3 ms·

It's supposed to be the "Share" menu, but that stopped meaning anything very fast because they just crammed everything into it for lack of other UX for system s

It's supposed to be the "Share" menu, but that stopped meaning anything very fast because they just crammed everything into it for lack of other UX for system services. Macs have the problem multiple times over, because now they have the normal menu bar and toolbar, and a Share menu that just gets arbitrary stuff dumped into by App Store apps, and the Services menu that shows up in some contexts but not others, and the Quick Actions menu that shows up in some contexts but not others, and some services can just add things directly to right click menus.

xattt 8mo ago
Apple UI designers wanted to avoid the Android hamburger so much that they doubled-down on the share menu to duplicate hamburger menu functionality. I guess printing it to paper is a form of sharing so they may have the last laugh.
zozbot234 8mo ago
Windows Explorer supports its own equivalent to the "Share" menu, dubbed "Send To". It was there already in the original Windows 9x. Printers are generally not listed though, there is a separate "Print" option instead.
- hakfoo 8mo ago
  There's a very reasonable argument behind that, though. "Sending" a file to another disc or on the network is non-transformative. At the far end, it's still a file. But "printing" is inherently transformative-- you're expecting to get something clearly not a file (print-to-file pseudo-printers excepted). I can see the desire for minimalism-- having seperate rows for "share/send" and "print" is, well, two seperate rows. But if you offer adaptable and configurable interfaces, I could see suppressing one or both depending on context or user preferences. (You have no external drives or registered share-recipients? No "Send To/Share")
  - opan 8mo ago
    Obligatory: https://retrohacker.substack.com/p/bye-cups-printing-with-netcat https://retrohacker.substack.com/p/bye-cups-printing-with-ne...
  - benj111 8mo ago
    Maybe I've been in Linux land too long but sending a file to a printer seems pretty obvious to me. Yes it's transformative in a way, but you could equally argue that my word document with A4 layout is a digital version of a document, and the print out is equivalent. To me there seems to be more difference between sending and share. One is pushing something somewhere, the other implies making it available for someone/thing to pull. I'm not particularly saying you're wrong btw. We are talking metaphors, and there's no 'correct' way to do it.
jaffa2 8mo ago
Good point. Its a mess. Come on apple get someone to fix this

xattt 8mo ago

Apple UI designers wanted to avoid the Android hamburger so much that they doubled-down on the share menu to duplicate hamburger menu functionality. I guess printing it to paper is a form of sharing so they may have the last laugh.

zozbot234 8mo ago

Windows Explorer supports its own equivalent to the "Share" menu, dubbed "Send To". It was there already in the original Windows 9x. Printers are generally not listed though, there is a separate "Print" option instead.

hakfoo 8mo ago
There's a very reasonable argument behind that, though. "Sending" a file to another disc or on the network is non-transformative. At the far end, it's still a file. But "printing" is inherently transformative-- you're expecting to get something clearly not a file (print-to-file pseudo-printers excepted). I can see the desire for minimalism-- having seperate rows for "share/send" and "print" is, well, two seperate rows. But if you offer adaptable and configurable interfaces, I could see suppressing one or both depending on context or user preferences. (You have no external drives or registered share-recipients? No "Send To/Share")
- opan 8mo ago
  Obligatory: https://retrohacker.substack.com/p/bye-cups-printing-with-netcat https://retrohacker.substack.com/p/bye-cups-printing-with-ne...
- benj111 8mo ago
  Maybe I've been in Linux land too long but sending a file to a printer seems pretty obvious to me. Yes it's transformative in a way, but you could equally argue that my word document with A4 layout is a digital version of a document, and the print out is equivalent. To me there seems to be more difference between sending and share. One is pushing something somewhere, the other implies making it available for someone/thing to pull. I'm not particularly saying you're wrong btw. We are talking metaphors, and there's no 'correct' way to do it.

jaffa2 8mo ago

Good point. Its a mess. Come on apple get someone to fix this