Google Cleans Up Gmail App With An All-White Redesign (engadget.com)

While Gmail on the web was significantly redesigned last year, the app for Android and iOS stayed relatively unchanged, with the exception of an update last year that removed the bold colors in favor of an almost entirely white look. Engadget reports that a redesigned Gmail for mobile is starting to roll out today and it will be available to all Android and iOS users in the coming weeks. Engadget reports: Functionally, the new Gmail mobile app isn't wildly different than what came before. There's a button in the lower-right corner to compose a new email, just like before -- it's just white with a multi-colored "plus" sign, the same glyph that shows up in Gmail and Drive on the web. The iconic top red bar is now white, and the whole top area is a search bar; the old app required tapping a smaller target to get into search. Finally, there's a shortcut right to the account switcher on the main page. Previously, switching accounts required opening the sidebar, but now that option is front and center.

A few features that came to the web version of Gmail make their way to mobile today. Probably most recognizable is that attachment previews will show up below the messages, making it easier to both find messages with attachments and get a sense of the content. For those that prefer to see more messages, Google also has "comfortable" and "compact" density options that remove attachment previews and avatars, respectively. The large red phishing warnings that Gmail on the web shows also now show up in the app. Visually, it looks just like you'd expect if you've tried any of Google's recent mobile apps -- it's basically all white, with the new Google font throughout.

Comments

White?

[LordKronos]

Wow, perfect. So not only does it look more bland**, but now that phones are beginning to move to oleds we get MORE white in the UI? Good thinking!!!

**not sure why everyone seems to think it's good to not having lines denoting the borders of anything, whether it be separators between emails or the edges of a button.

Re:White?

[Anonymous Coward]

They saw the whitespace programming language and thought they would like to get the same aesthetic beauty and functionality in their interface to bring this concept to a larger audience.

Re:White?

[b0s0z0ku]

The app is actually written in Brainfuck++.

Re:White?

[Anonymous Coward]

"IT'S OKAY TO BE WHITE"

    -- Google, 2019

Re:White?

[Anonymous Coward]

And there's more white pixels to melt my eyes with!

Re: White?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dats raaaycist...

Re:White?

[Anonymous Coward]

Simple: Google is shit at UI, and most users are too dumb to notice.

There's a reason Android is so popular with the plebs.

Re: White?

[Anonymous Coward]

They should just get it over with. 99% white background, 95% white text, icons and interface elements.
100% unusable!

Re:White?

[tooyoung]

I read the summary and came in to make similar criticism to pretty much all of the comments I've seen so far. I mean, white on white on white? It seems ridiculous.

But then I looked at the before and after screenshots and I have to say... the after seems much more straight forward. Having dealt with a number of email apps, the after looks simply like a list of emails. The before looks... weird. The red portions are super exaggerated. It's not bad by any means, but the red seems like overkill to draw attention to the search and the new email areas. The new design actually makes it much more clear that it is a search area.

I'm no fan of redesign for redesign sake, and I'm definitely sensitive to changes in any website/app that I rely on. Still, this one seems like an improvement despite how it's positioned in the summary.

Re: White?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure it is. In light white is the combination of all spectrums, while black is the absence of light. Its is black that was considered not to be a colour.

Re:White?

[war4peace]

Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Re:White?

[AmiMoJo]

Are you sure you are not confusing the old and the new. The old design has the red bar at the top, and the clear list of emails. The new one adds some random labels to the list at the top, more crap I need to scroll past.

The old design had clear delimiting lines between mails and it was really obvious where the buttons and other UI elements were. Just the right amount of contrast.

The other big problem with email is lack of dark mode support. HTML mail is almost always a white background.

Re: White?

[Anonymous Coward]

Time for a new protest movement? Black pixels matter.

Re:White?

[Anonymous Coward]

Amen.

Re:White?

[PolygamousRanchKid]

It fits with their new motto:

"Do the white thing."

Re: White?

[Anonymous Coward]

People are white only when they are stored in morgue.

Re:White?

[jellomizer]

As display technology improves the less we need to use everything it can offer, and because the technology is so common place there is no need to show it off.

Early Video games and applications really tried to push the capabilities of the display technology of the time. Which first consisted of two subgroups of upgrades.
1. High Resolution displays (that had a goal of a clean 80 column display)
2. More color display, lower resolution but more colors.

The High Resolution monitors were usually monochrome (as Color bleeding was a problem, making text blurry and hard to read), with tall rectangular pixels because the text needed to be more narrow.

Color displays for the longest time on PC supported all their colors with a low resolution 320x200 screen.
Now these color applications from the 1980's - around the late 1990's really tried to use everything the display could handle.
If you game used EGA graphics (or less common composite CGA), all 16 of these colors will need to be used. there we see a lot of 3d ish buttons because you had white, gray and dark gray. and two shades of Blue,Green, Cyan, Red, Magenta and Yellow(brown). Apps of the early 90's especially were very colorful.
With VGA displays 256 colors games were excessively colorful. Primary just to show off the graphics. Around the mid-late 90's with the introduction of the high resolution SVGA displays We started seeing a more subdued approach to graphics design.

Now the SVGA 1024x768 was a long time standard, and higher resolutions just meant a bigger monitor. We have been on the around 70dpi displays for about 20 years, and they are still popular today. Now this is rather good resolution. However we are getting 4k displays, even on small devices like phones.

These now called ultra high resolution displays allow for very crisp easy to to read smaller text to be displayed on the screen. Giving more space for white space to show a separation vs. using a hard line or change of color to compensate with an unnatural small margin area. The OLED displays with near true black and bright white, really makes the smaller text pop and become more easy to read then before, so that allows for all the white space more easier to read and for people to comprehend the layout.

Re: White?

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a reason iOS is popular with the striving middle-to-upper middle class who are striving to appear affluent.

Re: White?

[Anonymous Coward]

You're an idiot. See below for the actual answer.

Re: White?

[pgmrdlm]

blow me bigot. I am upper middle class. And I like android. I have nothing against Apple, just don't like it. And unlike you bigot, I don't don't degrade people that have other preferences than my own. Maybe asshole, if you wasn't such a bigot. You wouldn't have to hide behind AC. Are you afraid bigot?

Re:White?

[Spazmania]

Every gmail UI redesign Google has ever done has decreased the contrast of the elements on the screen. Every time I hear its updating again, I fully expect a "pure" interface that's simply white on white.

Re:White?

[Anonymous Coward]

#GMAILSOWHITE #BLACKFONTSMATTER

-- Spike Lee, 2019

Lameness filter, blah blah... jesus christ slashdot, what fucking century are we in?

Modern UX design

[ArhcAngel]

The current crop of UX designers seem to be following the philosophy of listen to what your audience wants and make sure to avoid that at all cost. We've gone from vivid intricate icons to stick figures in shades of grey!

Re:Modern UX design

[bill_mcgonigle]

When all color and darkness has been removed it will be elegant and perfect.

Re:Modern UX design

[I75BJC]

I agree! Gmail was "perfect" for my email habits and likes but Gmail insists on changing things on a regular basis. It gets worse (shittier) with each "new" "improvement". In past years, I could keep the old version that I liked but I guess too many people, like me, thought the old version was good enough not to want to change. Then Gmail started forcing me to change whether I wanted to or not. Thankfully, on my iOS devices, I can skip the changes by staying with iOS' own Mail application. Gmail had a wonderful product years ago but they keep trying to improve it by making it worse. Yuck!

Re:Modern UX design

[Dutch Gun]

It's no good. I can still vaguely see some shapes of some controls, and there's an unsightly pile of black text to the left. The UX designers need to keep polishing until everything is a pure, beautiful, white form, unblemished by unsightly distractions.

Re:Modern UX design

[Anonymous Coward]

this horrible trend isn't limited to web or smartphone 'apps' either.

game ui (even in shooters and looters) is going through the same clusterfuck redesigns, too.

Re:Modern UX design

[antdude]

It's not just Gmail too. Look at YouTube as well. :(

Re: Modern UX design

[Anonymous Coward]

They forced me to upgrade from Gmail to inbox on my phone now I'm getting messages saying I'm going to be forced back to Gmail. Google's biggest problem is they're always changing. No consistency. This isn't about not embracing good change, it's just they seem to have no fuckng idea what they're doing. Google +, hangouts and all the other chat apps they've released and switched and flicked between since Google talk. I was a regular hangouts user and the whole debabcleeant I stopped using their platform. Partly because I just found it easier to use something more stable and partly because everyone else I use left in droves. I currently have 3 people I could actually talk to and get a response in hangouts and we all prefer telegram. Of course there are privacy reasons we all left Google for encrypted chats, sick of having our data farmed and used against us to try a different steal our money without even knowing, but the lack of stability certainly had more of an effect.

Re:Modern UX design

[mentil]

Still... un... clean!...
*continues frantically scrubbing the UI as it bleeds*

Re:Modern UX design

[Anonymous Coward]

Skeumorphic design works on the same principal as Japanese Anime; you fill in as little as humanly possible, and expect the brain to fill in the rest. Whatever you wants to see, you see. It's a marketing gimmick. You get the end user to believe whatever they want to believe about how the interface works and what the software does.

The problem with this design is it is not geared towards normal use of computers; good solid UI principles were well defined in the 90's. Meantime, anyone who's focusing on details or efficiency has to either slowly go insane mentally filling in lines and boxes everywhere to figure out where crap is actually at and how it works, or gets worn down to the point they stop caring. It's a "Nudging" tactic. Nudging, by the way, is designed one of two things but always with the same objective; either it's designed to wear you down to the point it forces you into a decision or it's designed to turn you into a literal science experiment with the singular objective of alleviating the guilty engineer of any guilt by alliowing them to call what is somewhere between engineering that ought to be career suicide and criminal behaivour, professional software development. All the UX Components in the world and you choose to not use them.

Exactly nobody thinks Skuemorphic design is superior. But when you're trying to sell idiots and the uninitiated end users, it's really important to get the marketing and communication right; to get all those little subtle lies and misdirections, nudges and so forth to get human beings to slide gently down the sales funnel into your gullet. They've polluted the internet with cheap wordpress sites that say absolutely nothing about the software; they remind me of porn sites in the early 2000's, an endless maze of links one site to the other, and you could waste hours looking for something specific and not find what you were looking for. And that's how they'll be remembered.

I have literally gotten to the point that at sales meetings, as an IT manager, where I see a Skuemorhphic UI design for an app and some company's trying to sell me, the first question I ask outright is "Why pick Skuemorphism?" and if they don't have a damn good practical answer or don't know what Skuemorphism is, my next question is "Why would I give a bunch of hucksters money?". Sad part is, A lot of the time its a young kid pitching a product that doesn't know anything about what the executive management is actually selling. When they put pictures of people on the front page of a brochure, that's the people they are looking for which says volumes about the what the executive thinks of their customers.

Selling medicine? Put a scared old women on the front because that's who you want to flock to the sales funnel.

Selling Trucks or Machinery? Put white men on the cover in work clothing doing something heroic-looking with the equipment, because we want to find people who will focus on value instead of capital because all sales is relative value. You sell manuer to farmers in bulk for a buck a hundred pounds, you sell the same manuer to the home gardener as miracle-grow ten bucks a pound.

Selling Software? Put an african lady with a fuzzy afro and a skin tone that could pass for a white tan or pitch dark black because we're racists and think africans and politically correct whites in a positions of authority are guillable and will sign over money and not ask too many questions while leading their company to ruin. The PC Croud is not known for being practical and are often quite guillable; Christians 500 years ago fell for the "yes" trick. You're faithful to god? Yes. You love Jesus? Yes. You want to sell the farm and buy a (fake) gold encrusted leather bound bible and live a life of piety? Yes. Answer yes over and over until it's a habit, then ask the consent question. Except it's "You believe in equality?" Yes. "You believe in womens rights?" Yes. "Will you buy this software made by a women-owned company (without knowing the requirements)?". Same deal. Guillable is guillable.

Re:Modern UX design

[serviscope_minor]

We've gone from vivid intricate icons to stick figures in shades of grey!

Didn't you RTFS? It's going to be stick figures in shades of white. On a white background.

Re: Modern UX design

[Anonymous Coward]

Get help

Re:Modern UX design

[thegarbz]

of listen to what your audience wants

You are not an audience. You are but an insignificant voice in a vast sea of consumers who happily continue using products that these UX designers produce and therefore clearly they must be doing something right because profits aren't down.

Nothing will change from isolated complaints, not when people keep using the software.

 

Re:Modern UX design

[butzwonker]

If design would only be the only problem. Why all this browser-based crap? I haven't encountered any "web app" yet that was better or even on a par with some corresponding desktop app. Most even fail to have basic keyboard shortcuts.

For a while everything was looking fine. We had powerful high-end desktop apps with unlimited undo, customizable shortcuts and menus, and local storage of your valuable information. Then this web madness started and everything reverted to pre 1990 standards. Why?

Re:Modern UX design

[DontBeAMoran]

First of all, it's spelled Skeuomorphic, not Skuemorhphic.
Secondly, Skeuomorphic design is the opposite of the current trend.

Re:Modern UX design

[DontBeAMoran]

If the forces are pushed on everyone without any choice, of course everyone will keep using it. That's not a good metric because they don't have a fucking choice.

Re:Modern UX design

[DontBeAMoran]

Because people are too stupid to do their own backups, because cloud storage means you can access your files from anywhere, because web apps (should) work on almost every device you own that has a modern web browser and because it's easier to share and work on the same files with other people.

For some things, though, I think the same way as you. Every time I start Sketchup, it's trying to push me to use "Sketchup Free" (a browser-based thing) instead of my desktop app. Fuck that!

Re:Modern UX design

[apoc.famine]

I can't. By the time everything on the page loads so I can interact with the content I've given up and have gone somewhere else. I swear youtube loads like websites used to on dial-up.

Re:Modern UX design

[butzwonker]

I forgot to mention that for a while it also looked as if every application would also be P2P enabled to exchange information on a decentralized network. It worked! And now we're now back to square one with centralized client/server architecture like in the 90s.

So include that into my rant. There are strong, dark forces against personal computing...

Re:Modern UX design

[mjwx]

The current crop of UX designers seem to be following the philosophy of listen to what your audience wants and make sure to avoid that at all cost. We've gone from vivid intricate icons to stick figures in shades of grey!

The problem is that they are "UX designers", not HMI engineers.

UX is a bollocks field made up by Apple to explain why their interfaces were contrary to HMI and HCI wisdom.

Until companies get designers out and engineers in, we'll continue to have horrible interfaces foisted on us... And to be honest, Google are the least worst offenders here.

Re:Modern UX design

[Anonymous Coward]

These aren't the product of the UX team, who *do* perform studies and make recommendations, usually application by application. Those recommendations are then ignored when senior management hires a buddy graphic "designer" who used to be a print publisher who overrides all that work with a new "Paper" policy for all applications and websites. Project Managers then get promotions based on how fast they comply with the policy. UX and software engineering have little to do with this.

Re:Modern UX design

[SiliconJesus]

How much of this is the vast technical resources Alphabet / Google have accumulated over the years needing something to do. Everyone wants to make their mark and instead of incremental improvements, they rely on massive change to stake out a claim. Youtube's problem is largely chasing dollars and wanting to rebrand themselves as TV instead fo what made Youtube great.

Re:Modern UX design

[Tablizer]

A found a box of my old clothes. Other than size issues (shuddup), they came back in style. The new UX/UI's resemble the original Mac. In a few years, the Windows 95 look may be back too. And then the flashing Geocities look with rotating logos... Gag me with a groovy spoon.

Re:Modern UX design

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it interesting that it has taken the recent round of "whitening" to be closely followed by "dark" modes for most apps now (app-specific, not a global setting, not supported by all apps, in weird/inconsistent places). It's almost as if somebody got pissed off enough by somebody else asking to make these changes and wanted to make it AS BLINDING AS POSSIBLE so that a few more people would request a dark theme mode, so they could finally get back to the good old days of Android 4 and before, where one could actually load the settings screen and some apps in the dark without vision loss.

Re: Modern UX design

[kiki320]

Youtube's problem is largely chasing dollars and wanting to rebrand themselves as TV instead fo what made Youtube great. https://xender.pro/ https://discord.software/ https://omegle.onl/

Re:Modern UX design

[Anonymous Coward]

Get an extension to spoof your useragent on a site-by-site basis and tell youtube you're running an old browser (FF 35 seems to be old enough). It'll give you the old, superior version.

Thank God for IMAP

[Kunedog]

n/t

Re:Thank God for IMAP

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but at what cost?

Re:Thank God for IMAP

[Anonymous Coward]

Unfortunately, gmail doesn't really do true IMAP. It presents a IMAP facade that has a number of issues if you start to use IMAP with folders. For one, it does mail de-duplication. Which means you only ever get one copy of your email. If you use IMAP filters that rely on multiple copies that won't work. I am subscribed to some mailing lists with cross-posting and that always screws things up because mail threads are missing mails in one IMAP folder or the other. Your own messages to mailing lists don't show up either, because you already have a copy in your Sent Mail.

I will take a true IMAP server any day over Gmail.

Re:Thank God for IMAP

[Anonymous Coward]

Everything.

Re:Thank God for IMAP

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, but I HATE going back to an email system where to put something in two places at once, it needs to be two copies, this just doubles my work.

Labels are superior to folders.

words

[Falos]

It's a bunch of shit no one needed. I say that without looking, yet without doubt apology or shame.

Well, "no one needed" is not 100% accurate. Can't forget designers who have to look busy at least once a quarter lest people start asking what they cost.

Is it a Flash when it doesn't?

[Pitawg]

This is the affirmative response to "Your face is too dim in the front facing camera when the screen is dark."

The lighter the screen/alternative-lighting, the better the image of you and the room you are in.

This is not a surprise. Just because you were not using the front camera does not mean it has to go to waste.

Re:Is it a Flash when it doesn't?

[drinkypoo]

This is the affirmative response to "Your face is too dim in the front facing camera when the screen is dark."

In gmail? Why, so they can monitor your expression while they read your email?

Re:Is it a Flash when it doesn't?

[Pitawg]

What better way to determine the reception to their allowed ad mail? Giving feedback can enhance any ad-based revenue stream on both sides.

Additional revenue from a location determining AI being fed images while viewing email could not hurt either.

Re:Is it a Flash when it doesn't?

[Pitawg]

If I had an AI that could determine, or at least guess well, at the reaction to any number of messages from friends, family, co-workers, or even complete strangers, being given thousands of examples every minute as an example pool, would it help to have a little extra lighting on the user?

Re: Your skin is your uniform.

[Anonymous Coward]

My voice is my passport. Verify me.

End of line

Hitchhiker's

[Anonymous Coward]

Somebody should be an easy +5 Funny by doing the Hitchhiker's GUide quote. 50 year old man-children with a fetish for childish shit of their past would love it.

GOD DAMN YES

[Anonymous Coward]

THAT"S WHAT I NEED! Instead of using color and shapes to help me distinguish various functions and areas on the screen, just make it all white on white with white trim. ITS SO SIMPLE A CHILD COULD DO IT!

Re:GOD DAMN YES

[DontBeAMoran]

Virtual +1 funny, I hope a well-known stand-up comedian uses that in his show, maybe Google, Microsoft and Apple will suddenly wake up and go back to sane user interfaces.

Re:he's goin down

[Anonymous Coward]

Why you hating on Trump so much. Trump's the man!

Re:he's goin down

[Anonymous Coward]

Racist trump abused his power to make google turn their gmail app all white just like how trump wants america

How Much You Paying Teh G?

[Anonymous Coward]

Pay for it or take it all in and swallow.

Re:How Much You Paying Teh G?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a funny statement, because the "paid for" enterprise versions of gapps have the same limitations...

Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Text is not white. Fail.

Traditional UX design: Change things

[aberglas]

Whatever it was, make it different.

This is not only a method that ensures work for UI designers. It genuinely works. Most people will recognize "new" vs "old", and want "new". "New" just looks better than "old". Always.

Eventually UIs will have white text on pale grey backgrounds before the next crop of designers develops green text on a black background and we will all know that this new green screen design is the pinnacle of novel user experience development.

Re:Traditional UX design: Change things

[halivar]

No, designers are already all-in on green text. Users track green "calls to action" faster than any other color, and feel better about the action being the right one. You ever notice how those fake download sites all have big, green, "Download Now" buttons? It's psychology. (disclaimer: I have run too many of these damn UI/UX user trials)

Re: Traditional UX design: Change things

[Anonymous Coward]

Man except that colour of uniques in diablo.

Still gives me adrenaline when I see it.

Re:Traditional UX design: Change things

[Anonymous Coward]

(The green screen is referring to the way terminals looked in the 1980s. I.e. back to the future.)

Re:Traditional UX design: Change things

[DontBeAMoran]

I don't know why modern UX designers are so afraid of colours, lines and borders.

A good UX concept for buttons and messages is to use the same colours as traffic lights and road signs:
GREEN = let's go (it's safe to use)
YELLOW = warning/be careful (are you sure you want to use this / it's a warning, I need to read it)
RED = stop (something has happened that made everything stop, you have to read it)
WHITE on BLUE = information, you might find it useful to read it

Can you imagine if traffic lights and road signs changed every few years, for change's sake?

The conventions above had been true almost as long as computers have been able to display those colours, until those new morans came along about a decade ago.

So, fuck you, modern UX designers. Just because it's been used for decades doesn't mean it's not good anymore. Interfaces are meant to be used by people, not printed on a poster to hang in a fucking museum of art.

Re: Traditional UX design: Change things

[Anonymous Coward]

Only the plebs had greenscreens. The elite had amber phosphor.

Re:Traditional UX design: Change things

[halivar]

It's over-reactionary anti-skeuomorphism. Designers collectively woke up, realized wood grain and 3D-contoured buttons have no place in UI, and proceeded to lose their collective minds.

Re:Racists

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm basically deciding to not update anything Google again if I can help it so I can stop getting these fucking dumbass UX changes.

Not everyone is happy.

[fahrbot-bot]

Hotblack Desiato’s and his band Disaster Area would prefer an all black on black interface ...

Re:Not everyone is happy.

[acroyear]

glad i'm not the only one who thought about that reference

Re:Not everyone is happy.

[serviscope_minor]

glad i'm not the only one who thought about that reference

Same! The description of the control system (i.e. user interface) in the ship was marvellous. It wasn't supposed to be a guide though.

Whitewashed!

[Anonymous Coward]

Gmail web app is a beat down. Can't tell what I am sending or where to click to do anything. Too much whiteness everywhere washing everything out.

with respect to Douglas Adams:

[acroyear]

"It’s the wild color scheme that freaks me out,’ said Zaphod, whose love affair with the app had lasted almost three minutes after the download. 'Every time you try and operate these weird white controls that are labeled in white on a white background, a little white light lights up in white to let you know you’ve done it.’"

Re: he's goin down

[Anonymous Coward]

Now you're just being homophobic.

WTF Google?!

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently you have too many UI designers on hand. Let them go, please and f*up someone else's design. It used to be UI designers had to be actually *good* at their job. Nowadays they are just everywhere. At my company they are now beefing up every stupid email and powerpoint presentation for no apparent value. Sure all is looking a bit nicer, a bit more polished.

In reality however *nobody was asking for it*.

It's NOT OK to be White

[Anonymous Coward]

At least on OLED and other screens with rich blacks.

But when the poor blacks are around, it's definitely OK to be white.

Cringe

[cowdung]

I always cringe at Google redesigns.. I thought Gmail was just fine when it came out. Then they started messing with the UI. It wasn't an improvement.. now things are harder to see, they don't stand out as much. Now they're at it again. I worry.

Same goes for Chrome. They seem to come out with something really good in the beginning but then they want to "improve" it and they just mess it up.

Re:Cringe

[Anonymous Coward]

now things are harder to see, they don't stand out as much. Now they're at it again. I worry.

and slower, don't forget slower.

the web version used to load and the compose button would be instantly available. Now I have to count to three with my hands off the mouse before I start sending an email.

Re:he's goin down

[Anonymous Coward]

FOUR MORE YEARS!

I can't be the only one :(

[Fly Swatter]

I can't be the only one that finds a dark background and white text easier on the eyes. It is just more comfortable. Modern UIs are like staring at a bright light bulb all day. I guess they are fine outdoors and under bright lights, but in normal inside lighting conditions, especially in a home all white is just annoying. Paper products are like this because paper is inherently light, and reflected light works well there. Computers are shining lights into your eyes, it is a completely different medium - I wish manufacturers would realize this - they killed off paper now stop trying to imitate it.

Re:I can't be the only one :(

[unkmar]

Agreed!
That is why I stuck with Android 4.4 for so long. To avoid changing to all white backgrounds. Apple made those iPhones with plane, simple, flat early 90's style designs but rounded. Then Google just had to have some of that sleek and new look blinding bright white background while trying to read in bed interface in their Android OS. Besides, who doesn't want to waste battery power on bright white displays. That easy on the eyes, high contrast white is just so easy to see. I feel like I need to where sunglasses to use my phone in bed at night. <bad lyrics>Blinded by the light, wrapped up in a douche of an Applie U.I.<badlyrics>

No, I'm not a comedian. I just have good wit sometimes. You're welcome.

PS: Some sort of update pushed that blaring white crap anyway sigh. Even after I resisted the update to Android 5. I Installed Nova Launcher and at least got most of my sanity back. Freaking middle home button is still glaring white though. :(

Re:I can't be the only one :(

[AmiMoJo]

Back in the 80s when GUIs were new we used to have grey backgrounds. That provided enough, but not too much contrast with black text, and allowed white text for highlights, and most colours worked fine too. With black or white backgrounds there are always some colours that don't work (e.g. black/blue, white/yellow).

Re:I can't be the only one :(

[Anonymous Coward]

If you feel like you're looking at a bright lamp, turn the screen brightness down. A white screen should not be much brighter than a white sheet of paper next to the screen. The reason why black on white is preferred is that people can usually see better that way. Unless you have perfect vision, a brighter environment allows for sharper vision, because the pupil dilates in dark environments. White on black has a lower overall brightness. The wider pupil exposes more of an imperfect lens and you get an image that is not as sharp as black on white text.

Re:I can't be the only one :(

[jez9999]

I'm probably in a minority here, but I disagree with this. For some reason white text on a black background makes my eyes strain after a while. I prefer dark text on light.

Re:I can't be the only one :(

[swillden]

I'm probably in a minority here, but I disagree with this. For some reason white text on a black background makes my eyes strain after a while. I prefer dark text on light.

You're actually in the non-vocal majority.

Re:I can't be the only one :(

[DontBeAMoran]

That's because there's too much contrast between the two. Try darker text on a black background. After you found the proper contrast, try different colours. Dark green on black is quite easy on the eyes.

Re:I can't be the only one :(

[Anonymous Coward]

The physiological reason is that white text on a black background makes your pupils dilate more because it's an overall darker picture. This amplifies any vision defects you may have and that causes the eye strain. A (reasonably) bright environment is easier on the eyes because contracted pupils to some extent reduce the effect of myopia, astigmatism and other imperfections of the lens.

Re:I can't be the only one :(

[Anonymous Coward]

I am curious about this, since I use both (where forced to use black on white) for much of the day and I have no issues other than annoyance at the brightness and related issues such as people coming up with crazy ideas that there should be an "HDR" mode that works around the fact that making backgrounds full white limits the normal maximum brightness that might otherwise be nice to exceed in pictures.

Anyway, do you wear glasses? Contacts? Is it perhaps a case of white on black showing more blurriness or astigmatism or something along these lines?

Black on white certainly helps to cover some visual issues because blurry black on white turns into more of a grey on white, as opposed to black on white which shows any blur or focus problems on top of the otherwise-black areas. Also, the iris may close slightly with bright sources which will also cover up some optical issues by reducing the aperture (including some issues such as contacts with too small an optical correction area).

Re:Racists

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't worry, every Android phone ever published will get these new applications via force pushed updates. Thankfully the security updates are stopped after two years, so they do not break the usability of phone.

Re: he's goin down

[Anonymous Coward]

No with the Maga hat controversy Google realised they had to get away from rainbows before that became a symbol of hatred because we know the rainbow crowd is just as likely to support death camps for their cause.

White is right!

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently Google thinks so...

Because Inbox

[Anonymous Coward]

Google remembered that they're turning off Inbox in a couple of months I guess.

I just hope they add reminders to the, uh, inbox. That was super useful. Also, more cards! All the cards!

If it ain't broke ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah the "google touch" whereby every improvement makes the thing shittier. Gmail is no exception it seems.

Re: Racists

[Anonymous Coward]

It's true. I can't recall the last time a Google update actually improved the software. Often enough the updates make it worse.

Professional Designers

[Anonymous Coward]

When GMail first came out it was an unimportant product developed but a small team of really good engineers.

But then it became important, and managed by MBAs who used UX professionals to make the design trendy.

The good engineers cashed in their stock options and are either in a start up or retired.

Yay! All white! Zero contrast is what we need!

[Chas]

Because why the hell should we be able to have clear and concise visual navigation aids?

Pfft! What is this? 2018?

So light, it's almost white!

[Anonymous Coward]

What a bunch of absolute fucking idiots must work at Google. The ONLY usable version of GMail is the HTML version, which is incredibly hard to find and make permanent in the first place - all because the twats responsible for the shit that is 'Material Design' know that MOST people hate their shit design!
It's just beyond belief - a multi-billion dollar company that's involved in websites can't allow its customers to ADJUST the colours on their own GMail account, so that it looks the way they want?

Definitely

[Anonymous Coward]

Now, it's starting to look like a cheap ass, worthless 90's web site that was poorly coded in FrontPage 97...

THAT'S RACIST!!!!

[The123king]

*insert sarcmark here*

Crunched it, now stretched it

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Back in the day when smart phones were new, so many web sites scrunched their regular web page designed for 15 inch displays into those 3.5 inch screens. Now, they are designing their sites for 6 inch phones and are stretching the same thing on 24 inch displays.

Nothing to show what are clickable and what are not. There is no shortage of screen real estate, still the site comes with minimal info on huge fonts.

Re:Crunched it, now stretched it

[DontBeAMoran]

Also, you need to rotate your desktop display 90 degrees to view the page in portrait mode.

Re:Crunched it, now stretched it

[Anonymous Coward]

Nothing like viewing a website on a desktop with cryptic icons and no fucking tool tips. I understand tool tips on mobile probably make little to no sense, but come the fuck on.

The War on Usability

[Anonymous Coward]

History may never know who fired the first shot in a war that would ultimately end the Web. It all started with the elimination of borders between related groups of information. Then it extended to the removal of any contrasting colors. Finally, it ended with website looking like someone just vomited up a glob of unverified information and said, 'meh, it looks good enough. Let the user sort it out.'

Re:The War on Usability

[DontBeAMoran]

This would make a good mockumentary.

Re:The War on Usability

[Anonymous Coward]

No truer word ever spoken: "It all started with the elimination of borders between related groups of information".

Aah, but oftentimes the borders are still there, but almost impossible to see! So it REALLY confuses your brain.

And what about the joys of virtually invisible scrollbars, which are the same colour as the scrollbar channel? Or better still, ones which change colour to become MORE visible AFTER you hover over them! We can't have coloured, easy to see scrollbars, that would be too easy!

The entire surround of my monitor is covered with little stickers of photographs of cats, and the top has numerous cat figures stuck all over it - I never, ever notice them. Anybody coming to my desk for the first time always immediately points out the stickers and figures. The same applies to the cretinous designers who hate what they claim are 'distractions' (i.e. absolutely vital parts of the program).

What in the fuck, Google.

[Anonymous Coward]

You make phones. Surely you know what white pixels do to battery efficiency. What do you want your users doing, charging their phones or actually fucking using them? Retards. This is what happens when you replace all the engineers with privilege checkers.

How many generations of humanity will it take before we end our obsession with making screens look like paper?

Americans with Disabilities Act violation

[Anonymous Coward]

Somebody needs to file an ADA claim and stop this bullshit. These terrible UI designs violate the basic premise of the ADA.

design

[Anonymous Coward]

What no snowflake complain about what privilege and the racist move by google?

Re: Your skin is your uniform.

[DontBeAMoran]

Just shut up and go buy yourself a new pair of sneakers.

YOU CAN'T SPELL!!!

[DontBeAMoran]

*insert proper way of writing sarcasm here*

Re:YOU CAN'T SPELL!!!

[The123king]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/...

Re:YOU CAN'T SPELL!!!

[DontBeAMoran]

Damn you, The123king! I don't come here to learn stuff!

Zaphod would love it

[Anonymous Coward]

'Every time you try and operate these weird white controls that are labeled in white on a white background, a little white light lights up in white to let you know you’ve done it.’

SMTP

[DogsBollocks]

Why use the app? Personally i just use Gmail with SMTP from any email client, forget the App.

It's to save on bandwidth

[rsilvergun]

White UIs are the easiest to view/read when you're building everything with simple CSS. Companies like building everything with simple CSS because you can do an entire UI in text, no images. For a big company that's a lot of bandwidth.

Jokes on them

[rsilvergun]

I'm red/green color blind.

Seriously UI designers, stop color coding crap so much, especially in games. I had to give up my dream of 1CCing Raiden IV because I kept switching to the wrong powerup.

It's like, how much more black could it be

[rsilvergun]

and the answer is none. None more black.

Not Fit For Purpose - And Knowing It

[Anonymous Coward]

Not Fit For Purpose - And Knowing It

"All-White Redesign"?

[Locke2005]

Are they trying to make google more popular with Trump supporters?

UX tax

[Anonymous Coward]

Worked with a UX team for 5+ years as a software developer on a 40 person project. UX used up 1 to 2 developers for the entire year for all of the minor minor chrome they wanted in a large web site over the 5 years.

Finally, our management got UX to do the html / css related development and would not go forward with any new web page until UX handed over working HTML and CSS for the new page.

The amount of shimming and fine toothed chrome wrapping greatly stopped once UX had to deliver their own work and not infeasible PDF mock ups.

No changes here!

[sootman]

"basic HTML" mode FTW.

It's time to go back

[Anonymous Coward]

This new interface is garbage, and the email list/content is even more smaller than before.
I just reverted back to the html version. It's so much better.