3 ms·
What kills me is that we've known how to make UIs usable in human control situations for 4+ decades and this new generation of UX designers just ignore it. Look
by titzer 3y ago
What kills me is that we've known how to make UIs usable in human control situations for 4+ decades and this new generation of UX designers just ignore it. Look at the cockpit of an F-16 or F-22. Digital LCD displays ringed by physical buttons. Car UIs used to work like this, when they first introduced screens.
But the wider point is that we keep doing this over and over again, forgetting the lessons of the past, prioritizing flashy and less usable UI over ugly and usable because it's either cheaper or more convenient for the people making UIs, or it's the zeitgeist and it's all they know.
- stavros 3y agoI love my 2014 Mercedes A-class. There's a screen and a joystick, and the controls never wrap around the elements. This means that I can press up/left a bunch of times without looking, and be sure I've ended up at a known point. From there, I can operate anything blind.
- willcipriano 3y agoOriginal iPod was similar, still prefer that over any modern music player.
- stavros 3y agoExactly, that UX was perfect.
- damnesian 3y agoCheap, convenient, but also law of similarity. We are so smartphone focused now, practically on the species level, if people see a touchscreen, it's an interface they truly understand, it must be the cause of a perceivable sales bump.
- epicide 3y agoYou're alluding to the benefits of building interfaces to what people are already familiar with, but touchscreens are still a learned behavior. There is nothing about our physiology that affords anything with a touchscreen beyond touching it. Touchscreens add flexibility (and lower production costs), but that flexibility comes at a cost. There is no universally agreed-upon usage for them. Certainly not to the degree that "[all] people" understand them the same way. It's all too common to run into a touchscreen-based interface that you haven't seen before and simply not realize you were meant to drag that one element, tap another, or long-press something. Discoverability can be useful, but that quickly loses its value when operating a vehicle -- at least beyond its entertainment system. Buttons, knobs, wheels, sliders, and levers all have physical characteristics that signal some use. Keep in mind that those can also be (ab)used incorrectly! For example, imagine a knob that you shouldn't turn but must push or pull only. Or perhaps a button that you must twist.
- hef19898 3y agoThat is one thing, touch screen only, you can literally blame Tesla and Musk for. I know I do.
- mastercheif 3y agoYour mistake is thinking that the car manufactures are optimizing for UX. What they're actually optimizing for is looking impressive/high-tech to help sell cars and reducing build costs.
- titzer 3y agoI know, and it's depressing as hell. One problem is that for almost any idea these days, the market that buys impressive-looking but unusable, throw-away UI is so much bigger than the rest of us that it attracts all the product offerings.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]