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I have good eyesight. I don't need glasses. I still like to zoom in on text by double-tapping and pinching to zoom. What if I'm on a bus and it's easier to read

I have good eyesight. I don't need glasses. I still like to zoom in on text by double-tapping and pinching to zoom. What if I'm on a bus and it's easier to read larger text? You can add 'with an under-developed theory of mind' to the end of that list.

sanderjd 13y ago
Or you can get rid of this uncharitable list altogether and replace it with something like 'with a mandate to balance complex trade-offs between technological constraints and competing user, web page, and web application designer needs'.
- waterlion 13y ago
  That's the thing though (I agree, it's not a nice list, but it's not nice to remove features either). Who says they have a mandate to do the balancing this way? It's their software to do with as they want. That's less mandate and more unilateral. I wouldn't mind swapping a bit of a delay for a checkbox in the settings. I wouldn't even mind the checkbox being unticked by default.
- kinlan 13y ago
  Just to add there is a Checkbox in Settings (at least on the beta of Chrome) that overrides this behaviour --- it is in accessibility settings
- jaffathecake 13y ago
  I'm not convinced this makes things worse for any user. Can you think of a case?
- jackgavigan 13y ago
  You don't have to balance complex trade-offs if you make it a configuration setting. Soooo many "Should we do A or B?" debates over software functionality are settled by "Do A but let the user change it to B in the Settings."
  - sanderjd 13y ago
    That's a trade-off. Choosing "Do A but let the user change it to B in the Settings" is very similar to "Choose A", because nobody changes settings. You just move the debate to what the default should be. Not to mention that "Should we or shouldn't we have crap-tons of settings?" is its own trade-off.
    - jackgavigan 13y ago
      > That's a trade-off. Choosing "Do A but let the user change it to B in the Settings" is very similar to "Choose A", because nobody changes settings. You just move the debate to what the default should be. Okay, smart-ass, what's your solution? Maybe we should put the GUI inside a box with the "A or B" decision delegated to a mechanism that monitors a radioactive source. We'll call it Schrodinger's GUI.
      - sanderjd 13y ago
        I wasn't being a smart-ass at all. I said "you have to balance trade-offs", you said "no, you don't have to, here's a non-trade-off solution", and I said "no, you've just changed the trade-off". Many people seem to think that moving things into configuration is a "free" solution, and I am very non-sarcastically saying that no, it is not. My solution is to be aware that there is no "solution", and you have to balance trade-offs (which is what I said to start!).
lukeschlather 13y ago
I also have good eyesight and like to zoom. I zoom HN until just before the layout breaks on the desktop.

sanderjd 13y ago

Or you can get rid of this uncharitable list altogether and replace it with something like 'with a mandate to balance complex trade-offs between technological constraints and competing user, web page, and web application designer needs'.

waterlion 13y ago
That's the thing though (I agree, it's not a nice list, but it's not nice to remove features either). Who says they have a mandate to do the balancing this way? It's their software to do with as they want. That's less mandate and more unilateral. I wouldn't mind swapping a bit of a delay for a checkbox in the settings. I wouldn't even mind the checkbox being unticked by default.
kinlan 13y ago
Just to add there is a Checkbox in Settings (at least on the beta of Chrome) that overrides this behaviour --- it is in accessibility settings
jaffathecake 13y ago
I'm not convinced this makes things worse for any user. Can you think of a case?
jackgavigan 13y ago
You don't have to balance complex trade-offs if you make it a configuration setting. Soooo many "Should we do A or B?" debates over software functionality are settled by "Do A but let the user change it to B in the Settings."
- sanderjd 13y ago
  That's a trade-off. Choosing "Do A but let the user change it to B in the Settings" is very similar to "Choose A", because nobody changes settings. You just move the debate to what the default should be. Not to mention that "Should we or shouldn't we have crap-tons of settings?" is its own trade-off.
  - jackgavigan 13y ago
    > That's a trade-off. Choosing "Do A but let the user change it to B in the Settings" is very similar to "Choose A", because nobody changes settings. You just move the debate to what the default should be. Okay, smart-ass, what's your solution? Maybe we should put the GUI inside a box with the "A or B" decision delegated to a mechanism that monitors a radioactive source. We'll call it Schrodinger's GUI.
    - sanderjd 13y ago
      I wasn't being a smart-ass at all. I said "you have to balance trade-offs", you said "no, you don't have to, here's a non-trade-off solution", and I said "no, you've just changed the trade-off". Many people seem to think that moving things into configuration is a "free" solution, and I am very non-sarcastically saying that no, it is not. My solution is to be aware that there is no "solution", and you have to balance trade-offs (which is what I said to start!).

lukeschlather 13y ago

I also have good eyesight and like to zoom. I zoom HN until just before the layout breaks on the desktop.