8 ms·

What if you want to know the relative length of a page without scrolling first? What if it's one of those webpages with a full height hero as the first element

by worble 6y ago

What if you want to know the relative length of a page without scrolling first? What if it's one of those webpages with a full height hero as the first element and no indicator you can actually scroll? What if I want to click and drag the scroll to a specific location but have to take wild flailing guesses at where the scrollbar actually is because it keeps going invisible?

chrisseaton 6y ago
There’s always obscure use cases like this. You could go on forever listing individual people’s wants and you’d end up with a Homer car. We design interfaces for the many first, and keep them as simple as possible but not simpler.
- noisem4ker 6y ago
  An always visible scroll bar or indicator is conceptually simpler than one that disappears randomly. Knowing that a view is scrollable and there's more content to see is absolutely not an obscure edge case but a basic accessibility feature. Relevant past discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20951580 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20951580 Also relevant, what happens when the user doesn't realize more content is available: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21353920 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21353920
  - chrisseaton 6y ago
    Well I just subjectively disagree - as apparently do the legions of professional experts at multiple distinct companies who research user interaction and design these interfaces.
    - noisem4ker 6y ago
      I'm convinced designers have since long overthrown human-machine interaction experts, and usability consistently went down in the search for what's visually appealing and cleaner. I particularly blame Apple as a trend-setter in this, along with everyone that dumbly followed the fashion. No appeal to authority will ever convince me that disappearing scroll indicators are good for me, as I've been burned by them and I see less able people around me having ever increasing difficulty navigating modern interfaces thanks to similar innovations.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
    - buckminster 6y ago
      The "professional experts" are not interested in usability. They care only about sales and/or engagement. You can see this in every consumer product, not just software.
  - Scapeghost 6y ago
    > An always visible scroll bar or indicator is conceptually simpler than one that disappears randomly. An always visible scroll bar takes up a good chunk of screen space when you have multiple of them, and it's easy to develop intuition for what's scrollable and what isn't, just like we know what's right-clickable and what isn't. It should be an option and it is, at least on Macs.
- Symbiote 6y ago
  Knowing how long a document is, and whereabouts your current view is, seems pretty fundamental. You may as well argue against page numbers in books.
  - chrisseaton 6y ago
    You just scroll a tiny bit and you can see. Doesn't need to on the screen all the time, taking up space, distracting from the content which is what I care about, rather than whizz-bang user-interface elements.
    - noisem4ker 6y ago
      Me asking myself "how long is this article" before I start reading it is a distraction? Too bad, I can't help but want to know. I could've learned that instantly by unconsciously glancing at the scroll indicator, but instead I have to move the whole content down for it to appear (possibly with a whizz-bang animation, no less), introducing friction and further distracting me from the content. Good job, I guess.
      - chrisseaton 6y ago
        I don't know what you tell you - most people don't think about user interfaces like this. As we can clearly tell by people not designing them like this anymore.
        perl4ever 6y ago
        Most user interfaces are not designed any more with any intent to provide what's best for the user, because they are part of a product being sold to corporations/advertisers.
        noisem4ker 6y ago
        If I were to find a causal relation, it would be the opposite: people not expecting affordances such as scroll indicators would be a result of designers hiding them in the first place.
- tomcooks 6y ago
  > We design interfaces for the many first, and keep them as simple as possible but not simpler. The many being able bodied, literate, touch-device-carrying people? I am not sure interfaces should be designed like that.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]

by worble 6y ago

chrisseaton 6y ago

There’s always obscure use cases like this. You could go on forever listing individual people’s wants and you’d end up with a Homer car. We design interfaces for the many first, and keep them as simple as possible but not simpler.

noisem4ker 6y ago
An always visible scroll bar or indicator is conceptually simpler than one that disappears randomly. Knowing that a view is scrollable and there's more content to see is absolutely not an obscure edge case but a basic accessibility feature. Relevant past discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20951580 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20951580 Also relevant, what happens when the user doesn't realize more content is available: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21353920 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21353920
- chrisseaton 6y ago
  Well I just subjectively disagree - as apparently do the legions of professional experts at multiple distinct companies who research user interaction and design these interfaces.
  - noisem4ker 6y ago
    I'm convinced designers have since long overthrown human-machine interaction experts, and usability consistently went down in the search for what's visually appealing and cleaner. I particularly blame Apple as a trend-setter in this, along with everyone that dumbly followed the fashion. No appeal to authority will ever convince me that disappearing scroll indicators are good for me, as I've been burned by them and I see less able people around me having ever increasing difficulty navigating modern interfaces thanks to similar innovations.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
  - buckminster 6y ago
    The "professional experts" are not interested in usability. They care only about sales and/or engagement. You can see this in every consumer product, not just software.
- Scapeghost 6y ago
  > An always visible scroll bar or indicator is conceptually simpler than one that disappears randomly. An always visible scroll bar takes up a good chunk of screen space when you have multiple of them, and it's easy to develop intuition for what's scrollable and what isn't, just like we know what's right-clickable and what isn't. It should be an option and it is, at least on Macs.
Symbiote 6y ago
Knowing how long a document is, and whereabouts your current view is, seems pretty fundamental. You may as well argue against page numbers in books.
- chrisseaton 6y ago
  You just scroll a tiny bit and you can see. Doesn't need to on the screen all the time, taking up space, distracting from the content which is what I care about, rather than whizz-bang user-interface elements.
  - noisem4ker 6y ago
    Me asking myself "how long is this article" before I start reading it is a distraction? Too bad, I can't help but want to know. I could've learned that instantly by unconsciously glancing at the scroll indicator, but instead I have to move the whole content down for it to appear (possibly with a whizz-bang animation, no less), introducing friction and further distracting me from the content. Good job, I guess.
    - chrisseaton 6y ago
      I don't know what you tell you - most people don't think about user interfaces like this. As we can clearly tell by people not designing them like this anymore.
      - perl4ever 6y ago
        Most user interfaces are not designed any more with any intent to provide what's best for the user, because they are part of a product being sold to corporations/advertisers.
      - noisem4ker 6y ago
        If I were to find a causal relation, it would be the opposite: people not expecting affordances such as scroll indicators would be a result of designers hiding them in the first place.
tomcooks 6y ago
> We design interfaces for the many first, and keep them as simple as possible but not simpler. The many being able bodied, literate, touch-device-carrying people? I am not sure interfaces should be designed like that.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]