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Oh wow, I never knew this existed. It seems the selection can only grow and on both sides, which is the main problem. If they showed the cursor with a differe

Oh wow, I never knew this existed. It seems the selection can only grow and on both sides, which is the main problem. If they showed the cursor with a different color than the selected text, and if they shrink and grow the selection as you move, I think it could be pretty nice: select the starting point of the selection, and select only what’s in between the original cursor and the moving one. Alas it’s more like painting a selection at the moment, with an invisible brush.

chazhaz 4y ago
The problem here is that the “move left to expand left” and “move right to expand right” doesn’t map mentally to the way a cursor works. With a traditional cursor, it places an anchor wherever you’ve moused down and then drags the selection around that anchor. Whereas with Haptic Touch selection, there’s no anchor, so you find yourself selecting text you didn’t mean to. I’m sure that once you’ve gotten used to it, it’s a nice feature; but it’s not intuitive if you’re not accustomed to it (which seems to be the majority of folks).
- pmontra 4y ago
  I enabled arrows keys on every single keyboard on the Android devices I owned. I use them to move the cursor and fix mistakes, usually by tapping and adjusting with the arrows. Faster than attempting to tap at the right spot. Are there no arrows on iOS keyboards?
empyrrhicist 4y ago
> Oh wow, I never knew this existed. iOS UI in a nutshell.
- hobs 4y ago
  When I worked at Apple training people about the first iPhone generations they always said stuff like "it SHOULD be intuitive, we dont WANT a tutorial" I chuckled then, but add 15 years of changes on something and I don't know how that was ever going to be possible.
  - SllX 4y ago
    Tips is underrated. I think back then people just didn’t want a thick manual (also available in the Apple Books store) just to get value out of their phones, but Tips fills the need of providing some guidance as changes occur.
    - aaaaaaaaata 4y ago
      What is Tips?
      - SllX 4y ago
        It is an App installed on current iPhones, iPads, and Apple Watches. It just outlines features in the products, e.g. new iOS 15 features, “Essentials”, What’s new in watchOS 8, “Health”, “Beyond Basics”, “AirPods Max”, “AirPods”. I think various sections show up depending on what you buy or add to your Apple ID, and usually I’m able to learn a few things a year from it that I missed in the announcements or didn’t see covered elsewhere.
  - netsharc 4y ago
    Huh, it's actually been 15 years since the iPhone came out. God damn it, now I feel old...
- hbn 4y ago
  I hear this complaint a lot, but what is the solution exactly? Cramming labeled buttons for every possible action onto every screen? There's not a lot of space to work with, and even less when the touch targets have to be large enough for a big fat thumb to press accurately/reliably. You can do most of the things that most users need to do just knowing how to tap icons and swipe up to go home. I don't think it's such a big issue that there are some power user features that you either discover by messing around or word of mouth.
  - empyrrhicist 4y ago
    Unobtrusive GUI indicators - small tabs that suggest pulling, textures to suggest numbers of fingers or tapping actions etc. Add a menu item to turn visual hints off if desired, but have the UI be discoverable by default.
hbn 4y ago
> It seems the selection can only grow and on both sides, which is the main problem. I could have sworn it used to work like how you'd expect, where it's anchored from the place you started highlighting. I got my first iPhone, the 12 mini, when it came out. So end of 2020, and I thought that was how text selection worked when I first got it, then it seemed at some point, perhaps after an update it started working where it would only grow the selection and you couldn't unselect if you accidentally went too far. I thought they introduced a bug but it hasn't changed since then. I have no source for this, only my own memory, but maybe someone else can tell me I'm correct/incorrect about that? The current implementation is way too hard to use. Especially if, for example, you're selecting something starting on the far right side of a line to the far left side of the same line. You have to thread the needle of the above and below lines like a game of Operation, because if you go too high or too low, you'll accidentally end up selecting that entire line.

chazhaz 4y ago

The problem here is that the “move left to expand left” and “move right to expand right” doesn’t map mentally to the way a cursor works. With a traditional cursor, it places an anchor wherever you’ve moused down and then drags the selection around that anchor. Whereas with Haptic Touch selection, there’s no anchor, so you find yourself selecting text you didn’t mean to. I’m sure that once you’ve gotten used to it, it’s a nice feature; but it’s not intuitive if you’re not accustomed to it (which seems to be the majority of folks).

pmontra 4y ago
I enabled arrows keys on every single keyboard on the Android devices I owned. I use them to move the cursor and fix mistakes, usually by tapping and adjusting with the arrows. Faster than attempting to tap at the right spot. Are there no arrows on iOS keyboards?

empyrrhicist 4y ago

> Oh wow, I never knew this existed. iOS UI in a nutshell.

hobs 4y ago
When I worked at Apple training people about the first iPhone generations they always said stuff like "it SHOULD be intuitive, we dont WANT a tutorial" I chuckled then, but add 15 years of changes on something and I don't know how that was ever going to be possible.
- SllX 4y ago
  Tips is underrated. I think back then people just didn’t want a thick manual (also available in the Apple Books store) just to get value out of their phones, but Tips fills the need of providing some guidance as changes occur.
  - aaaaaaaaata 4y ago
    What is Tips?
    - SllX 4y ago
      It is an App installed on current iPhones, iPads, and Apple Watches. It just outlines features in the products, e.g. new iOS 15 features, “Essentials”, What’s new in watchOS 8, “Health”, “Beyond Basics”, “AirPods Max”, “AirPods”. I think various sections show up depending on what you buy or add to your Apple ID, and usually I’m able to learn a few things a year from it that I missed in the announcements or didn’t see covered elsewhere.
- netsharc 4y ago
  Huh, it's actually been 15 years since the iPhone came out. God damn it, now I feel old...
hbn 4y ago
I hear this complaint a lot, but what is the solution exactly? Cramming labeled buttons for every possible action onto every screen? There's not a lot of space to work with, and even less when the touch targets have to be large enough for a big fat thumb to press accurately/reliably. You can do most of the things that most users need to do just knowing how to tap icons and swipe up to go home. I don't think it's such a big issue that there are some power user features that you either discover by messing around or word of mouth.
- empyrrhicist 4y ago
  Unobtrusive GUI indicators - small tabs that suggest pulling, textures to suggest numbers of fingers or tapping actions etc. Add a menu item to turn visual hints off if desired, but have the UI be discoverable by default.

hbn 4y ago

> It seems the selection can only grow and on both sides, which is the main problem. I could have sworn it used to work like how you'd expect, where it's anchored from the place you started highlighting. I got my first iPhone, the 12 mini, when it came out. So end of 2020, and I thought that was how text selection worked when I first got it, then it seemed at some point, perhaps after an update it started working where it would only grow the selection and you couldn't unselect if you accidentally went too far. I thought they introduced a bug but it hasn't changed since then. I have no source for this, only my own memory, but maybe someone else can tell me I'm correct/incorrect about that? The current implementation is way too hard to use. Especially if, for example, you're selecting something starting on the far right side of a line to the far left side of the same line. You have to thread the needle of the above and below lines like a game of Operation, because if you go too high or too low, you'll accidentally end up selecting that entire line.