Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Steve Jobs Wanted the First iPhone To Have a Permanent Back Button Like Android (bgr.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the secret-history dept.

anderzole shares a report from BGR: Brian Merchant's new book, The One Device: The Secret History of the iPhone, provides a captivating and intriguing look at how the most revolutionary product of our time was designed and developed. Through a series of interviews with Apple engineers and designers who played an integral role in the iPhone's creation and development, Merchant maps out how the iPhone came to be after more than two years of non-stop work at breakneck speed. One of the more interesting revelations from the book is that the iPhone design Apple unveiled in January of 2007 might have looked vastly different if Steve Jobs had his way. According to Imran Chaudhri, a veteran Apple designer who spent 19 years working on Apple's elite Human Interface Team, Steve Jobs wanted the original iPhone to have a back button in addition to a home button. Believe it or not, the original iPhone could have very well looked like a modern-day Android device. "The touch-based phone, which was originally supposed to be nothing but screen, was going to need at least one button," Merchant writes. "We all know it well today -- the Home button. But Steve Jobs wanted it to have two; he felt they'd need a back button for navigation. Chaudhri argued that it was all about generating trust and predictability. One button that does the same thing every time you press it: it shows you your stuff. 'Again, that came down to a trust issue,' Chaudhri says, 'that people could trust the device to do what they wanted it to do. Part of the problem with other phones was the features were buried in menus, they were too complex.' A back button could complicate matters too, he told Jobs. 'I won that argument,' Chaudhri says."

7 of 208 comments (clear)

  1. Do one thing? by Vylen · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Except the Home button now does multiple things depending on if you long-press, double or even triple click it?

    1. Re:Do one thing? by MangoCats · · Score: 4, Insightful

      This, from the company that brought you the one button mouse, that you can click three ways.

    2. Re:Do one thing? by darkain · · Score: 4, Insightful

      These problems exist on MacOS too. I was recently handed a MacBook for compatibility testing of a web site with Safari. Only problem? How the FUCK do I launch Safari? It wasnt in the launch bar at the bottom. Literally had to go to another machine just to Google how to do it, because there is apparently no way to just have a simply listing of all available installed applications to launch from the main OS UI. It is inside of Finder apparently, under some Applications menu inside of there. This honestly reminded me of all the bullshit in Windows 3.1 that was needed to get simple things done.

    3. Re:Do one thing? by drinkypoo · · Score: 1, Insightful

      And, furthermore, the second you utilize TIME in your clicks, you're now forcing time to be a component in their usage. I can press as many radio buttons on my car radio as I want... as fast as I want. I don't have to press one button, and then HOLD IT to have it move radio station. I don't have to watch for the "Context" to change.

      That's kind of a horrible example, because on old car stereos you would pull the button to set a preset, and on most car stereos of today you hold the button to set a preset, while you simply touch it to select one. If you hold the button down too long, you'll reset your preset.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  2. Re:Well, there you go by fustakrakich · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Jobs hated context menus because they hid functionality in unpredictable ways

    Yeah, like Ctrl-Click...

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
  3. Re:I always cursed Jobs for this too.. by saccade.com · · Score: 4, Insightful

    +1. In every iPhone app, you have to hunt around for the "Done" or "Cancel" or "Close" or whatever. Best of all, Android's "back" works across apps; so if an app launches the browser to show you something, tapping Back returns you to the original app. Sorry Chaudhri, Steve Jobs was correct.

  4. Re:I always cursed Jobs for this too.. by darkain · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Coming from an Android world, this honestly confused the shit out of me on iOS when I needed to beta test an app. It had an option to launch Apple Maps from within it for navigation, and I've yet to figure out how the fuck to get back to the app I was in without going all the way back to the home screen an re-launching it. How the hell is that supposed to be a "good" user experience!?