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Yeah, but from a user perspective text is superior to date. I don't even know a non technical person that doesn't curse under their breath when a date picker po

Yeah, but from a user perspective text is superior to date. I don't even know a non technical person that doesn't curse under their breath when a date picker pops up. A simple "date (DD/MM/YYYY)" or similar format above a text field is a blessing these days, but I'll take anything over a date picker. A good date picker would let the year drop down somewhere, show calendar view, and allow text input of the date. That's the minimum requirements, a month drop down would be nice too. Sometimes I run into date pickers that have some unintuitive way to page years, one click at a time of course, and while I dislike that, at least I can move back by a year, it doesnt ruin my day. Imagine someone deciding that to input the exact time of something you'd select a drop down containing Unix timestamps, one option for each second, that's probably the only thing I can think of that would be more frustrating and senseless than the current state of affairs, and even then perhaps not because at least it's a dropdown you can scroll on. Literally a scrolling dropdown of all dates back to 01/01/1900 would be a superior UX to the current common date picker design.

culi 4y ago
> Yeah, but from a user perspective text is superior to date Hmm I'm not sure if that's always true for mobile users (the subject of this post). Given any default starting date, I can enter in my DOB in: - 1 tap - 2 swipes - another tap If I was instead presented a keyboard I'd have to make 8 taps. 9 if I count having to switch from abc to 123. And this is under the assumption that the text field has an input mask built-in so I don't manually have to type the separators. If I did have to type those this would be bumped up to 11 taps I agree with you on desktop though. But the thing is, that already is the way it works on desktop. You can ignore the calendar picker and just type it in directly. It actually works that way on mobile too, but most people don't have a keyboard plugged into their phones
- mgkimsal 4y ago
  > Given any default starting date, I can enter in my DOB in: - 1 tap - 2 swipes - another tap =================== How? Reading this, I can’t imagine any scenario where I could enter a specific date on mobile with 4 interactions.
  - culi 4y ago
    well I guess 5 1. Tap the year-month 2. Swipe to your year 3. Swipe to your year 4. Hit the checkmark 5. Tap the day of the month
    - friend_and_foe 4y ago
      Lol the crux here is "swipe to your year". This could be 100 swipes or more. This should not be the standard way you select a number from a sequence of numbers, it is insanity. But even that is better than the common approach which only let's you swipe months. I've seen it on desktop as well as mobile, I've seen it implemented in JS and not just an HTML5 problem, so there are no excuses, but on the topic of mobile, I have a keyboard that pops up just as quickly as a calendar view, even with the argument that most people prefer to use their phones graphically and spatially (which I don't entirely buy), there's no reason to prevent me from typing in a 4 to 8 digit number if I want to, none. UX design is not just an issue of number of taps, it's an issue of cognitive load required for interaction also, both considerations can introduce or reduce friction, and in the case of a commonly implemented date picker you have artificially introduced friction from both of those considerations, it's a devolution in design, plain and simple.
uranusjr 4y ago
> I don't even know a non technical person that doesn't curse under their breath when a date picker pops up. I used to designed software for factory automation and every time there’s dates involved the datepicker is always an explicit requirement. I tried to ignore that once (they were more annoying to implement back in the days) and the plain text field didn’t even get past the first meeting. I guess “non technical person” is not as coherent a group as you may imagine.

culi 4y ago

> Yeah, but from a user perspective text is superior to date Hmm I'm not sure if that's always true for mobile users (the subject of this post). Given any default starting date, I can enter in my DOB in: - 1 tap - 2 swipes - another tap If I was instead presented a keyboard I'd have to make 8 taps. 9 if I count having to switch from abc to 123. And this is under the assumption that the text field has an input mask built-in so I don't manually have to type the separators. If I did have to type those this would be bumped up to 11 taps I agree with you on desktop though. But the thing is, that already is the way it works on desktop. You can ignore the calendar picker and just type it in directly. It actually works that way on mobile too, but most people don't have a keyboard plugged into their phones

mgkimsal 4y ago
> Given any default starting date, I can enter in my DOB in: - 1 tap - 2 swipes - another tap =================== How? Reading this, I can’t imagine any scenario where I could enter a specific date on mobile with 4 interactions.
- culi 4y ago
  well I guess 5 1. Tap the year-month 2. Swipe to your year 3. Swipe to your year 4. Hit the checkmark 5. Tap the day of the month
  - friend_and_foe 4y ago
    Lol the crux here is "swipe to your year". This could be 100 swipes or more. This should not be the standard way you select a number from a sequence of numbers, it is insanity. But even that is better than the common approach which only let's you swipe months. I've seen it on desktop as well as mobile, I've seen it implemented in JS and not just an HTML5 problem, so there are no excuses, but on the topic of mobile, I have a keyboard that pops up just as quickly as a calendar view, even with the argument that most people prefer to use their phones graphically and spatially (which I don't entirely buy), there's no reason to prevent me from typing in a 4 to 8 digit number if I want to, none. UX design is not just an issue of number of taps, it's an issue of cognitive load required for interaction also, both considerations can introduce or reduce friction, and in the case of a commonly implemented date picker you have artificially introduced friction from both of those considerations, it's a devolution in design, plain and simple.

uranusjr 4y ago

> I don't even know a non technical person that doesn't curse under their breath when a date picker pops up. I used to designed software for factory automation and every time there’s dates involved the datepicker is always an explicit requirement. I tried to ignore that once (they were more annoying to implement back in the days) and the plain text field didn’t even get past the first meeting. I guess “non technical person” is not as coherent a group as you may imagine.