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This is…disappointing. As unpopular as it was, I like the Win8? start menu for letting me neatly lay out and categorize all my frequently used programs using m

This is…disappointing. As unpopular as it was, I like the Win8? start menu for letting me neatly lay out and categorize all my frequently used programs using my full screen real estate. Now they’re turning it into a single app list that utilizes only 15% of my screen real estate, and is now fully redundant with my task bar in function and utility. A horizontal iPhone Home Screen sitting on my desktop. I can’t fathom the reasoning behind this.

naikrovek 5y ago
get ready to be dismayed with just about any decision any UI/UX people make. They like to design interfaces, good ones and bad ones, and they like it when people use them, so they make sure they're adopted and used. UX people don't give a crap about what you like. They like what THEY like. And they LOVE empty space and constant meaningless change. I suspect that by the time this reaches "release" status, it will have had some feedback incorporated and a few small changes made as token gestures. Whoever designed this will allow nothing more than that, and they'll get their stupid, undeserved raise, and then things will calm down for a while, and sane changes will again be made.
- rainonmoon 5y ago
  It's really strange to me that there's so much antipathy for UX designers on HN when their job is literally the opposite of "liking what THEY like." Undeniably some people employed in the field disregard designing for accessibility and usability, but in that case you're not referring to UX designers, you're referring to bad UX designers.
  - deckard1 5y ago
    the thing is UX people aren't even responsible for a lot of these messes. Look at Reddit and tell me that wasn't designed by some A/B-maximizing staple-counting corporate robot trying to bump up their "engagement" stat by 1/1000th of a percent. Their site is pretty much the parable of the Paperclip Maximizer AI. I refuse to believe any human was involved in their new design.
  - naikrovek 5y ago
    if ui/ux were based on anything scientific, each iteration would bring us closer to some ideal UI in a particular scenario. we don't see that. we see wild changes which break large portions of spatial and muscle memory, over and over and over again. we would stop seeing changes pretty soon if we measured and tested and honed in on the ideal UI for a given site or tool. changes happen MORE frequently and are more disruptive than ever, it seems.
Athari 5y ago
Windows 8 Start Menu was pure crap. It had half of the features the Start Menu has now in Windows 10. Features like named groups, collapsible folders, tiny icons, transparent tiles etc. were added long after Windows 10 release. Not to mention the Start Menu in Windows 8 was bugged as hell, like not working at all if more than 256 "apps" (actually files in the Start Menu folder) were installed. But yes, by now, the Start Menu of Windows 10 is the best of all Start Menus of all Windows versions. There're a few features that I miss from the old times (like the full "All Apps" list not supporting subfolders, or lack of the "tiny icon with long text" size), but overall it's never been better, especially for crazy people like me with hundreds of apps. It'd be really stupid of Microsoft to replace something as massive as this, which has been improved over many years, with a joke of UI with more "breathing space".

naikrovek 5y ago

get ready to be dismayed with just about any decision any UI/UX people make. They like to design interfaces, good ones and bad ones, and they like it when people use them, so they make sure they're adopted and used. UX people don't give a crap about what you like. They like what THEY like. And they LOVE empty space and constant meaningless change. I suspect that by the time this reaches "release" status, it will have had some feedback incorporated and a few small changes made as token gestures. Whoever designed this will allow nothing more than that, and they'll get their stupid, undeserved raise, and then things will calm down for a while, and sane changes will again be made.

rainonmoon 5y ago
It's really strange to me that there's so much antipathy for UX designers on HN when their job is literally the opposite of "liking what THEY like." Undeniably some people employed in the field disregard designing for accessibility and usability, but in that case you're not referring to UX designers, you're referring to bad UX designers.
- deckard1 5y ago
  the thing is UX people aren't even responsible for a lot of these messes. Look at Reddit and tell me that wasn't designed by some A/B-maximizing staple-counting corporate robot trying to bump up their "engagement" stat by 1/1000th of a percent. Their site is pretty much the parable of the Paperclip Maximizer AI. I refuse to believe any human was involved in their new design.
- naikrovek 5y ago
  if ui/ux were based on anything scientific, each iteration would bring us closer to some ideal UI in a particular scenario. we don't see that. we see wild changes which break large portions of spatial and muscle memory, over and over and over again. we would stop seeing changes pretty soon if we measured and tested and honed in on the ideal UI for a given site or tool. changes happen MORE frequently and are more disruptive than ever, it seems.

Athari 5y ago

Windows 8 Start Menu was pure crap. It had half of the features the Start Menu has now in Windows 10. Features like named groups, collapsible folders, tiny icons, transparent tiles etc. were added long after Windows 10 release. Not to mention the Start Menu in Windows 8 was bugged as hell, like not working at all if more than 256 "apps" (actually files in the Start Menu folder) were installed. But yes, by now, the Start Menu of Windows 10 is the best of all Start Menus of all Windows versions. There're a few features that I miss from the old times (like the full "All Apps" list not supporting subfolders, or lack of the "tiny icon with long text" size), but overall it's never been better, especially for crazy people like me with hundreds of apps. It'd be really stupid of Microsoft to replace something as massive as this, which has been improved over many years, with a joke of UI with more "breathing space".