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This is a low-effort article that completely fails to understand why a couple of the nits even happened, which would have been actually interesting. * On confi
by spankalee 2y ago
This is a low-effort article that completely fails to understand why a couple of the nits even happened, which would have been actually interesting.
* On confirming changes with ok/cancel:
Online and collaborative apps have trained many users to expect that all changes are automatically saved. Where Google Docs used to have a "save" button that did nothing, we may have now entered a new era where some users don't know what the state of things is if you don't hit one of the ok/cancel buttons. That's interesting, and maybe there's a more clear way of doing things because of this expectation change.
Not to mention that the OK button has hopefully deservedly died because it wasn't clear. The affirm button should have a custom label that describes the action that will happen if you click it.
* On apps (more specifically browsers) not being identifiable: This is good mostly? Browsers are presumably responding to users who care more about having maximum screen real estate dedicated to the content they're reading that the browser which hosts the content. An app that realizes that I often don't really _want_ to interact with the app itself is good. The removal of excessive toolbars and separate URL and search boxes is a all great. I want a browser that's almost full-screen content but still usable for navigation and window management.
* On gray selection: A code/text highlight example, really? Yes, I personally don't want a bright blue background for my selected code. It would be too distracting. But you can change this with your theme! Choose a theme you like. If other users like it too it'll be popular.
Or is he complaining about the selected tab? That has bold text and a color highlight line above it. I have no idea why the selected gray is so similar to unselected in his screen shot when the Dark and Dark Modern themes in VS Code for me have more contrast. Again, bright colors would be distracting and you change change the theme.
The interesting question here would be how you balance obviousness of UI state with not being distracting, especially for editing apps.
These are tough design challenges and this article kind of flippantly dismisses the current state as "aesthetics" rather than considering that there are competing usability concerns and the author simply doesn't like where the tradeoff has landed, and completely ignores the market leading apps and OSes to similar design decisions.
- tuetuopay 2y ago> Or is he complaining about the selected tab? I think so, yes. No borders to indicate the selected tab, no background color. It took me a while to notice the selected tab is likely to be the one with the "close" cross and the 1px thin accent red above it. It is plainly bad. Oh and the text is not bold, just a bit lighter than the other tabs. > there are competing usability concerns This is very true, especially since the author uses red and green for ok/cancel buttons. A colorblind colleague of mine actually likes the current trend of grey-ifying stuff because there is an increased difference in luma, not only in chroma, between elements.
- ghnws 2y agoThat is some custom theme they have on their VsCode though. Not a very good example to use.
- rootusrootus 2y agoThe default theme you see on the VSCode home page is not much better.
- rootusrootus 2y ago> Not to mention that the OK button has hopefully deservedly died because it wasn't clear. I disagree. The great thing about the OK and Cancel buttons were not that they were a good description for what you were doing, but that everyone understood what was going to happen. It is that consistency that has been lost. Trying to get terminology to be more accurate is a laudable goal, but what really kills me about modern UI design is how every single app or web page feels like they need to roll their own.
- spankalee 2y ago> everyone understood what was going to happen I disagree here. OK/Cancel only make in the context of the text in the dialog, and are only clear if there are clear negative and positive actions. Even when there are clear positives and negatives, it's almost always better to just label the OK button with the actual action. Save, Revert, Close, Send, etc., are always better than OK.
- remram 2y agoThis is a weird comment. The fact that users expect changes to be saved is not a problem, they will see a "how you sure you want to leave" if they don't. Even browsers support this now, if you were to try and close the whole tab/window. The "ok" button can be labelled "save" if that makes sense. I don't think that takes anything away from the article's point. "Just get another theme" is not a solution. The point is that most themes are this way, whether default themes or others. Most apps also don't have theming options, other than light/dark. Or do you mean that end users should make their own theme? > low-effort article that completely fails to understand
- spankalee 2y agoThe author chose a non-default theme with apparently low contrast. They should simply use a default theme or a better custom one.
- hulitu 2y ago> Online and collaborative apps have trained many users to expect that all changes are automatically saved. Except when they are not. Consistency is not a virtue anymore.
- hulitu 2y ago> But you can change this with your theme This was a long time ago. Today it is either dark or light.