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Why Are There So Many Knobs in Audio Software? (theoutline.com)
John Lagomarsino, writing for The Outline: Skeuomorphic design, where user interfaces emulate the appearance of physical objects, has been popular for pretty much the history of personal computing. The ideas of "files," "folders," and the "recycle bin" in Windows could be considered skeuomorphs, intended to help transition early computer users from analog to digital, as could the idea of an "inbox" and "outbox" in email and the paperclip that symbolizes attachments. More recently, a lot of early iOS apps were famous for their heavy-handed skeuomorphic elements, with felt textures and chunky drop shadows. But no area of computing has so thoroughly gone for it more than audio software. The first Billboard #1 single that was recorded to a hard drive instead of tape was "Livin' La Vida Loca" in 1999; 18 years later, in 2017, most audio software still looks like the designers attempted to replicate physical equipment piece for piece on a computer screen. Faders, switches, knobs, needles twitching between numbers on a volume meter -- they're all there. Except you have to control them with a mouse. Winamp may have been Patient Zero in this gaudy epidemic, but it has spread far and wide. I spend a lot of my time mixing and editing audio, and that often involves having multiple audio plugins (essentially applications that run inside the main audio program) from multiple vendors running simultaneously. But all audio software, for what I suppose are historical reasons, features the most egregious skeuomorphic design in all of software. Alone, each plugin is hideous in its own unique way. A panel of 3D knobs here, a pixelated oscilloscope there.
I've even gone so far as to search for plug-ins that DON'T rely on skeuomorphic designs, and came up mostly empty. Plug-in designers put waaaay too much effort into making their front panels look like brushed aluminum and their needle velocity just so, and not nearly enough effort into making their interfaces intuitive and effective.
- The Kessel run is for nerf herders. I can circumnavigate the entire Central Finite Curve in a lot less than 12 parse
Audio engineers are not programmers? Well usually anyways.
They like to mimic what they know, mixers, synths, filters compressors etc. The H/W variety works with knobs, so the S/W variety mimics that to help, you know, real audio engineers.
This! The last thing any audio engineer needs to to learn a new interface after having spent many years learning on that has started to look pretty damn standard. If you really don't like the mouse, why not buy a USB mixer control surface and plug it in to your computer. That way you can physically control all the software controls, just like on a real mixing desk.
"You have to control them with a mouse".
Or a MIDI keyboard such as my Nektar LX49+, or a mixer like the Novation SL Mk 2, the Mackie Mix 8, the Behringer BCF2000, or the Faderport 8. A mouse! This ain't the Dark Ages, you know!
Garry Knight
It turns out that knobs are pretty space-efficient considering the function they perform, when physical or digitally presented. When doing live sound, having quick access to as many adjustments as possible with a simple reach is invaluable. One of the things I dislike about most modern digital mixing consoles is that they tried to limit the number of knobs which in turn leads to more buttons being pushed to switch between channels.
If your response to a usability complaint involves a command line in any way, you are part of the problem.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Actually, no.
First, the author provides no solid complaint. Just that "there are knobs, and I don't know what most of them do". The latter is a matter of documentation, not UX, and for the former he offers zero in the way of alternatives. He complains that you have to control the knobs with a mouse... as opposed to what, real knobs? Does he suggest something like using mouseover-then-scrollwheel as opposed to drag-the-knob? No not even that. Instead he complains about retro app skins. At best he can point to a failure to herd cats into a more unified UX approach (even then, some behavioral variety may actually be desirable to help the muscle memory build.)
Now if you are a live performance musician or soundboard operator, you want everything you normally tweak to be in a known location so your muscle memory can get you there. Does TFA want someone to open a search box, type the first few letters of a control, select it from a dropdown, and type in a numerical value in a popup? Or use a giant cascading menu? Or some sort of touch-and-hold-then-drag thing on an inaccurate laggy touchscreen? Good luck staying in the pocket with any of those schemes.
No, you have two alternatives: 1) use a physical layout so your hands know where stuff is, either on the desktop or with peripherals and 2) use live coding... which, is indeed a CLI thing and very popular.
Someone had to do it.
Knobs don't belong in UIs, full stop. Use sliders instead.
Sliders mean precisely one thing in audio: attenuation.
They convey the same information, but are natural to use with the mouse.
No. To an audio engineer, they convey that they control is for adjusting the relative volume of a channel, because that's how we've used them for the last eight decades or so.
UIs should look like what other UIs on the same OS look like.
No, UIs should look like what other UIs on the same functional equipment look like. I mean, sure, there are the brands who have their "weird" controls, and every board puts the different functional blocks in different places, but a mixer channel is basically laid out the same regardless of who built it.
Now if you are a live performance musician or soundboard operator, you want everything you normally tweak to be in a known location so your muscle memory can get you there.
Well, yes. We don't exactly get much time to fix things before the audience notices, unless the house serves really good drinks...
Muscle memory won't carry over from a physical panel to a mouse. That's just not what muscle memory is.
It's not just muscles, though. It's also hand-eye coordination, and instant visual recognition of the controls. If I need to tweak a channel's gain, I know immediately I'm looking for a knob at the top of the channel stack. To change it to a slider means I have to look at something different and recognize it's the gain (rather than the typically-a-slider fader).
For another example, let's talk about pan. Usually it's a knob, but you're suggesting a slider. Since pan is a left-to-right control, it would make sense to have a horizontal slider. However, the fader is a up-or-down control, so it'd make sense to be a vertical slider. Now each channel is a wide and tall block, either wasting space or rearranging controls that have been standard for decades.
Awkward controls won't make things better. Putting the controls in about the same place on the screen as they are on the physical panel? Sure, that part makes sense. But knobs on a screen is just exasperating in its stupidity.
Now, the other thing to consider is that there is a reason the knobs are knobs on physical boards. The knobs are controls that rarely need adjustment. They're meant to be set at the beginning of a piece, and are typically left alone. Sure, there are a number of weird moments where the vocalist gets an effect bumped on, or the guitarist runs across the stage with his sound panning to match... but primarily, the knobs are just left alone. They're there if you need them, but you usually don't. Usually the primary control is the fader, literally sitting at your fingertips. From that perspective, it seems silly to turn knobs (which are very dense controls combining a display output with a range input in a small footprint) into sliders (which waste a lot of space with the unused slide). That's wasting valuable display space that I could be using for another effect, another monitor, or simply more channels of control.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.