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For GUIs, Just the Right Degree of Realism
mr crypto writes "User interfaces make copious use of pictures and symbols, but how abstract should images be? Lukas Mathis has an interesting blog entry on where to draw the line."
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Really. That was a very nice article that made me think about some things I've never really considered.
My, that was many words to say one thing over and over and over again. Pretty pictures though.
But regardless of age there are good and bad icons. Newer icons aren't better, and often they seem to be even more confusing than many old icons.
It's time to realize that a clean strict interface for the users is often better than all those flashy colors, gradients and animations that wastes time and productivity. Look into what users really do, not what you think the users should do with your software.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
There's no such thing as "intuitive" computer interfaces. Instead, you want your interfaces to be "discoverable" and to build on other trained discoveries in a consistent way.
From that example of the new YouTube buttons, I agree they're bizarre. Pretty much any button that JUST shows an arrow is useless for discoverability. Does the arrow mean 'move' or 'grow' or 'next' or some other action? By "discover," we don't mean to literally experiment with invoking the button to see what it does-- many people are too timid to press anything they don't already understand. Instead, discovery involves finding that there IS a button that PROBABLY does what you already intend to do. For example, follow the mental conversation: "this window is too small, I want to make it bigger, there's got to be a button around here somewhere for making it bigger, oh aha! that one looks like a dark box getting bigger, so let me try that, yep, that's better."
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While this guy talks about realism, he's missing the point. If we didn't have each software designer creating its own visual language, then we wouldn't have the issue of how well that language is designed.
When Microsoft has its own set of hieroglyphics, and Apple has theirs, and Adobe has theirs, and each OSS has its own language--which is similar to some existing commercial language to leverage user experience, but different enough to avoid getting sued--then the issue is not how well these languages are designed.
The issue is, why should the user need to learn a new language for each application?
You may say, well, if you put all your commands in English, then only English speakers can use your app. Fair enough. But if you put all your commands in some bespoke language spoken by no one, doesn't it follow then no one can use your app?
Designers, pick an existing language used by your target market. Is that real enough?
Early to the Mid 90's is when most computers were able to do at least 640x480x8bit this was a big deal, before we were stuck on 320x200 resolution for 8bits (if you were lucky, I was a 320x200 2bits CGA) But in short this is when computers now able to show photo realistic pictures. And many developers have long waited for the ability to make programs that look so much like the real thing, As the earlier systems required a lot of artistry to come up with a cartoonish icon at best. So it was really a large scale experiment on how realistic you can make your program... What happened over time was people realized that being to realistic wasn't helpful and overlaying a 3d Interface with 2d controls was counter productive
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
In other words, it's the Uncanny Valley in action.
There's no such thing as "intuitive" computer interfaces.
No there are lots of intuitive interfaces, there just aren't many (if any) "universal" interfaces. You can give me flack for it, but I'm going to go ahead and say that the Slashdot comment interface is very intuitive. I know the reply button starts a reply. The Cancel button cancels it. The option button lets me see various options. Very intuitive, I have not needed to press any of these buttons to know their respective meaning. That by definition makes it intuitive.
However, if I was from Japan, I wouldn't have any clue what any of these buttons mean. I'd probably get so fed up with it I'd request a Japanese version of Slashdot.
So what it comes down to is trying to make something universally understood. Surprisingly enough, any country that has vehicular traffic uses Green for Go and Red for stop. Whether thats based on open standards or some psychological root, I don't know. So if you had an option that you could start or stop, putting the same image in green and the other in red would show which one starts it and which one stops it. Similarily, the symbols on every Media player for Play, Pause, Rewind, Fast Forward, Stop, and Record are also Universal across the planet. So it makes sense to put them on any application that plays media.
There are a handful of things like this out there. It's not impossible to create an intuitive computer interface. The tricky part is to make it universal across all demographics of people who will use it, especially if there is a language barrier. This is where icons with the help of tooltip popups can be great.
My experience is that people will click with wild abandon when they shouldn't, and be deathly afraid to do anything when there's no real harm involved.
These are the people who will install anything they damn well please, change important settings for absolutely no reason "because it seemed like a good idea", set passwords on things that don't need passwords and then forget them, forward phone A to phone B and phone B to phone A because "I wanted them both to ring if I got a call," and other general nonsense. They have no problem screwing around to their heart's content and breaking everything and never learning.
That same person will also submit endless tickets or place endless helpdesk calls because they were afraid to change a trivial setting that involves a single, labelled checkbox, because "I wasn't sure if that would mess anything up."
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