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"When we spoke, he told me how deeply he admires the interface design of musical equipment like guitar pedals." Keyboardist here, so I cannot say much about gu

"When we spoke, he told me how deeply he admires the interface design of musical equipment like guitar pedals." Keyboardist here, so I cannot say much about guitar pedals, but I very much agree in general. Of course there is a ton of bad UI design also, but I think well designed musical instruments beat the best designs in other areas. For example: I have a modern digital stage piano. It's a computer with several gigs of RAM an yet the whole manual is like eight pages. This is the complete manual, not some quick start guide. While it's no DAW it's not simple either, you can do a lot with it and still my child uses it without ever looking in the manual.

dfox 4y ago
One UX issue that I've seen on most stage pianos is that while there are direct physical controls for most of the commonly used functionality due to lack of display and some menu system configuring “uncommon” things (like MIDI) leads to totally undiscoverable configuration modes, multi button chords and what not that you have to read the manual to find out.
- weinzierl 4y ago
  This is so true, especially for master keyboards. Mine is a stage piano and it kind of side-steps this issue by having only a very simple MIDI setup. For a piano that is not meant to be the control center of everything else this is ok. If anyone knows a good master keyboard that has solved this issue satisfactorily, I'm all ears.
marshray 4y ago
I used to think classical musical instruments were the epitome of design because they evolved to their function over hundreds of years. But then I started trying to learn to play one and began reading about the problems with physical injury that professional musicians persistently face. I realized musical instruments were full of design compromises like everything else.
- quartesixte 4y ago
  cries in the strained neck of a violinist
- asdff 4y ago
  A perfect instrument is physically impossible imo. There is always going to be a compromise because you are playing with fingers and their limited range of motion versus pure thoughts.

dfox 4y ago

One UX issue that I've seen on most stage pianos is that while there are direct physical controls for most of the commonly used functionality due to lack of display and some menu system configuring “uncommon” things (like MIDI) leads to totally undiscoverable configuration modes, multi button chords and what not that you have to read the manual to find out.

weinzierl 4y ago
This is so true, especially for master keyboards. Mine is a stage piano and it kind of side-steps this issue by having only a very simple MIDI setup. For a piano that is not meant to be the control center of everything else this is ok. If anyone knows a good master keyboard that has solved this issue satisfactorily, I'm all ears.

marshray 4y ago

I used to think classical musical instruments were the epitome of design because they evolved to their function over hundreds of years. But then I started trying to learn to play one and began reading about the problems with physical injury that professional musicians persistently face. I realized musical instruments were full of design compromises like everything else.

quartesixte 4y ago
cries in the strained neck of a violinist
asdff 4y ago
A perfect instrument is physically impossible imo. There is always going to be a compromise because you are playing with fingers and their limited range of motion versus pure thoughts.