear and explicit UIs, and Apple will claim it just invented it!

schrijver 7y ago
I wouldn’t be surprised :) The Windows 95 aesthetic is already back into fashion, I see it a lot on flyers, web art… just not yet in computer applications! I guess that’s a matter of time. Check out the flyer for this party: https://highclouds.org/highclouds-online-antivirus-party-magdalena-bay-cobrah-dolly-bing-bing/ https://highclouds.org/highclouds-online-antivirus-party-mag... They used vectors, looks like the Windows 95 aesthetics that was so connected to pixel survives this transition quite well!
- squiggleblaz 7y ago
  That's later than Windows 95 - maybe 98 or 2000. Windows 95 didn't support gradient titlebars.
  - xattt 7y ago
    Gradient titlebars were the killer feature for Windows 98.
  - nobleach 7y ago
    Some of us replaced our GDI.EXE, GDI32.DLL, SHELL.DLL, etc and installed TweakUI.exe to get those Windows 98 features a year or so earlier.... Then again, I was a Memphis beta tester (legitimately, not the "I found these rars on a warez site" variety of "beta tester") So I "enjoyed" some of those features pretty early on.
- lucideer 7y ago
  > already back into fashion That seems more like retro/throwback fashion (which is always a thing, in every era) than the fundamental principles of that aesthetic being incorporated into modern design (which is what I would typically consider actually being "in fashion"). Still, nice to consider we're at the point where that's what we're framing as retro. No longer is it System 1 or CRT terminals.
- bartread 7y ago
  > The Windows 95 aesthetic is already back into fashion It's certainly big in vaporwave and, to some extent, synthwave. Obviously both genres of music but also, and particularly the former, very strong aesthetics.
- andrepd 7y ago
  That's vaporwave, a specific aesthetic style, and it's quite different from Win98 design making a mainstream comeback :p
api 7y ago
That will be really nice, since it will benefit from high DPI and of course much better displays.
fstephany 7y ago
Haiku OS and Gnome have such a different feeling when I use them. Haiku has this delightful vibe to it, I can't explain.
- soulofmischief 7y ago
  Gnome evokes the feeling of shoving my eyes through a cheese-grater and then being gaslighted about the usefulness of every UI convenience I've come to take for granted.

Scapeghost 7y ago

I don't know, Windows 95 looked crude even during its day. Functional, but not pleasant. I guess Brutalist would be the term? As soon as there was the ability to skin it, people tried to veer away the default look, with Mac-like styles being a common alternative. People probably have rose-tinted nostalgia for the 95 era because of the nightmare that followed: Windows XP :)

djsumdog 7y ago
95 and XP both had good scroll bars. XP styling was pretty good for its era. Modern day scroll bars are atrocious on a lot of toolkits.
- Scapeghost 7y ago
  > XP styling was pretty good for its era. XP was skinned like a very tacky Fischer Price toy, with garish colors and oversized elements that would have been more at home on a touchscreen. I don't think anyone called it a good theme unsarcastically. Why do we even need always visible scroll bars? They just take screen space and billions of people do fine without them on Macs and mobile OSes.
  - roelschroeven 7y ago
    > Why do we even need always visible scroll bars? They just take screen space and billions of people do fine without them on Macs and mobile OSes. Don't get me started. Pros of a proper always-present scrollbar with appropriately-styled thumb: - It indicates that the thing you're viewing even is scrollable. - You can see at once where you are in a document, and how large it is relative to your viewport. - It offers a convenient UI to scroll in both small or large amounts, or scroll to the very top or bottom. For lots of uses the scroll wheel on your mouse is a substitute, but certainly not for everything. Cons: - It takes a tiny bit of screen real estate - It offends some people's esthetics taste, I guess
  - orhmeh09 7y ago
    I have heard this criticism so many times since Luna, and almost every single time I’ve noticed that Fisher-Price is misspelled by the critic. How can you trust someone like that?