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| Where Microsoft has 'more taste' than Apple |
| By Thom Holwerda on 2012-07-22 17:05:06 |
| Mike Elgan at Cult of Mac: "It must surely be a sign of the impending apocalypse that Microsoft's operating systems have 'more taste' than Apple's. I'm referring, of course, to Apple's inexplicable use of skeuomorphic design in iOS and OS X apps, and contrasting that with Microsoft's stark avoidance of such cheesy gimmickry in the Windows 8 and Windows Phone user interfaces. A skeuomorphic design in software is one that 'decorates' the interface with fake reality - say, analog knobs or torn paper. The problem is worse than it sounds." Won't come as a surprise to anyone that I wholeheartedly agree with this one. iOS and Mac OS X are ruined by an incredibly high Microsoft BOB factor. I have no idea how - or if - Apple will address this, or if the current downward spiral is going to continue. |
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| RE: It is the circle of tech... |
| By Morgan on 2012-07-22 18:55:17 |
|
I don't think you should include a game as an example, as the whole point of a game is escapism. You don't want it to look like a computer interface (unless of course you're playing one of those "hacker" type games). Otherwise, you're exactly right: Microsoft and Apple are both to blame for this pointless dumbing down of modern computer interfaces. I'm glad Microsoft is throwing all of that out and I hope Apple does the same. |
 - Score: 3 |
| RE[4]: Hm |
| By Raziel on 2012-07-22 19:18:13 |
| I DID use a Lumina phone before installing the Android launcher, and it looked exactly the same to me. And by "missing functionality", I mean my widgets and tens of applications I normally use right in the main Window, classified by type in different screens, without the need to scroll that much because of the buttons being huge as in Metro. I also didn't find a single permanent notification area, a couple of pixels to instantly know if something's happened in my phone in the last minutes, with drop-down for details, instead of looking for changes around the whole screen. |
| - Score: 1 |
| RE: Both Apple and Microsoft can do better |
| By MysterMask on 2012-07-22 19:26:46 |
|
The critique is way over the top. There is a vast difference between a pseudo leather background look which can - depending on personal taste - look pleasant or not and the QuickTime 4 problem where discussions were (rightfully) about a wrongly chosen UI control: You don't have to interact with the leather background so there's IMHO no problem to use something that looks 'real world'. From the 'use' standpoint there is no real difference if you use grey or pseudo-somehing. You can see how ridiculous the discussion is if i start calling the white background in a MSWord document a skeuomorphism because it looks like real world paper. Is this a problem. No. Just one of those Holwerda stories stating the message that the success of Apple is the downfall of good IT .. |
| - Score: 2 |
| RE[5]: Hm |
| By Morgan on 2012-07-22 19:28:41 |
|
You hit on my one true gripe with Metro as it exists currently on WP7 phones: I miss the notification bar from Android. I would be satisfied with notifications via the status LED, but on my phone (HTC Arrive) it only has four indicators, three for charging state and one for missed calls. Why can't I have email/SMS/social status indicators without scrolling the main screen? Some of your other issues are being addressed with the 7.8 and WP8 releases, giving the user a 1/4 size button choice so there will be room for more indicators on the main view, and a double-width button choice for displaying widget-class info. The latter feature currently exists but is controlled entirely by the app vendor; the new OS releases will put the control in the user's fingers, so to speak. My "perfect" phone interface would be very similar to Metro but with features I've seen in OpenMoko, Bada, Android and even Symbian. Alas, that will never happen, but it's nice to think about. |
| - Score: 2 |
| Agreed |
| By jbrown94305 on 2012-07-22 20:27:50 |
|
Yeah it really sucks. I can't understand why there are millions ( or is it billions ) of people buying it. Don't they realize that monochrome, butt-ugly metro is so much more aestheticly pleasing? |
| - Score: -1 |
| I doubt... |
| By Coxy on 2012-07-22 20:50:33 |
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...that apple users have ever even heard of "skeuomorphism" or care what it is. They couldn't care about fitts law or any other over-used phrases. And they don't need to, they have an os that everyone thinks is the best in the world, and where you need lots of money to have it. There are sites now that only let you join if you use a mac, or offer you more expensive products and services... when you put up with that, I guess you couldn't care if some blogger thinks that your contact application shouldn't look like a filofax. Edited 2012-07-22 20:50 UTC |
| - Score: 3 |
| Comment by historyb |
| By historyb on 2012-07-22 21:10:01 |
| I saw the article. I hay to say I like the screenshot of the reel to reel player |
| - Score: 2 |
| RE: Virtual Steampunk. |
| By orfanum on 2012-07-22 22:20:15 |
|
I understand the kind of argument you are trying to make but you are using the wrong example with Gutenberg: even his innovations largely emulated previous manuscript production. He wasn't printing in Courier. http://www.slideshare.net/fpaise... |
| - Score: 3 |
| RE[2]: Hm |
| By henderson101 on 2012-07-22 22:25:05 |
|
> That said, I think Apple goes too far with, for example, GarageBand with its wasted pixels on either side to represent functionless wooden cabinet panels. I need to stop you there. GarageBand is a REALLY, REALLY poor example to use. Anyone who has used ant kind of music creation software can tell you that this is the absolute norm. Here are some key players who skeuomorph like a Mofo: Native Instruments - Guitar Rig, Studio Drummer, pretty much all of their products and plug ins (including ones that work in GarageBand) IK Multimedia's AmpliTube. Peavey ReValver Toontrack EZ Drummer Addictive Drummer Any of the 100's of free or low cost VST or AudioUnit plug-ins for PC or Mac. I have no idea why they feel they need to look like real hardware. It is actually harder to use them in many respects. But they do. |
| - Score: 4 |
| RE[2]: Both Apple and Microsoft can do better |
| By laffer1 on 2012-07-22 22:42:11 |
|
You are certainly entitled to your opinion, but I don't think this critique is simply about the rise of Apple and the downfall of everything. It's a critique on the poor usability of modern operating system (and application) development. Everything we've learned in the last thirty years has been thrown out. I have a Mac Pro and a PC w/ Windows + BSD on it. I'm not so narrowly minded that I think all things Microsoft and Apple are bad. I just find my computers less and less useful over time. That is a problem to me and it should be to anyone else who needs to get real work done. At the same time, I don't hear anyone I know claiming computers are getting easier to use. Most people are confused with the new interfaces too. Not only did they throw out what they new, they don't make sense and have no consistency. Every "screen" is different. |
| - Score: 3 |
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