My phone is a dual-core 1.2GHz A9, so a 1GHz A8 and all the other gubbins seems rather worthless to me, but the larger display is nice.
How about selling a 'dock' for the phone that happens to be a 7" or 10" display that uses the HDMI portion of the dock output of the phone to drive the display, and some more battery of course? I.e., a tablet without the innards - just the display and touchscreen (that can use the USB portion of the dock).
I wrote "Why not hovering the mouse over the icon - that makes a lot more sense in a graphics UI.".
So it does that. Great. Exactly what I wrote would make sense. I don't recall Office 2007 actually doing that, but maybe it just was having a hissy fit at the time or I've buried the memories of using it.
I'm amazed that you determined all that from me writing that needing to have specific knowledge (about the 'alt' key - I presume the 'menu' key on the keyboard does the same too) about one thing means all the rest you have written. Ultimately it isn't the most obvious thing in the world to pick up if you haven't used DOS twenty years ago - and that is what I am commenting on. Well done for assuming that I didn't know that 'alt' did that, I was merely challenging the concept.
And I'm not commenting on how the fucking word processor application is implemented. Auto-detecting the user's intention is a good thing, sheesh.
And yes, I do use styles, both paragraph level and character level. In fact I do believe that allowing free-style formatting is annoying, especially when you are trying to apply a common look and feel across documents.
I think the Ribbon concept is good actually, even after having to use Office 2007 for a few years. But Microsoft seems to want to futz with the concept until it actually looks really really messy, and rather than being a clear interface there are dozens of small icons and UI elements that make it appear cluttered. Just look at the screenshots - especially the top left of the window, and then try to claim again that this implementation is good, intuitive and easy to pick up.
Having had the misfortune to use Office 2007 for several years, not every common function on the ribbon showed a shortcut when you hovered the mouse over it. If Microsoft have added this - or there is some setting somewhere that activates this - then that's good.
It seems there are a lot of Microsoft Windows defenders here who actually think that the Windows UI is good and intuitive (or easy to learn). I think some of them went on to design KDE interfaces.
If you don't know that 'alt' shows menus (but the keyboard has a menu key, wha?) then you out of luck. Glad that the setting is so easy to find as well, and defaults to the one that hides the keyboard shortcut from the user until they press the magic key that isn't the menu key.
it IS obvious to anyone who has been using Windows for years
Epic Fail.
Anyway, I never wrote anything there against the concept of the ribbon. I do actually think the idea is good, although I'm not particularly fond of how Microsoft has implemented it (possibly because of things around the ribbon that are terrible, like the Office 2007 app icon thing). And it will be especially useful for touch interfaces.
However if people weren't using menus before then people obviously needed some training - just like the 'alt' key. Then again I think some people need training on the fact that there are keyboard shortcuts in the first place. So for them having some big buttons to mash is good and they'll never go any further in the computer interaction.
And you can't claim that Explorer Ribbon UI is good in any way. Adequate, maybe. Lots of stuff to learn around it - icons on the title bar, menus on the title bar, tabs next to not-tabs, and so on.
It did nothing. Then again I'm using Chrome on a Mac.
In a file explorer, double clicking opens files. Okay, the ribbons not the file pane, fair enough. Still, it's a fair leap in logic to think "how do I close this ribbon? I know, I'll double click on it".
To be fair, the carat icon, oddly placed as it is, would obviously be the more obvious action to take. Therefore you don't even need a double click action that works on unused portions of the Ribbon.
Fair point. It just looks fricking weird with that "Library Tools" thing. What is Library Tools anyway? And why is it in the title bar?
Never mind all the other icons that make the window look schizophrenic.
Dump the ribbon. Have a row of larger icons that consist of the top 10 to 15 actions that users do, with the option to have a text label beneath the icons. No need for a ribbon. Put all the other functionality into a menu or context sensitive pull down menu icon on the toolbar.
So take the Win 7 UI, move the file info pane and get rid of the file listing header, and you've got 28/29 files shown. The Ribbon is hiding 4 or 5 files.
You seriously think that's a good UI? Having to hit 'alt' on the keyboard to get some hint of things on the ribbon?
Firstly, it is something you have to learn. The fact you are writing that here to people who have used the ribbon and who don't know it, shows that it isn't intuitive nor obvious. That's a major fail right up.
Secondly, why alt? Why not hovering the mouse over the icon - that makes a lot more sense in a graphics UI. To know that you have to hit that special key to get hints is ludicrous. It's quite clearly not 'before your eyes'.
Menus worked. The learned thing to do there was to click on the menu name. At least that's a mouse driven action. It makes sense, then a menu appears, and hey, shortcuts.
you can just lear the key press for it, and use that.
At least menus tell you outright what the shortcut is.
I see no indication that these actions have a shortcut on the ribbon. Maybe if I hover over an icon it tells me? I doubt it because I don't recall that from Office 2007.
The thing is, the concept of a Ribbon isn't that bad. But I think that having a configurable toolbar (single row of larger icons) is better (not Office 2003 style toolbars full of tiny icons), when used with menus. I guess that's why Apple still uses that style of UI in many software products (e.g., Pages).
can't figure out how to minimize the Ribbon. Hint: You double click it.
Whoa, that makes no sense at all. That usually opens something.
Admit it - that Explorer Ribbon UI is one that has to be learned, and once learned you forget that it is actually a POS that looks like an icon factory shat on a UI.
The top left of the Explorer window is a morass of buttons and text things. I actually don't understand it.
The window title bar has several icons on it. First looks like the application icon - but it looks like a text document icon. Then there is a yellow icon - an open folder? After that there is a ticked document. What is that for? Then there is a downward arrow thing - does that bring up more menus?
THEN we get the application title - but oh no, it's not centred. There's a weird "Library Tools" thing encroaching from the ribbon into the window's title bar. Now I know that this happens in Office, e.g., "Table Tools", but it's just additional confusion here.
So under that we get the Ribbon. Great! The Ribbon is essentially an icongraphic tabbed representation of a menu. We can see the different Ribbons here - File, Home, Share, View, and that Library Tools - Manage one.
But... wait... File is dark blue. Home is white. The others are grey-blue. Which one is the active tab? Why is the other one a different appearance? Confusing!
Then there's a carat on the right hand side. Does that hide the ribbon? No idea.
The ribbon itself is a typical ribbon - common actions are bigger. I can see that it would be useful for a touch interface... but...
Oh look how small the Cut icon is - vindicating Apple's decision to not offer Cut as an option in Finder, perhaps?
What is a New Easy Access?
View is a separate Ribbon (I think) - no more quick view changes eh!
Oh, I can't continue. I have been presented with what appears to be a contender for worst UI of the decade, and it's only 2011.
So someone's written a slower, less featured clone of Minecraft in C++. I know it's merely a test, but it's slower, it has none of the niceties of Minecraft, and... oh who cares.
All that demo shows me is that Java really isn't the sloth that many others say it is.
Doesn't mean that Notch is a great programmer using great programming techniques and optimisations, but then again optimising too early isn't the best idea either.
Millions of people love the game for what it is. Some people just don't like the idea that a single developer has made millions, and not only that, but he's made millions from a simple idea written in Java.
Minecraft is a very graphics heavy game, despite the appearance. There are bazillions of vertices being transformed. It might not need an enthusiast graphics card to run, but it certainly requires something that was released in the past five years - and even then on the older / lower-end hardware you need to cut down on the view distance and graphical quality.
I guess the textures all fit within on-chip caches though!
Nope, why would I hate socialism? I'm not American, I don't associate socialism with communism, and there are many benefits to having a society take a wider holistic viewpoint to matters and to practice some form of utilitarianism in order to provide greatest good to society as a whole.
But hey, if the parents of these children were told they had the option of paying more taxes to keep the children in a five day week and were so scared about the tax word that they said no, then my sympathy for their situation has gone. I guess they can choose their own rip-off childcare provider now, or argue for 9/10 working or half-days on a Friday, etc.
There used to be a time in the UK when everything would shut down on Wednesday afternoons, presumably for economic reasons. That's the closest we ever got to a four day working week. A few more years of Tory power soon killed that off and again we all live to work to make money for corporate overlords...
It doesn't help if you want to be zoomed in though!
Pixelmator on the Mac has the same issue. Don't these application writers know that the border around the canvas is very important - especially when being off by one pixel on the image could mean clicking outside the window, and thus doing all sorts of annoying behaviour like bringing another window forward.
If you learned to read, you would see that when I write "and in many ways it just hasn't moved forward UI-wise" that's because I still use it, and that in many ways it just hasn't moved forward UI-wise.
I.e., I've used it frequently (i.e., multiple times a year) every year since 1998. I mentioned 1998 to emphasise that the UI issue isn't new.
I bet the lawyers kept a link to the download - which he didn't host.
He removed the link, but obviously the direct link still worked.
It's a complete failure on the lawyer's part to properly vet the case. I truly hope Real loses this case as they should, and then gets hit for punitive damages.
Why? Because obviously at some point they asked the guy to remove the software on his site (he wasn't hosting), so he removed the link (he has witnesses for this). Then they fucked up and got his computers confiscated and have ruined his life for a year or so. This is a malicious act abusing the legal system, and the Dutch courts should be having none of it.
I'm sure a few nice meals for the judge will adjust the result of the case, that 'linking' is equal to 'hosting' even if you linked innocently.
Yes, I have no faith in the legal system or the ability of people to fuck over other people just to satisfy their own greed.
It would seem safer for them to ready Android 3.x for the devices as those versions have explicitly been okayed, rather than tweak a single application whilst keeping the version that has been deemed infringing.
What it also means is that Apple can go after all Android 2.x devices to get them barred from sale, if they use the same gallery application.
All it means is that all the phone makers will be forced to provide 3.x updates for their phones - thus in the end helping the Android infrastructure move forward from 2.x.
The only issue is how ready for deployment the phone variant of Android 3.x is - I believe it is 3.2 that will have to be used, and it's probably that it won't be ready in 7 weeks time. But maybe the Android 3 gallery application can be back-ported to 2.3 initially.
What about the parents who used to be able to rely on their kids being in school so they could go out to work? Do they now need to arrange childcare for Fridays too?
This is just transferring a small cost to the system into a massive cost for society - unless you're in the childcare industry.
Does it now include effect layers and better text support?
I remember playing with Gimp in 1998, and in many ways it just hasn't moved forward UI-wise. It will be interesting to see how, err, gimped this single-window UI is.
Exactly. It's a right earned by proving ability to drive, and then not breaking the law (or being caught breaking the law) whilst driving - i.e., showing responsibility.
You've earned the right, it is not a privilege , unless you start talking about poverty / affordability of driving / etc, which is a different matter entirely in this situation (although worth discussing in its own right in a country that is so reliant on car travel).
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My phone is a dual-core 1.2GHz A9, so a 1GHz A8 and all the other gubbins seems rather worthless to me, but the larger display is nice.
How about selling a 'dock' for the phone that happens to be a 7" or 10" display that uses the HDMI portion of the dock output of the phone to drive the display, and some more battery of course? I.e., a tablet without the innards - just the display and touchscreen (that can use the USB portion of the dock).
I wrote "Why not hovering the mouse over the icon - that makes a lot more sense in a graphics UI.".
So it does that. Great. Exactly what I wrote would make sense. I don't recall Office 2007 actually doing that, but maybe it just was having a hissy fit at the time or I've buried the memories of using it.
I'm amazed that you determined all that from me writing that needing to have specific knowledge (about the 'alt' key - I presume the 'menu' key on the keyboard does the same too) about one thing means all the rest you have written. Ultimately it isn't the most obvious thing in the world to pick up if you haven't used DOS twenty years ago - and that is what I am commenting on. Well done for assuming that I didn't know that 'alt' did that, I was merely challenging the concept.
And I'm not commenting on how the fucking word processor application is implemented. Auto-detecting the user's intention is a good thing, sheesh.
And yes, I do use styles, both paragraph level and character level. In fact I do believe that allowing free-style formatting is annoying, especially when you are trying to apply a common look and feel across documents.
I think the Ribbon concept is good actually, even after having to use Office 2007 for a few years. But Microsoft seems to want to futz with the concept until it actually looks really really messy, and rather than being a clear interface there are dozens of small icons and UI elements that make it appear cluttered. Just look at the screenshots - especially the top left of the window, and then try to claim again that this implementation is good, intuitive and easy to pick up.
Having had the misfortune to use Office 2007 for several years, not every common function on the ribbon showed a shortcut when you hovered the mouse over it. If Microsoft have added this - or there is some setting somewhere that activates this - then that's good.
It seems there are a lot of Microsoft Windows defenders here who actually think that the Windows UI is good and intuitive (or easy to learn). I think some of them went on to design KDE interfaces.
If you don't know that 'alt' shows menus (but the keyboard has a menu key, wha?) then you out of luck. Glad that the setting is so easy to find as well, and defaults to the one that hides the keyboard shortcut from the user until they press the magic key that isn't the menu key.
it IS obvious to anyone who has been using Windows for years
Epic Fail.
Anyway, I never wrote anything there against the concept of the ribbon. I do actually think the idea is good, although I'm not particularly fond of how Microsoft has implemented it (possibly because of things around the ribbon that are terrible, like the Office 2007 app icon thing). And it will be especially useful for touch interfaces.
However if people weren't using menus before then people obviously needed some training - just like the 'alt' key. Then again I think some people need training on the fact that there are keyboard shortcuts in the first place. So for them having some big buttons to mash is good and they'll never go any further in the computer interaction.
And you can't claim that Explorer Ribbon UI is good in any way. Adequate, maybe. Lots of stuff to learn around it - icons on the title bar, menus on the title bar, tabs next to not-tabs, and so on.
It did nothing. Then again I'm using Chrome on a Mac.
In a file explorer, double clicking opens files. Okay, the ribbons not the file pane, fair enough. Still, it's a fair leap in logic to think "how do I close this ribbon? I know, I'll double click on it".
To be fair, the carat icon, oddly placed as it is, would obviously be the more obvious action to take. Therefore you don't even need a double click action that works on unused portions of the Ribbon.
Fair point. It just looks fricking weird with that "Library Tools" thing. What is Library Tools anyway? And why is it in the title bar?
Never mind all the other icons that make the window look schizophrenic.
Dump the ribbon. Have a row of larger icons that consist of the top 10 to 15 actions that users do, with the option to have a text label beneath the icons. No need for a ribbon. Put all the other functionality into a menu or context sensitive pull down menu icon on the toolbar.
So take the Win 7 UI, move the file info pane and get rid of the file listing header, and you've got 28/29 files shown. The Ribbon is hiding 4 or 5 files.
You seriously think that's a good UI? Having to hit 'alt' on the keyboard to get some hint of things on the ribbon?
Firstly, it is something you have to learn. The fact you are writing that here to people who have used the ribbon and who don't know it, shows that it isn't intuitive nor obvious. That's a major fail right up.
Secondly, why alt? Why not hovering the mouse over the icon - that makes a lot more sense in a graphics UI. To know that you have to hit that special key to get hints is ludicrous. It's quite clearly not 'before your eyes'.
Menus worked. The learned thing to do there was to click on the menu name. At least that's a mouse driven action. It makes sense, then a menu appears, and hey, shortcuts.
you can just lear the key press for it, and use that.
At least menus tell you outright what the shortcut is.
I see no indication that these actions have a shortcut on the ribbon. Maybe if I hover over an icon it tells me? I doubt it because I don't recall that from Office 2007.
The thing is, the concept of a Ribbon isn't that bad. But I think that having a configurable toolbar (single row of larger icons) is better (not Office 2003 style toolbars full of tiny icons), when used with menus. I guess that's why Apple still uses that style of UI in many software products (e.g., Pages).
can't figure out how to minimize the Ribbon. Hint: You double click it.
Whoa, that makes no sense at all. That usually opens something.
Admit it - that Explorer Ribbon UI is one that has to be learned, and once learned you forget that it is actually a POS that looks like an icon factory shat on a UI.
I'm looking at the screenshot right now. http://blogs.msdn.com/cfs-filesystemfile.ashx/__key/communityserver-blogs-components-weblogfiles/00-00-01-29-43-metablogapi/7245.Figure_2D00_8_2D002D002D00_Win8_2D00_Hero_5F00_449B7A36.png
The top left of the Explorer window is a morass of buttons and text things. I actually don't understand it.
The window title bar has several icons on it. First looks like the application icon - but it looks like a text document icon. Then there is a yellow icon - an open folder? After that there is a ticked document. What is that for? Then there is a downward arrow thing - does that bring up more menus?
THEN we get the application title - but oh no, it's not centred. There's a weird "Library Tools" thing encroaching from the ribbon into the window's title bar. Now I know that this happens in Office, e.g., "Table Tools", but it's just additional confusion here.
So under that we get the Ribbon. Great! The Ribbon is essentially an icongraphic tabbed representation of a menu. We can see the different Ribbons here - File, Home, Share, View, and that Library Tools - Manage one.
But ... wait ... File is dark blue. Home is white. The others are grey-blue. Which one is the active tab? Why is the other one a different appearance? Confusing!
Then there's a carat on the right hand side. Does that hide the ribbon? No idea.
The ribbon itself is a typical ribbon - common actions are bigger. I can see that it would be useful for a touch interface... but...
Oh look how small the Cut icon is - vindicating Apple's decision to not offer Cut as an option in Finder, perhaps?
What is a New Easy Access?
View is a separate Ribbon (I think) - no more quick view changes eh!
Oh, I can't continue. I have been presented with what appears to be a contender for worst UI of the decade, and it's only 2011.
So someone's written a slower, less featured clone of Minecraft in C++. I know it's merely a test, but it's slower, it has none of the niceties of Minecraft, and ... oh who cares.
All that demo shows me is that Java really isn't the sloth that many others say it is.
Doesn't mean that Notch is a great programmer using great programming techniques and optimisations, but then again optimising too early isn't the best idea either.
Millions of people love the game for what it is. Some people just don't like the idea that a single developer has made millions, and not only that, but he's made millions from a simple idea written in Java.
Minecraft is a very graphics heavy game, despite the appearance. There are bazillions of vertices being transformed. It might not need an enthusiast graphics card to run, but it certainly requires something that was released in the past five years - and even then on the older / lower-end hardware you need to cut down on the view distance and graphical quality.
I guess the textures all fit within on-chip caches though!
Nope, why would I hate socialism? I'm not American, I don't associate socialism with communism, and there are many benefits to having a society take a wider holistic viewpoint to matters and to practice some form of utilitarianism in order to provide greatest good to society as a whole.
But hey, if the parents of these children were told they had the option of paying more taxes to keep the children in a five day week and were so scared about the tax word that they said no, then my sympathy for their situation has gone. I guess they can choose their own rip-off childcare provider now, or argue for 9/10 working or half-days on a Friday, etc.
There used to be a time in the UK when everything would shut down on Wednesday afternoons, presumably for economic reasons. That's the closest we ever got to a four day working week. A few more years of Tory power soon killed that off and again we all live to work to make money for corporate overlords...
It doesn't help if you want to be zoomed in though!
Pixelmator on the Mac has the same issue. Don't these application writers know that the border around the canvas is very important - especially when being off by one pixel on the image could mean clicking outside the window, and thus doing all sorts of annoying behaviour like bringing another window forward.
If you learned to read, you would see that when I write "and in many ways it just hasn't moved forward UI-wise" that's because I still use it, and that in many ways it just hasn't moved forward UI-wise.
I.e., I've used it frequently (i.e., multiple times a year) every year since 1998. I mentioned 1998 to emphasise that the UI issue isn't new.
Idiot.
I propose removing the 'H' from HTTP and HTML.
I bet the lawyers kept a link to the download - which he didn't host.
He removed the link, but obviously the direct link still worked.
It's a complete failure on the lawyer's part to properly vet the case. I truly hope Real loses this case as they should, and then gets hit for punitive damages.
Why? Because obviously at some point they asked the guy to remove the software on his site (he wasn't hosting), so he removed the link (he has witnesses for this). Then they fucked up and got his computers confiscated and have ruined his life for a year or so. This is a malicious act abusing the legal system, and the Dutch courts should be having none of it.
I'm sure a few nice meals for the judge will adjust the result of the case, that 'linking' is equal to 'hosting' even if you linked innocently.
Yes, I have no faith in the legal system or the ability of people to fuck over other people just to satisfy their own greed.
It would seem safer for them to ready Android 3.x for the devices as those versions have explicitly been okayed, rather than tweak a single application whilst keeping the version that has been deemed infringing.
What it also means is that Apple can go after all Android 2.x devices to get them barred from sale, if they use the same gallery application.
All it means is that all the phone makers will be forced to provide 3.x updates for their phones - thus in the end helping the Android infrastructure move forward from 2.x.
The only issue is how ready for deployment the phone variant of Android 3.x is - I believe it is 3.2 that will have to be used, and it's probably that it won't be ready in 7 weeks time. But maybe the Android 3 gallery application can be back-ported to 2.3 initially.
What about the parents who used to be able to rely on their kids being in school so they could go out to work? Do they now need to arrange childcare for Fridays too?
This is just transferring a small cost to the system into a massive cost for society - unless you're in the childcare industry.
Does it now include effect layers and better text support?
I remember playing with Gimp in 1998, and in many ways it just hasn't moved forward UI-wise. It will be interesting to see how, err, gimped this single-window UI is.
I think you installed GimpShop by accident.
The OS supports SMB, just with an internal solution instead of Samba.
Apart from losing support for acting as a domain controller (1990's stuff), you get all the functionality that you need.
So what's the problem?
Exactly. It's a right earned by proving ability to drive, and then not breaking the law (or being caught breaking the law) whilst driving - i.e., showing responsibility.
You've earned the right, it is not a privilege , unless you start talking about poverty / affordability of driving / etc, which is a different matter entirely in this situation (although worth discussing in its own right in a country that is so reliant on car travel).