Slashdot Mirror
Experts Say Gestural Interfaces Are a Step Backwards In Usability
smitty777 writes "Veteran usability experts Donald A. Norman and Jakob Nielsen wrote an interesting article lamenting the current state of the art in gesture interfaces. According to them, the lack of standards for interacting with these devices puts us on par with the '94 vintage in web design, when designers discovered they could make the buttons and UI look like anything they wanted."
What with all the OS companies trademarking the various gestures, there's no way they'll become standardized. Unfortunately.
I don't see how anyone who is familiar with computers could find iOS's gestures "intuitive." I actually had to look up how to create folders after iOS 4.0 hit. Drag one application on top of another? How does that bear any resemblance to a) how things are already done on Windows/OS X/Gnome/KDE/etc. or b) common sense?
In Android, conversely, you long-press (stand-in for right-click) and bam, "New folder" is right there in the menu that comes up. Just like you're already used to.
In Windows Vista and 7 at least there is a visual indicator for a long press that aids in discoverability. When you touch the screen, a progress bar starts circling your finger. I've found people discover the long press on their own, since they wait to see what happens when the circle completes. It's hard to describe, so here's a link showing it. In the video the delay between when the screen is touched and when the progress bar stars is a little longer than the default.
I'm not anywhere near the caliber of UI expertise as Norman or Nielsen. But there's a big advantage to pioneering a new physical interface: you don't need the language part of your brain. My 1 year old twin nephews can interact with their iPads with only the most basic of demonstrations of how a new app works. They can't read or write but they can follow demos of fingers creating action pretty well.
Is bringing along the old interface of mice & menus helping or hurting? I particularly like the new "swipe up" gesture to scroll down of a touchscreen rather than the traditional "elevator window" model of scroll bars where clicking up scrolls up.
They are absolutely to be commended for chastising developers that there is no easy way to discover actions if they are not intuitive; I'd rather they come up with ways to address this than just fall back on menus though. For example, Apple included an interactive tutorial for using the custom gestures built-in to Pages, Numbers and Keynote because they aren't discoverable at all. Some I've forgotten because I don't use them (and I'd have to re-watch the tutorials again to re-program my brain). But the ones I have picked up on are absolutely ingrained and effortless now. Unfortunately, built-in tutorials are the exception rather than the rule, and even when they are included they more trouble to refer to than a drop down menu. But there are ways to improve without eliminating gestures.
I wouldn't want to use the gesture interface when I'm programming during the day, but when I'm swiping through my early morning junk mail, RSS feeds, and to-do items, my brain feels far more engaged on my iPad than my desktop. It's almost like the touch gestures are autonomic and leave my (limited) higher brain functions alone to read though the fog (at least until my caffeine kicks in.)
I agree that people need to improve gesture interfaces which are in their infancy, but I don't think it's justified to throw the baby out with the bath water just because of long traditions.