8 ms·

Matias Duarte on the philosophy of Ice Cream Sandwich

130 points by turing 15y ago

dporan 15y ago
What an engagingly written interview with a thoughtful designer. Two points stand out: 1. Unlike Apple, which apparently eschews formal user research, Google relied on "ethnographic research" to shape Android 4.0. 2. In between Apple's hyper-realistic UI and Microsoft's Spartan aesthetic, Google is trying to find a middle ground in Android 4.0 that facilitates new approaches and new experiences. From the screenshots alone, it's hard to tell what it actually will be like to use Android 4.0. But it's great to see that Google is thinking so deeply about user experience.
- magic_haze 15y ago
  Interesting how things change. Just a few years back it would have been impossible to associate the word 'spartan' with any tech company other than Google, let alone Microsoft (which more often than not ended up alongside 'gaudy' and 'tacky'. Like this, unfortunately: http://youtu.be/-F_ke3rxopc http://youtu.be/-F_ke3rxopc)
  - Raphael 15y ago
    You know, Windows 7 has a task bar that does everything. Most operating systems end up with 2 or 3, and somehow they do it in one.
- foobarbazetc 15y ago
  They might be thinking deeply, but they execute poorly and it still looks like crap. Matias should be replaced ASAP and the weird fascination with black/dark themes should be tossed into the trash.
  - joebadmo 15y ago
    I couldn't disagree more. I think the visual execution is great, and really cohesive with the rest of Google's re-design. I also prefer the black/dark themes. I imagine it has the functional benefit of using less power on OLED screens, as well. But the visual stuff is almost beside the point. I've been an Android user for a couple of years now, and the sense I always got was that the OS was very engineer-driven, with plenty of interesting features piled on, but no real sense of user experience. Duarte is clearly bringing a lot of focus on UX, by optimizing real usage patterns, making them fast and delightful. I'm actually pleasantly surprised at where Android is going.
- saturdaysaint 15y ago
  It's quite a stretch to call Apple's UI "hyper-realistic". The core interface and main apps (safari, mail, phone, messages, camera) mostly consist of non-textured gradients. There's a hint of glass on the lockscreen and a fabric texture used at the "edges" of the UI (in the notification center and multitasking tray) and that's about it. If anything, it looks like they're aping Apple with the icon animations, text selection, abandoning their menu buttons and attention to system fonts.
  - ricefield 15y ago
    i wouldnt claim that apple's UI is hyper realistic, but there are parts of its design which are intended to be realistic. sometimes good, sometime bad. a few examples: http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/07/mac-os-x-10-7.ars/5 http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/07/mac-os-x-10-7.a... http://pttrns.com/woodenshelfs http://pttrns.com/woodenshelfs http://pttrns.com/profiles#/detail/5e8603b7b0c551b85fcade3d104e3065 http://pttrns.com/profiles#/detail/5e8603b7b0c551b85fcade3d1... http://pttrns.com/calculators#/detail/697d4e1cf6b7561bffcbbf8bbf4851a5 http://pttrns.com/calculators#/detail/697d4e1cf6b7561bffcbbf... http://pttrns.com/widgets#/detail/4f83d8375a7f0a8a079dac5dd12cce62 http://pttrns.com/widgets#/detail/4f83d8375a7f0a8a079dac5dd1... http://pttrns.com/widgets#/detail/6b5f0e73657ddaca447f84f73c4ed9bf http://pttrns.com/widgets#/detail/6b5f0e73657ddaca447f84f73c...
    - saturdaysaint 15y ago
      Well, you're lumping a lot of things under the term "UI". As a rule, Apple minimizes these kinds of things in the core interface and often moves quickly to reduce them as new features become common knowledge. For example, the "dock" in the original iPhone looked like a speaker grill - it was probably a useful convention to denote to people that had never used OSX that it was a special section at the bottom of the phone/screen. Now it's a glassy reflective surface that subtly denotes the dock area and nicely borders the screen (much more subtly than the ICS dock, IMO). The scrollbars in OSX were once colorful and rounded, but steadily and gradually became flatter, grayer, and then basically invisible. I wouldn't be surprised if the now prevalent "fabric" pattern sees a similar fate. Apple tends to make the metaphors glaringly obvious and keep them around in a certain class of very simple apps (the compass and calculator fall under this). It's funny that Duarte mentioned wood because Apple nerds have been arguing about the wood trim in Garageband (a spinoff from the sleek, German designed Logic app) since it launched. For power users, these things are a stupid distraction, but for the %90 of the population that is boggled by the idea of using a completely new class of software, they denote that this is fun, easy-to-use software. Google, who've made plenty of great products that have gone relatively unused, could probably learn a few things here. There's a certain logic to the anti-skeutomorph thing, but it gets weird when it leads to dismissing Apple offhandedly. Mastery of these metaphors is a good part of the reason Apple are where they are today. It's amazing how consistent these textures, gestures and animations are across three platforms (and how smoothly they reached this point) while the other platforms are having identity crises. I should add that I'm enormously tempted to get the Galaxy Nexus, so please take this as pro-Apple, not anti-Google.
- nchlswu 15y ago
  > 1. Unlike Apple, which apparently eschews formal user research, Google relied on "ethnographic research" to shape Android 4.0. I definitely think this idea has began to take a life of its own so to speak. I've read that Apple doesn't do Usability testing, doesn't do market research or user research. All of the points can be summed up with the "Apple knows best" idea. But, I'm sure Apple does user research - just not with a consultancy, or by asking users what they want. They focus on users' behaviour and their needs and incorporate it into their vision. I don't think Google's core approach this time around is that much different from (what I presume is) Apple's approach. Google is using their ethnographic research to figure out what users do and what users need. I'd wager that Apple's own 'research' has focused on that all along.
dave1619 15y ago
Android and iOS are looking more and more similar as time goes on. Android copies iOS... iOS copies Android. Sometimes Android is ahead with features, sometimes iOS. Eventually both OS's will reach a point of maturity with relatively equal features but with a distinct look and personality.
- cpeterso 15y ago
  Like Windows vs OS X or Firefox vs Chrome.
- ugh 15y ago
  What? It seems pretty obvious to me that they are all moving in slightly different directions. (Android digs being cluttered and confusing, Apple digs being kitschy and fake. And I’m not happy about the direction each OS is going.)
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
- temphn 15y ago
  What has iOS copied from Android? Serious question.
  - dave1619 15y ago
    Multitasking, notifications, voice-to-text on keyboard, etc.
    - ryanwatkins 15y ago
      Much of which it copies from webOS. Notifications, multitasking, touch-to-share/beem. Not a suprise as Matias did those for webOS.
      - Pewpewarrows 15y ago
        Err... what? Android was out well before WebOS, complete with Notifications and Multitasking.
chubs 15y ago
I heard rumours that google was doing 2 things in particular to deal with the version fragmentation issue for developer's sake: * Enforcing a minimum hardware level, eg opengl es2 acceleration (eg no more cheap&slow androids that do the brand no favours) * Making it so that software updates cannot by stymied by hardware makers and carriers any more, so that as soon as google makes a new version, anyone can update to it without needing to root their device. Are these true does anyone know?
- anigbrowl 15y ago
  I hope so. It's kind of aggravating to be able to download and install the SDK in a few minutes but not to install the OS on either of the two phones or the tablet I have.
- llgrrl_ 15y ago
  I'm unsure about the first one, but the second one is no way can be true. Diplomatic problems aside, it's technically impossible. Google don't write the drivers for those phones, manufacturers/carriers do, so how in hell can Google sneak in alone without drivers?
  - vidarh 15y ago
    They could mandate an abstraction layer.
- mikesaraf 15y ago
  I don't know about the first one, but at Google IO they announced they were getting all of their partners (major carriers & hardware manufacturers) to agree to support any new device with software updates for 18 months. They hinted it would be required to be a Google certified device.
- yesimahuman 15y ago
  I wish more than anything they would try to stop manufacturer customization. I recently learned that the "dialer" app on my Motorola Atrix is not the default Android one, which might explain some of its really odd behaviors that just drive me insane. The home screen, even the browser is modified (at least the icon).
joebadmo 15y ago
Sounds like Duarte is bringing much needed focus on user experience. I thought Honeycomb was garish and the futuristicity forced. This tones it down quite a bit, but also moves away from Apple's kitschy skeuomorphism. I like it. I also really like the new typeface.
AmazingBytecode 15y ago
I was expecting an article about actual ice cream sandwiches. I'm not disappointed per se, just a little surprised.
- LiveTheDream 15y ago
  Android versions are named after dessert items in alphabetical order (C - Cupcake, D - Donut, ..., I - Ice Cream Sandwich)[1] [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_version_history http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_version_history
anedisi 15y ago
It looks like thisismynext is a new home of some engadget bloggers.
Steko 15y ago
Everything Matias said today about iOS is true but the bottom line is he's been on the job for a year, ICS was his baby and yet from what I gather it still stutters like Porky Pig in a helicopter. Optimize your fonts and visual style all day long but at the end of the day the magic of the OS is dispelled if the OS doesn't respond to input properly. Jellybean I guess...
- bookwormAT 15y ago
  Not sure about ICS, but Gingerbread on the Galaxy S2 is completely stutter-free. It took a while for Android to achieve this: I used 10 Android (company-)devices in the last 12 month, and even the Nexus S with Gingerbread would sometimes show some lag when scrolling through large lists. It was otherwise a very responsive device, and the lag is hardly noticeable unless you directly compare it with an iphone or an Galaxy S2. But there was some lag. The Galaxy S2 is perfectly smooth. I guess it's the combination of the multithreaded garbage collector that came with 2.3, the dual core processor, and a very fine Android implementation from Samsung that solved the problem. I also think that Android does benefit a lot from every MB additional RAM, because it gives both the application scheduler and the garbage collector more room to manage app lifecycles.
- rboyce 15y ago
  While this is a fair criticism of Android as a whole, the lead designer has very little control over the performance of the OS. I'm sure that all the lagginess in Android bothers him at least as much as it bothers you.
binarray2000 15y ago
...still no unified Gmail inbox. “It’s harder than you think,” he tells me. Can someone explain why? I'm not a mobile developer.
- adestefan 15y ago
  It's probably more of a Gmail issue than a mobile issue.
beza1e1 15y ago
"it doesn’t matter how great a product you have and how revolutionary the product is… distribution and marketshare are the things that matter" That's an interesting point of view.
- nextparadigms 15y ago
  And he should know. He built what was arguably the most beautiful and elegant OS until now (WebOS), and he got to watch it crumble.
revorad 15y ago
Imagine how good Andoid could be if Google just built one phone. Just one frickin phone with incredible people like Duarte working on it. All wood behind one arrow. Yeah, it's not their general strategy. They are a software company commoditising hardware etc etc. But cannibalising that strategy could really make Android as great a product as Google Search. Imagine.
- Aissen 15y ago
  So you don't think that's what the Galaxy Nexus is about ? Or all the Nexus line for that matter ?
  - revorad 15y ago
    I mean no other Android phones. Because people like Duarte and others who actually care about making a great product will bust their asses off to do it, and then Samsung and HTC will come along and spray their crapware all over it.
    - generalk 15y ago
      What? You get the effect you want already, there's been a number of "official Google phones": the G1, the Nexus One, the Nexus S, and soon the Galaxy Nexus. These are Google-only, no-crapware phones, designed to showcase the newest Android offerings in the best light. With iOS, there's only the one blessed option. You get one new phone a year. If it's a feature-bump like the 3GS or 4S, then that's what you get. With Android, you not only get the Google-branded Official Phones, but you also get an entire ecosystem of devices to suit any taste. Want a hardware keyboard? You got it. 4.5-inch screens too big for you? Not a problem, plenty of options.
      - misterbwong 15y ago
        As a side note, I'm convinced that one of the reasons WP7 is not gaining any traction is because it doesn't have the "one phone." They don't have a halo product that draws attention to the OS.

130 points by turing 15y ago

What an engagingly written interview with a thoughtful designer. Two points stand out: 1. Unlike Apple, which apparently eschews formal user research, Google relied on "ethnographic research" to shape Android 4.0. 2. In between Apple's hyper-realistic UI and Microsoft's Spartan aesthetic, Google is trying to find a middle ground in Android 4.0 that facilitates new approaches and new experiences. From the screenshots alone, it's hard to tell what it actually will be like to use Android 4.0. But it's great to see that Google is thinking so deeply about user experience.

magic_haze 15y ago
Interesting how things change. Just a few years back it would have been impossible to associate the word 'spartan' with any tech company other than Google, let alone Microsoft (which more often than not ended up alongside 'gaudy' and 'tacky'. Like this, unfortunately: http://youtu.be/-F_ke3rxopc http://youtu.be/-F_ke3rxopc)
- Raphael 15y ago
  You know, Windows 7 has a task bar that does everything. Most operating systems end up with 2 or 3, and somehow they do it in one.
foobarbazetc 15y ago
They might be thinking deeply, but they execute poorly and it still looks like crap. Matias should be replaced ASAP and the weird fascination with black/dark themes should be tossed into the trash.
- joebadmo 15y ago
  I couldn't disagree more. I think the visual execution is great, and really cohesive with the rest of Google's re-design. I also prefer the black/dark themes. I imagine it has the functional benefit of using less power on OLED screens, as well. But the visual stuff is almost beside the point. I've been an Android user for a couple of years now, and the sense I always got was that the OS was very engineer-driven, with plenty of interesting features piled on, but no real sense of user experience. Duarte is clearly bringing a lot of focus on UX, by optimizing real usage patterns, making them fast and delightful. I'm actually pleasantly surprised at where Android is going.
saturdaysaint 15y ago
It's quite a stretch to call Apple's UI "hyper-realistic". The core interface and main apps (safari, mail, phone, messages, camera) mostly consist of non-textured gradients. There's a hint of glass on the lockscreen and a fabric texture used at the "edges" of the UI (in the notification center and multitasking tray) and that's about it. If anything, it looks like they're aping Apple with the icon animations, text selection, abandoning their menu buttons and attention to system fonts.
- ricefield 15y ago
  i wouldnt claim that apple's UI is hyper realistic, but there are parts of its design which are intended to be realistic. sometimes good, sometime bad. a few examples: http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/07/mac-os-x-10-7.ars/5 http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/07/mac-os-x-10-7.a... http://pttrns.com/woodenshelfs http://pttrns.com/woodenshelfs http://pttrns.com/profiles#/detail/5e8603b7b0c551b85fcade3d104e3065 http://pttrns.com/profiles#/detail/5e8603b7b0c551b85fcade3d1... http://pttrns.com/calculators#/detail/697d4e1cf6b7561bffcbbf8bbf4851a5 http://pttrns.com/calculators#/detail/697d4e1cf6b7561bffcbbf... http://pttrns.com/widgets#/detail/4f83d8375a7f0a8a079dac5dd12cce62 http://pttrns.com/widgets#/detail/4f83d8375a7f0a8a079dac5dd1... http://pttrns.com/widgets#/detail/6b5f0e73657ddaca447f84f73c4ed9bf http://pttrns.com/widgets#/detail/6b5f0e73657ddaca447f84f73c...
  - saturdaysaint 15y ago
    Well, you're lumping a lot of things under the term "UI". As a rule, Apple minimizes these kinds of things in the core interface and often moves quickly to reduce them as new features become common knowledge. For example, the "dock" in the original iPhone looked like a speaker grill - it was probably a useful convention to denote to people that had never used OSX that it was a special section at the bottom of the phone/screen. Now it's a glassy reflective surface that subtly denotes the dock area and nicely borders the screen (much more subtly than the ICS dock, IMO). The scrollbars in OSX were once colorful and rounded, but steadily and gradually became flatter, grayer, and then basically invisible. I wouldn't be surprised if the now prevalent "fabric" pattern sees a similar fate. Apple tends to make the metaphors glaringly obvious and keep them around in a certain class of very simple apps (the compass and calculator fall under this). It's funny that Duarte mentioned wood because Apple nerds have been arguing about the wood trim in Garageband (a spinoff from the sleek, German designed Logic app) since it launched. For power users, these things are a stupid distraction, but for the %90 of the population that is boggled by the idea of using a completely new class of software, they denote that this is fun, easy-to-use software. Google, who've made plenty of great products that have gone relatively unused, could probably learn a few things here. There's a certain logic to the anti-skeutomorph thing, but it gets weird when it leads to dismissing Apple offhandedly. Mastery of these metaphors is a good part of the reason Apple are where they are today. It's amazing how consistent these textures, gestures and animations are across three platforms (and how smoothly they reached this point) while the other platforms are having identity crises. I should add that I'm enormously tempted to get the Galaxy Nexus, so please take this as pro-Apple, not anti-Google.
nchlswu 15y ago
> 1. Unlike Apple, which apparently eschews formal user research, Google relied on "ethnographic research" to shape Android 4.0. I definitely think this idea has began to take a life of its own so to speak. I've read that Apple doesn't do Usability testing, doesn't do market research or user research. All of the points can be summed up with the "Apple knows best" idea. But, I'm sure Apple does user research - just not with a consultancy, or by asking users what they want. They focus on users' behaviour and their needs and incorporate it into their vision. I don't think Google's core approach this time around is that much different from (what I presume is) Apple's approach. Google is using their ethnographic research to figure out what users do and what users need. I'd wager that Apple's own 'research' has focused on that all along.

dave1619 15y ago

Android and iOS are looking more and more similar as time goes on. Android copies iOS... iOS copies Android. Sometimes Android is ahead with features, sometimes iOS. Eventually both OS's will reach a point of maturity with relatively equal features but with a distinct look and personality.

cpeterso 15y ago
Like Windows vs OS X or Firefox vs Chrome.
ugh 15y ago
What? It seems pretty obvious to me that they are all moving in slightly different directions. (Android digs being cluttered and confusing, Apple digs being kitschy and fake. And I’m not happy about the direction each OS is going.)
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
temphn 15y ago
What has iOS copied from Android? Serious question.
- dave1619 15y ago
  Multitasking, notifications, voice-to-text on keyboard, etc.
  - ryanwatkins 15y ago
    Much of which it copies from webOS. Notifications, multitasking, touch-to-share/beem. Not a suprise as Matias did those for webOS.
    - Pewpewarrows 15y ago
      Err... what? Android was out well before WebOS, complete with Notifications and Multitasking.

chubs 15y ago

I heard rumours that google was doing 2 things in particular to deal with the version fragmentation issue for developer's sake: * Enforcing a minimum hardware level, eg opengl es2 acceleration (eg no more cheap&slow androids that do the brand no favours) * Making it so that software updates cannot by stymied by hardware makers and carriers any more, so that as soon as google makes a new version, anyone can update to it without needing to root their device. Are these true does anyone know?

anigbrowl 15y ago
I hope so. It's kind of aggravating to be able to download and install the SDK in a few minutes but not to install the OS on either of the two phones or the tablet I have.
llgrrl_ 15y ago
I'm unsure about the first one, but the second one is no way can be true. Diplomatic problems aside, it's technically impossible. Google don't write the drivers for those phones, manufacturers/carriers do, so how in hell can Google sneak in alone without drivers?
- vidarh 15y ago
  They could mandate an abstraction layer.
mikesaraf 15y ago
I don't know about the first one, but at Google IO they announced they were getting all of their partners (major carriers & hardware manufacturers) to agree to support any new device with software updates for 18 months. They hinted it would be required to be a Google certified device.
yesimahuman 15y ago
I wish more than anything they would try to stop manufacturer customization. I recently learned that the "dialer" app on my Motorola Atrix is not the default Android one, which might explain some of its really odd behaviors that just drive me insane. The home screen, even the browser is modified (at least the icon).

joebadmo 15y ago

Sounds like Duarte is bringing much needed focus on user experience. I thought Honeycomb was garish and the futuristicity forced. This tones it down quite a bit, but also moves away from Apple's kitschy skeuomorphism. I like it. I also really like the new typeface.

AmazingBytecode 15y ago

I was expecting an article about actual ice cream sandwiches. I'm not disappointed per se, just a little surprised.

LiveTheDream 15y ago
Android versions are named after dessert items in alphabetical order (C - Cupcake, D - Donut, ..., I - Ice Cream Sandwich)[1] [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_version_history http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_version_history

anedisi 15y ago

It looks like thisismynext is a new home of some engadget bloggers.

Steko 15y ago

Everything Matias said today about iOS is true but the bottom line is he's been on the job for a year, ICS was his baby and yet from what I gather it still stutters like Porky Pig in a helicopter. Optimize your fonts and visual style all day long but at the end of the day the magic of the OS is dispelled if the OS doesn't respond to input properly. Jellybean I guess...

bookwormAT 15y ago
Not sure about ICS, but Gingerbread on the Galaxy S2 is completely stutter-free. It took a while for Android to achieve this: I used 10 Android (company-)devices in the last 12 month, and even the Nexus S with Gingerbread would sometimes show some lag when scrolling through large lists. It was otherwise a very responsive device, and the lag is hardly noticeable unless you directly compare it with an iphone or an Galaxy S2. But there was some lag. The Galaxy S2 is perfectly smooth. I guess it's the combination of the multithreaded garbage collector that came with 2.3, the dual core processor, and a very fine Android implementation from Samsung that solved the problem. I also think that Android does benefit a lot from every MB additional RAM, because it gives both the application scheduler and the garbage collector more room to manage app lifecycles.
rboyce 15y ago
While this is a fair criticism of Android as a whole, the lead designer has very little control over the performance of the OS. I'm sure that all the lagginess in Android bothers him at least as much as it bothers you.

binarray2000 15y ago

...still no unified Gmail inbox. “It’s harder than you think,” he tells me. Can someone explain why? I'm not a mobile developer.

adestefan 15y ago
It's probably more of a Gmail issue than a mobile issue.

beza1e1 15y ago

"it doesn’t matter how great a product you have and how revolutionary the product is… distribution and marketshare are the things that matter" That's an interesting point of view.

nextparadigms 15y ago
And he should know. He built what was arguably the most beautiful and elegant OS until now (WebOS), and he got to watch it crumble.

revorad 15y ago

Imagine how good Andoid could be if Google just built one phone. Just one frickin phone with incredible people like Duarte working on it. All wood behind one arrow. Yeah, it's not their general strategy. They are a software company commoditising hardware etc etc. But cannibalising that strategy could really make Android as great a product as Google Search. Imagine.

Aissen 15y ago
So you don't think that's what the Galaxy Nexus is about ? Or all the Nexus line for that matter ?
- revorad 15y ago
  I mean no other Android phones. Because people like Duarte and others who actually care about making a great product will bust their asses off to do it, and then Samsung and HTC will come along and spray their crapware all over it.
  - generalk 15y ago
    What? You get the effect you want already, there's been a number of "official Google phones": the G1, the Nexus One, the Nexus S, and soon the Galaxy Nexus. These are Google-only, no-crapware phones, designed to showcase the newest Android offerings in the best light. With iOS, there's only the one blessed option. You get one new phone a year. If it's a feature-bump like the 3GS or 4S, then that's what you get. With Android, you not only get the Google-branded Official Phones, but you also get an entire ecosystem of devices to suit any taste. Want a hardware keyboard? You got it. 4.5-inch screens too big for you? Not a problem, plenty of options.
    - misterbwong 15y ago
      As a side note, I'm convinced that one of the reasons WP7 is not gaining any traction is because it doesn't have the "one phone." They don't have a halo product that draws attention to the OS.