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> So basically the new GTK is iOS but without the professional designers behind it. Professional designers seem to be the ones creating these problems. Back wh

by flukus 5y ago

> So basically the new GTK is iOS but without the professional designers behind it. Professional designers seem to be the ones creating these problems. Back when it was just programmers you could tell a button was a button, a tab was a tab and we didn't hide basic functionality behind a swipe gesture or long press that users were supposed to just know. Now everything is pretty but harder to use.

warning26 5y ago
> Back when it was just programmers you could tell a button was a button, a tab was a tab and we didn't hide basic functionality behind a swipe gesture or long press that users were supposed to just know. Keep in mind that programmers also gave us this: http://www.martin-achern.de/wgetgui/images/linux_wgetgui.jpg http://www.martin-achern.de/wgetgui/images/linux_wgetgui.jpg People across all disciplines are capable of making poor design choices
- userbinator 5y ago
  Keep in mind that programmers also gave us this You're basically proving the point. That is so much clearer and obvious to use than the screenshots in the original article, and it doesn't treat you like an idiot.
  - notriddle 5y ago
    Yes, I know which things are buttons, which things are text entry, and which are checkboxes. This was a strength of early 2000's UI design, and it's a shame that so many applications don't give such clear indicators any more. This application still has an absolutely crap design. * How do I specify where the downloaded data goes? Why are there onscreen options for literally everything else, but not that? * Which text entry fields are disabled, and which ones are enabled? This is something Win95 got right. * What even is "force directories"? And it looks like checkboxes are used for both it and "no directories", so what happens if I check both? * What's the difference between Spider and Recursive? Those sound like the same thing to me, and I know I'm in a pretty elite club just knowing what web spiders are at all. * Are jpeg/gif/etc only used when Reject is turned on, or are they also used when Accept is turned on? * Is the wget-list input field connected to the Input file checkbox? It's right underneath it, and presumably I have to specify the input file somewhere, but the spacing implies it's not. * What's the difference between "quiet" and "non verbose"? What happens if both are turned on? * The rest of the buttons are pretty well labeled, but what's AG? * Does it really need its own quit button? The window manager already provides one.
    - userbinator 5y ago
      I'm not saying it's perfect, but it's better than the "small mysterious monochrome hieroglyphics floating in a sea of white/darkness" that "modern" UIs seem to be gravitating towards. At least textual labels are searchable.
      - notriddle 5y ago
        > I'm not saying it's perfect I didn’t stop listing problems because I ran out. I stopped because I got bored. Now you got me going again: * Why does input-file have no “Browse” button? * Why does log file have no “Browse” button? * What is the point of showing the command line flags? I’ve seen a few GUI apps that let me “export CLI” commands that match what I configured in the GUI. That would be a much better way to do this. * Why does nothing indicate that the exclude/include lists are only used for recursive fetching? * Extra Params can potentially be very long, yet the box is tiny. * I assume quota=0 turns the feature off. Why no check mark? * Why do the exclude lists have check marks, when leaving them empty should be equivalent to turning them off, if quota has none. Wget’s CLI is better than that thing. > but it's better than the "small mysterious monochrome hieroglyphics floating in a sea of white/darkness" that "modern" UIs seem to be gravitating towards. At least textual labels are searchable. I did intentionally start my post by saying I agree with this part. iOS 7 was a mistake.
  - jancsika 5y ago
    Were you raised in the desert by a cactus or something? Because there is nothing clear nor obvious to me about that motif word salad. Ah, I can just feel it failing to pop up a tooltip when I mouse over the "spider" option! I can also feel the entire window disappearing when I click "START wget." Is that what happens? Maybe not, but that was par for the course on a lot of those motif GUIs. And I can definitely feel how the growing information density was even frustrating the poor dev. "Load sett.", "Save sett.", ah fuck it... "AG" And again, feeling the disappointment as I mouse over "AG" and get nothing...
- ogurechny 5y ago
  There are many crappy UIs made by dragging buttons and labels in visual editors, but I believe this example comes from a discussion of a different problem. Namely, how to make a non-shitty non-toy GUI for a console tool. And the answer is, you can't, unless you'd already had the mental model, the hierarchy of options and modes of operation that could be projected onto both types of interaction before you made them. Essentially, this is not even a GUI application, this is a printed cheat sheet for console program with interactivity, like HyperCard or '90s context help systems, but with “callbacks” affecting the program state. It is made for people who know and understand the console version, and just want to choose options with the mouse. Of course, it may be advertised as something made for regular people, but that's a honest false belief. It's more of a convenient shell alias transferred into 2D, something which is not expected to be super nice, or handle all corner cases if it helps you in general. I think it is, actually, something to be encouraged. There are some tools that people made in Flash for their own use or some fan group because that's what they “programmed” in, not to mention big examples like (Visual) Basic, etc. A user is not just a consumer of what comes to the dumb personal device, a user is someone who can make it work in some unique way, because that's what computers are made for.
marcosdumay 5y ago
> you could tell a button was a button, a tab was a tab and we didn't hide basic functionality... Those conventions were created by usability experts after years of research. It wasn't simply programmers building them back then.
- michaelmrose 5y ago
  Arguably you have 4 camps. 1. Developers with a wide range of understanding of UI from negligible to acceptable. 2. UI experts who actually understand code. 3. UI "experts" in industry whose only skills are image editors. 4. Academics who did said research. Seems like the entire problem is the ascendancy of Camp 3 which decision makers who being ignorant of technical matters themselves can't tell from camp 2. Meanwhile everyone is ignoring camp 4.
  - marcosdumay 5y ago
    That's my impression too. Camp 2 is also a problem when they decide to improve things under heavy time constraints, but it's mostly camp 3 being the issue, and camp 4 being ignored. Meanwhile, camp 1 mostly won't break anything by themselves (developers do usually learn enough UX for that), but also are unable to fix anything. I'll just add that camp 4 didn't exist only in universities by the time those things got developed. But they almost only exist there now.

by flukus 5y ago

warning26 5y ago

> Back when it was just programmers you could tell a button was a button, a tab was a tab and we didn't hide basic functionality behind a swipe gesture or long press that users were supposed to just know. Keep in mind that programmers also gave us this: http://www.martin-achern.de/wgetgui/images/linux_wgetgui.jpg http://www.martin-achern.de/wgetgui/images/linux_wgetgui.jpg People across all disciplines are capable of making poor design choices

userbinator 5y ago
Keep in mind that programmers also gave us this You're basically proving the point. That is so much clearer and obvious to use than the screenshots in the original article, and it doesn't treat you like an idiot.
- notriddle 5y ago
  Yes, I know which things are buttons, which things are text entry, and which are checkboxes. This was a strength of early 2000's UI design, and it's a shame that so many applications don't give such clear indicators any more. This application still has an absolutely crap design. * How do I specify where the downloaded data goes? Why are there onscreen options for literally everything else, but not that? * Which text entry fields are disabled, and which ones are enabled? This is something Win95 got right. * What even is "force directories"? And it looks like checkboxes are used for both it and "no directories", so what happens if I check both? * What's the difference between Spider and Recursive? Those sound like the same thing to me, and I know I'm in a pretty elite club just knowing what web spiders are at all. * Are jpeg/gif/etc only used when Reject is turned on, or are they also used when Accept is turned on? * Is the wget-list input field connected to the Input file checkbox? It's right underneath it, and presumably I have to specify the input file somewhere, but the spacing implies it's not. * What's the difference between "quiet" and "non verbose"? What happens if both are turned on? * The rest of the buttons are pretty well labeled, but what's AG? * Does it really need its own quit button? The window manager already provides one.
  - userbinator 5y ago
    I'm not saying it's perfect, but it's better than the "small mysterious monochrome hieroglyphics floating in a sea of white/darkness" that "modern" UIs seem to be gravitating towards. At least textual labels are searchable.
    - notriddle 5y ago
      > I'm not saying it's perfect I didn’t stop listing problems because I ran out. I stopped because I got bored. Now you got me going again: * Why does input-file have no “Browse” button? * Why does log file have no “Browse” button? * What is the point of showing the command line flags? I’ve seen a few GUI apps that let me “export CLI” commands that match what I configured in the GUI. That would be a much better way to do this. * Why does nothing indicate that the exclude/include lists are only used for recursive fetching? * Extra Params can potentially be very long, yet the box is tiny. * I assume quota=0 turns the feature off. Why no check mark? * Why do the exclude lists have check marks, when leaving them empty should be equivalent to turning them off, if quota has none. Wget’s CLI is better than that thing. > but it's better than the "small mysterious monochrome hieroglyphics floating in a sea of white/darkness" that "modern" UIs seem to be gravitating towards. At least textual labels are searchable. I did intentionally start my post by saying I agree with this part. iOS 7 was a mistake.
- jancsika 5y ago
  Were you raised in the desert by a cactus or something? Because there is nothing clear nor obvious to me about that motif word salad. Ah, I can just feel it failing to pop up a tooltip when I mouse over the "spider" option! I can also feel the entire window disappearing when I click "START wget." Is that what happens? Maybe not, but that was par for the course on a lot of those motif GUIs. And I can definitely feel how the growing information density was even frustrating the poor dev. "Load sett.", "Save sett.", ah fuck it... "AG" And again, feeling the disappointment as I mouse over "AG" and get nothing...
ogurechny 5y ago
There are many crappy UIs made by dragging buttons and labels in visual editors, but I believe this example comes from a discussion of a different problem. Namely, how to make a non-shitty non-toy GUI for a console tool. And the answer is, you can't, unless you'd already had the mental model, the hierarchy of options and modes of operation that could be projected onto both types of interaction before you made them. Essentially, this is not even a GUI application, this is a printed cheat sheet for console program with interactivity, like HyperCard or '90s context help systems, but with “callbacks” affecting the program state. It is made for people who know and understand the console version, and just want to choose options with the mouse. Of course, it may be advertised as something made for regular people, but that's a honest false belief. It's more of a convenient shell alias transferred into 2D, something which is not expected to be super nice, or handle all corner cases if it helps you in general. I think it is, actually, something to be encouraged. There are some tools that people made in Flash for their own use or some fan group because that's what they “programmed” in, not to mention big examples like (Visual) Basic, etc. A user is not just a consumer of what comes to the dumb personal device, a user is someone who can make it work in some unique way, because that's what computers are made for.

marcosdumay 5y ago

> you could tell a button was a button, a tab was a tab and we didn't hide basic functionality... Those conventions were created by usability experts after years of research. It wasn't simply programmers building them back then.

michaelmrose 5y ago
Arguably you have 4 camps. 1. Developers with a wide range of understanding of UI from negligible to acceptable. 2. UI experts who actually understand code. 3. UI "experts" in industry whose only skills are image editors. 4. Academics who did said research. Seems like the entire problem is the ascendancy of Camp 3 which decision makers who being ignorant of technical matters themselves can't tell from camp 2. Meanwhile everyone is ignoring camp 4.
- marcosdumay 5y ago
  That's my impression too. Camp 2 is also a problem when they decide to improve things under heavy time constraints, but it's mostly camp 3 being the issue, and camp 4 being ignored. Meanwhile, camp 1 mostly won't break anything by themselves (developers do usually learn enough UX for that), but also are unable to fix anything. I'll just add that camp 4 didn't exist only in universities by the time those things got developed. But they almost only exist there now.