4 ms·

Care to share even 1 or 2 of the most egregious off the top of your head? Edit: Thanks all. I have to disagree that "Apple's no better than anyone else when it

by pb7 6y ago

Care to share even 1 or 2 of the most egregious off the top of your head? Edit: Thanks all. I have to disagree that "Apple's no better than anyone else when it comes to UX" -- I think they are better but also make a lot of annoying mistakes. UX is hard, doubly so when you have such popular devices that try to cater towards so many different groups (children, techies, common folks, older non-tech savvy, etc). No one makes nearly as many popular devices and software under the same brand that comes close to this high of a standard. The reason all of these things stick out is because the expectations are so high.

capableweb 6y ago
Not the most egregious but three examples: If you're using CarPlay, there is a phone call and you pick up, CarPlay changes the entire screen to the phone call (which is just the profile pic of the person you're talking to), even if you're using Maps or anything else. Everything has a different way to be closed or go back to the previous screen. Sometimes you swipe up, sometimes to the left, sometimes there is a back arrow in the top left, sometimes there is a X in the top right. When to do what is often not clear, and there is no universal "go back" action that seems to work either. Swapping application context goes by "last touched", and it's easy to get lost when swapping left/right and trying to look/copy/scroll from many apps.
- pb7 6y ago
  >Everything has a different way to be closed or go back to the previous screen. Sometimes you swipe up, sometimes to the left, sometimes there is a back arrow in the top left, sometimes there is a X in the top right. When to do what is often not clear, and there is no universal "go back" action that seems to work either. I can think of one extremely annoying exception that was definitely an oversight, but generally these is a HIG that is associated with each of these. Not everything makes sense to be in a left-to-right stack. The windows that pop up from the bottom are supposed to have a different purpose (usually have a "Close" button) vs the nav stack that have a back button. 3rd party apps do their own thing.
  - capableweb 6y ago
    > Not everything makes sense to be in a left-to-right stack. The windows that pop up from the bottom are supposed to have a different purpose (usually have a "Close" button) vs the nav stack that have a back button I agree. I think what I'm getting at with that is less about how you structure your app, and more about my frustration that there is no universal way of going back. If the developer forgets to implement a back button, suddenly I can get stuck on a step and having to restart the app. In a non-iOS app UI (like desktop GTK, browsers, Windows UI or anything really) it's always really obvious that I can press the OS hotkey to go back, or press backspace/escape to get back to where I was before.
- muthuraj57 6y ago
  >Everything has a different way to be closed or go back to the previous screen. Sometimes you swipe up, sometimes to the left, sometimes there is a back arrow in the top left, sometimes there is a X in the top right. When to do what is often not clear, and there is no universal "go back" action that seems to work either. Very true. I moved from Android to iPhone few months ago and even through the current iPhone I use (iPhone 11) is smaller than my Android device (Samsung S20 Plus), I can't use it with one hand.
lelandbatey 6y ago
Not who asked, but as someone who bought an iPad I can share at least some which completely threw me for a loop. How do I search through all the apps on my iPad? I want to see a list, or have a text field where I can type, how do I get one to show up? I try swiping down from the top edge, that gives me a "lock screen". Swipe down from the top right corner, that gives me a _different_ status and widget screen than the one that I get swiping down from the top edge anywhere else. I swipe from the left to the right, I get yet ANOTHER set of widgets I don't care about. Swipe from the right to the left and I start moving through the randomly organized pages of apps. No, to be able to search for an app, I have to know that if I put my finger in the center of the home screen, right on top of all the app icons which normally I tap to enter said apps, and then swipe down from that position, A FULL PAGE SEARCH BOX MATERIALIZES FROM NOWHERE AND PULLS FOCUS FROM EVERYTHING ELSE?! How the hell am I supposed to "just know this"? I do like my iPad, but it is full of these kinds of "how am I supposed to know that that works that way?" moments. I got an iPad for my older, less technically focused mother, and I really got the brunt of it then. Text and buttons are indistinguishable in the flat paradigm; you can't increase the size of things like the text that is used to label the apps on the home screen just below their icons (or at least, I couldn't figure it out after much searching); the contrast of UI elements is waaaay too low and many don't respond to accessibility options, meaning things like area dividers are hard to see and thus can't guide the user; dividing up UI elements like the bottom-of-the-screen bar in Apple Podcasts ends up being confusing (is this a part of the "overall app" UI, or is what's on the screen now merely a part of this single view-pane?); apps are always playing "where's the back button" because there is no dedicated "back" button like on Android, so sometimes the back button is in the top left corner, sometimes it's in a different corner because I'm in a sub-view, sometimes it's not there because I need to swipe this menu away, but no matter what, it's never near where my hand always is: the bottom right of the device, so it's always a chore to go "back". I could go on. What I mean to say is that I strongly agree with author when they say "Apple’s no better than anyone else when it comes to UX"; I'm sure if I got used to it I'd be fine with all of this, just as I and my older mother are "fine-ish" with Android because it's what we're used to. But make no mistake: > Apple’s no better than anyone else when it comes to UX
robotmay 6y ago
My biggest frustration since I wrote this article was that by swiping up from the bottom right corner of an iPad, the keyboard would move up to the middle of the screen and split itself in two. Turns out if you were slightly inside the screen when you start swiping it triggers a long-press popup menu for the keyboard.
robotmay 6y ago
Thank you for disagreeing in a reasonable manner. Where I feel Apple fall short is in trying to take away “excess information”, where honestly they often succeed, they end up with some very confusing interfaces. And while this might make it faster to learn, it doesn’t necessarily mean people are learning the “right” things, i.e. what is actually going on. Although pretty much anyone using the term “cloud” is doing the same thing. I still stand by the headline though, for my opinion. I just think they’re better at some things and worse at others. I find most current OS about as bad as each other in terms of UX.
muthuraj57 6y ago
Every alarm clock app in Android lets you edit the time when you just tap the time in the list of alarms. But iOS does nothing on tapping the time. We have to click `Edit` from top left, then tap the time to edit it. I don't how this qualifies as great UX. I recently moved from Android to iOS and there are lot of annoyances like this all over the phone.

by pb7 6y ago

capableweb 6y ago

Not the most egregious but three examples: If you're using CarPlay, there is a phone call and you pick up, CarPlay changes the entire screen to the phone call (which is just the profile pic of the person you're talking to), even if you're using Maps or anything else. Everything has a different way to be closed or go back to the previous screen. Sometimes you swipe up, sometimes to the left, sometimes there is a back arrow in the top left, sometimes there is a X in the top right. When to do what is often not clear, and there is no universal "go back" action that seems to work either. Swapping application context goes by "last touched", and it's easy to get lost when swapping left/right and trying to look/copy/scroll from many apps.

pb7 6y ago
>Everything has a different way to be closed or go back to the previous screen. Sometimes you swipe up, sometimes to the left, sometimes there is a back arrow in the top left, sometimes there is a X in the top right. When to do what is often not clear, and there is no universal "go back" action that seems to work either. I can think of one extremely annoying exception that was definitely an oversight, but generally these is a HIG that is associated with each of these. Not everything makes sense to be in a left-to-right stack. The windows that pop up from the bottom are supposed to have a different purpose (usually have a "Close" button) vs the nav stack that have a back button. 3rd party apps do their own thing.
- capableweb 6y ago
  > Not everything makes sense to be in a left-to-right stack. The windows that pop up from the bottom are supposed to have a different purpose (usually have a "Close" button) vs the nav stack that have a back button I agree. I think what I'm getting at with that is less about how you structure your app, and more about my frustration that there is no universal way of going back. If the developer forgets to implement a back button, suddenly I can get stuck on a step and having to restart the app. In a non-iOS app UI (like desktop GTK, browsers, Windows UI or anything really) it's always really obvious that I can press the OS hotkey to go back, or press backspace/escape to get back to where I was before.
muthuraj57 6y ago
>Everything has a different way to be closed or go back to the previous screen. Sometimes you swipe up, sometimes to the left, sometimes there is a back arrow in the top left, sometimes there is a X in the top right. When to do what is often not clear, and there is no universal "go back" action that seems to work either. Very true. I moved from Android to iPhone few months ago and even through the current iPhone I use (iPhone 11) is smaller than my Android device (Samsung S20 Plus), I can't use it with one hand.

lelandbatey 6y ago

Not who asked, but as someone who bought an iPad I can share at least some which completely threw me for a loop. How do I search through all the apps on my iPad? I want to see a list, or have a text field where I can type, how do I get one to show up? I try swiping down from the top edge, that gives me a "lock screen". Swipe down from the top right corner, that gives me a _different_ status and widget screen than the one that I get swiping down from the top edge anywhere else. I swipe from the left to the right, I get yet ANOTHER set of widgets I don't care about. Swipe from the right to the left and I start moving through the randomly organized pages of apps. No, to be able to search for an app, I have to know that if I put my finger in the center of the home screen, right on top of all the app icons which normally I tap to enter said apps, and then swipe down from that position, A FULL PAGE SEARCH BOX MATERIALIZES FROM NOWHERE AND PULLS FOCUS FROM EVERYTHING ELSE?! How the hell am I supposed to "just know this"? I do like my iPad, but it is full of these kinds of "how am I supposed to know that that works that way?" moments. I got an iPad for my older, less technically focused mother, and I really got the brunt of it then. Text and buttons are indistinguishable in the flat paradigm; you can't increase the size of things like the text that is used to label the apps on the home screen just below their icons (or at least, I couldn't figure it out after much searching); the contrast of UI elements is waaaay too low and many don't respond to accessibility options, meaning things like area dividers are hard to see and thus can't guide the user; dividing up UI elements like the bottom-of-the-screen bar in Apple Podcasts ends up being confusing (is this a part of the "overall app" UI, or is what's on the screen now merely a part of this single view-pane?); apps are always playing "where's the back button" because there is no dedicated "back" button like on Android, so sometimes the back button is in the top left corner, sometimes it's in a different corner because I'm in a sub-view, sometimes it's not there because I need to swipe this menu away, but no matter what, it's never near where my hand always is: the bottom right of the device, so it's always a chore to go "back". I could go on. What I mean to say is that I strongly agree with author when they say "Apple’s no better than anyone else when it comes to UX"; I'm sure if I got used to it I'd be fine with all of this, just as I and my older mother are "fine-ish" with Android because it's what we're used to. But make no mistake: > Apple’s no better than anyone else when it comes to UX

robotmay 6y ago

My biggest frustration since I wrote this article was that by swiping up from the bottom right corner of an iPad, the keyboard would move up to the middle of the screen and split itself in two. Turns out if you were slightly inside the screen when you start swiping it triggers a long-press popup menu for the keyboard.

robotmay 6y ago

Thank you for disagreeing in a reasonable manner. Where I feel Apple fall short is in trying to take away “excess information”, where honestly they often succeed, they end up with some very confusing interfaces. And while this might make it faster to learn, it doesn’t necessarily mean people are learning the “right” things, i.e. what is actually going on. Although pretty much anyone using the term “cloud” is doing the same thing. I still stand by the headline though, for my opinion. I just think they’re better at some things and worse at others. I find most current OS about as bad as each other in terms of UX.

muthuraj57 6y ago

Every alarm clock app in Android lets you edit the time when you just tap the time in the list of alarms. But iOS does nothing on tapping the time. We have to click `Edit` from top left, then tap the time to edit it. I don't how this qualifies as great UX. I recently moved from Android to iOS and there are lot of annoyances like this all over the phone.