12 ms·

I don't know that I'd necessarily attribute it to the Canonical team, but the best UI designers make decisions that don't sound right out loud, but actually wor

by bmelton 16y ago

I don't know that I'd necessarily attribute it to the Canonical team, but the best UI designers make decisions that don't sound right out loud, but actually work quite well in the product. That's often the very point of UI, is in studying behaviors and responding to them in ways that aren't obvious, and that often sound wrong on their face. Apple, in particular, are considered a paragon of UI excellence, yet many of the decisions they make SOUND downright terrible. Of course, using their products is generally easy and convenient. For the record, I am not a UI/UX guru, so all I can offer are anecdotes on this, but I think that the important takeaway is that good UI/UX should not be obviously right. If it were, everybody would have already been doing it, and I think that we can all agree that most UI of yore is downright bad.

joe_the_user 16y ago
Recently, meaning in OS X, I've felt like the Apple UI has degenerated through the use of "easy looking" UI elements that remove every "confusing" element to the point of preventing the user from doing anything. Not only can I not find files when Finder doesn't use folders but my parents and my friends who actually have Macs can't find files either. It seems to me the Mac doesn't win by real usability but by looking beautiful on first glance, having a reputation for usability and having a strong following of folks who will teach people who otherwise struggle with the interface.
- cookiecaper 16y ago
  I agree, generally. I find Mac the most irritating platform to use -- the shortcuts are all different because Apple has a silly insistence of using Super where they should use Ctrl, and common shortcuts are supplanted by the OS, leaving apps to have to find new ones. The Dock is a slow method of switching and Sup+~ shortcut to switch to a windows is more annoying than a straight Alt+Tab. Sup+H and your window goes away; this has confused a lot of people I know, and it annoys me a lot when I try to look at history. I really see no serious UI benefit in Apple's products. It seems roughly equivalent to me, and it uses the same paradigms as other conventional systems, it just does it in a shinier way, and it seems cool just because Apple does it, just like everything MTV does seems cool to a teenager.
  - cabacon 16y ago
    Huh. I find that shortcut consistency is actually a strength of the platform. Are you talking about inconsistencies between OS X's choice and the other OSes you use? Because otherwise, I don't see it. Only on the Mac do I know that I can use the same key combo (apple-,) to get to the preferences of an application, regardless of where it came from. And I'm not sure how apple-` is "more annoying" than alt-tab; apple-tab still exists for switching between applications. apple-` just switches between the windows of an application. I actually like that ability, and again, it's consistent across applications. OS X may not be your cup of tea, and that's just fine. You just happened to attack what I perceive as one of its strengths, so I'm surprised by your choice of targets.
    - arrogant 16y ago
      I agree with this. The fact that you can cycle through both applications and a specific applications' individual windows (in a consistent way) is definitely a perk of the way that OS X handles windows.
    - cookiecaper 16y ago
      I do mean that it's inconsistent between OS X and other OSes. I mean that Apple+Tab is more annoying, and I would prefer it all to just switch windows instead of applications. Most apps on other platforms have a consistent shortcut to the preferences and/or menu bar (Alt).
  - _djo_ 16y ago
    Actually, Apple's use of the Command key for GUI shortcuts both precedes the use of Ctrl for the same task and pioneered many of the conventions, such as Ctrl/Cmd x, v, c & s, that are universal today. Although I was a bit skeptical at first, once I got used to the concept it made a lot of sense. On a Mac, Ctrl+key combos are for contextual menus in the GUI and navigation/commands in terminals and text areas. For instance, you can navigate to the beginning and end of nearly any text element in OS X by using Ctrl-a and Ctrl-e, the standard Emacs shortcuts. And the Cmd+key combos are for GUI and application-level shortcuts, such as copy, paste, print, close, etc. There are two different contexts being handled, so it makes sense to use a different key. The combo to copy a line from a terminal window should not interfere with the combo to cancel the running process within that window, as an example, and on OS X it doesn't. Most importantly, those shortcuts are implemented consistently across applications. No matter what app I'm working on, Cmd+, will always bring up the Preferences window, Cmd+w will close the window, Cmd+q will quit the application, Cmd+h will hide it, Cmd+p will invoke the print dialog, Cmd+s will save, Cmd+S will save as, Cmd+z will undo, etc. I never have to stop and think about it, or get jarred out of my train of thought by an application that uses some non-standard shortcut to save, or quit or similar. I use Ubuntu at the office and while many apps are making good progress on presenting a consistent interface across the OS, I still get frustrated regularly by apps that do things differently. Finally, Cmd+Tab provides the same functionality as Alt-Tab on Windows and Linux. Cmd+` lets you switch between the windows of a particular application, which I've found to be quite useful on a many occasions. Point being, don't knock it till you understand why others like it. While I don't agree with all of Apple's UI decisions, there are plenty of excellent usability features in OS X and I now prefer it to both Windows and Linux because those features line up nicely with the way I work. Aside from a few crappy lowest-common denominator Java desktop apps that haven't been optimised for OS X, but thankfully those are disappearing fast.
- tvon 16y ago
  > Not only can I not find files when Finder doesn't use folders (...) Huh? Do you mean things like iPhoto that bundle photos?
  - joe_the_user 16y ago
    I really don't understand how current finder works, having used it a dozen times. Whatever it does, doesn't seem to involve separate folders. Seems Prima facie evidence of lack of usability since I have been able to reasonably easily understand Windows, Linux and the older Macintosh finder-thing. And yes, iPhotos seem to be a problem. I watched a friend spend three hours trying to find some photos they'd previous loaded in iPhoto.
    - weaksauce 16y ago
      A right click in most programs on a "file" will reveal an option that is along the lines of reveal "filename" in finder. iPhoto does this. I don't know if I understand what finder is doing different than say windows explorer or konqueror in linux. when you click on finder it opens a new file browser that has the typical list and icon view as well as some quicklook view that I don't like much and a nested list view where each column is a different folder. It seems pretty similar to windows in my opinion. (not that it's all peaches, I would really like to have a file cut and paste option instead of only copy but I digress) edit: Looking at your higher up comment I guess you are talking about the isuite of programs that aggregate all your files and handle them internally? even that is a folder on your hard drive(~/usrname/Pictures/iPhoto Library is still a folder just right click on it to select show package contents and you can get to all your files or just open iPhoto and right click on a picture you want to locate and select reveal in finder) though and it's less of a function of finder and more of a function of the iphoto itunes etc.
      - tvon 16y ago
        Are you sure iPhoto still has a 'reveal in finder' option? I"m not seeing it... Though I don't know why you'd need it with iPhoto since you can just DnD photos out to the desktop (or wherever) if you want to work on them.
mcantelon 16y ago
>Apple, in particular, are considered a paragon of UI excellence, yet many of the decisions they make SOUND downright terrible. And some, like the UI of iTunes and their elimination of the right mouse button, are terrible. I don't see Apple as innovative on the UI front... more so in terms of visual design.

by bmelton 16y ago

joe_the_user 16y ago

Recently, meaning in OS X, I've felt like the Apple UI has degenerated through the use of "easy looking" UI elements that remove every "confusing" element to the point of preventing the user from doing anything. Not only can I not find files when Finder doesn't use folders but my parents and my friends who actually have Macs can't find files either. It seems to me the Mac doesn't win by real usability but by looking beautiful on first glance, having a reputation for usability and having a strong following of folks who will teach people who otherwise struggle with the interface.

cookiecaper 16y ago
I agree, generally. I find Mac the most irritating platform to use -- the shortcuts are all different because Apple has a silly insistence of using Super where they should use Ctrl, and common shortcuts are supplanted by the OS, leaving apps to have to find new ones. The Dock is a slow method of switching and Sup+~ shortcut to switch to a windows is more annoying than a straight Alt+Tab. Sup+H and your window goes away; this has confused a lot of people I know, and it annoys me a lot when I try to look at history. I really see no serious UI benefit in Apple's products. It seems roughly equivalent to me, and it uses the same paradigms as other conventional systems, it just does it in a shinier way, and it seems cool just because Apple does it, just like everything MTV does seems cool to a teenager.
- cabacon 16y ago
  Huh. I find that shortcut consistency is actually a strength of the platform. Are you talking about inconsistencies between OS X's choice and the other OSes you use? Because otherwise, I don't see it. Only on the Mac do I know that I can use the same key combo (apple-,) to get to the preferences of an application, regardless of where it came from. And I'm not sure how apple-` is "more annoying" than alt-tab; apple-tab still exists for switching between applications. apple-` just switches between the windows of an application. I actually like that ability, and again, it's consistent across applications. OS X may not be your cup of tea, and that's just fine. You just happened to attack what I perceive as one of its strengths, so I'm surprised by your choice of targets.
  - arrogant 16y ago
    I agree with this. The fact that you can cycle through both applications and a specific applications' individual windows (in a consistent way) is definitely a perk of the way that OS X handles windows.
  - cookiecaper 16y ago
    I do mean that it's inconsistent between OS X and other OSes. I mean that Apple+Tab is more annoying, and I would prefer it all to just switch windows instead of applications. Most apps on other platforms have a consistent shortcut to the preferences and/or menu bar (Alt).
- _djo_ 16y ago
  Actually, Apple's use of the Command key for GUI shortcuts both precedes the use of Ctrl for the same task and pioneered many of the conventions, such as Ctrl/Cmd x, v, c & s, that are universal today. Although I was a bit skeptical at first, once I got used to the concept it made a lot of sense. On a Mac, Ctrl+key combos are for contextual menus in the GUI and navigation/commands in terminals and text areas. For instance, you can navigate to the beginning and end of nearly any text element in OS X by using Ctrl-a and Ctrl-e, the standard Emacs shortcuts. And the Cmd+key combos are for GUI and application-level shortcuts, such as copy, paste, print, close, etc. There are two different contexts being handled, so it makes sense to use a different key. The combo to copy a line from a terminal window should not interfere with the combo to cancel the running process within that window, as an example, and on OS X it doesn't. Most importantly, those shortcuts are implemented consistently across applications. No matter what app I'm working on, Cmd+, will always bring up the Preferences window, Cmd+w will close the window, Cmd+q will quit the application, Cmd+h will hide it, Cmd+p will invoke the print dialog, Cmd+s will save, Cmd+S will save as, Cmd+z will undo, etc. I never have to stop and think about it, or get jarred out of my train of thought by an application that uses some non-standard shortcut to save, or quit or similar. I use Ubuntu at the office and while many apps are making good progress on presenting a consistent interface across the OS, I still get frustrated regularly by apps that do things differently. Finally, Cmd+Tab provides the same functionality as Alt-Tab on Windows and Linux. Cmd+` lets you switch between the windows of a particular application, which I've found to be quite useful on a many occasions. Point being, don't knock it till you understand why others like it. While I don't agree with all of Apple's UI decisions, there are plenty of excellent usability features in OS X and I now prefer it to both Windows and Linux because those features line up nicely with the way I work. Aside from a few crappy lowest-common denominator Java desktop apps that haven't been optimised for OS X, but thankfully those are disappearing fast.
tvon 16y ago
> Not only can I not find files when Finder doesn't use folders (...) Huh? Do you mean things like iPhoto that bundle photos?
- joe_the_user 16y ago
  I really don't understand how current finder works, having used it a dozen times. Whatever it does, doesn't seem to involve separate folders. Seems Prima facie evidence of lack of usability since I have been able to reasonably easily understand Windows, Linux and the older Macintosh finder-thing. And yes, iPhotos seem to be a problem. I watched a friend spend three hours trying to find some photos they'd previous loaded in iPhoto.
  - weaksauce 16y ago
    A right click in most programs on a "file" will reveal an option that is along the lines of reveal "filename" in finder. iPhoto does this. I don't know if I understand what finder is doing different than say windows explorer or konqueror in linux. when you click on finder it opens a new file browser that has the typical list and icon view as well as some quicklook view that I don't like much and a nested list view where each column is a different folder. It seems pretty similar to windows in my opinion. (not that it's all peaches, I would really like to have a file cut and paste option instead of only copy but I digress) edit: Looking at your higher up comment I guess you are talking about the isuite of programs that aggregate all your files and handle them internally? even that is a folder on your hard drive(~/usrname/Pictures/iPhoto Library is still a folder just right click on it to select show package contents and you can get to all your files or just open iPhoto and right click on a picture you want to locate and select reveal in finder) though and it's less of a function of finder and more of a function of the iphoto itunes etc.
    - tvon 16y ago
      Are you sure iPhoto still has a 'reveal in finder' option? I"m not seeing it... Though I don't know why you'd need it with iPhoto since you can just DnD photos out to the desktop (or wherever) if you want to work on them.

mcantelon 16y ago

>Apple, in particular, are considered a paragon of UI excellence, yet many of the decisions they make SOUND downright terrible. And some, like the UI of iTunes and their elimination of the right mouse button, are terrible. I don't see Apple as innovative on the UI front... more so in terms of visual design.