> and that is how it works with a scroll wheel too right? Correct.
Notice how we have "worked around" the UI problem - by having a (standard) hardware we can simply the UI:-)
That's why dedicated calculators are examples of great design -- you have dedicated buttons that enable / empower the user to focus on the task-orientated processes without thinking about how to do it.
Apple has always had its "flavor of the month" philosophy. I just wish they would fix their previous UI mistakes instead of tossing them out and making even more new ones!
> Microsoft's solution? Use your Volume License - except we don't have one. To be expected.:-( Sadly because all MS seems to care about profits, except when things get a little *too* inconvenient. Pity they can't seem to focus on streamlining the tasks users do; if they did they would automatically have profitability.
> On the other hand, Microsoft is kind of helping themselves out of my way. Agreed. Anything that gets people to consider alternatives, Linux, BSD, OSX, etc. is a good thing.:-)
It demonstrates the Apple designers are completely failing to understand Fitt's law. As I get older I don't want to waste time trying to "hit" a skinny UI element because the darn thing is too small. The size of a target is THE primary metric used to determine how efficient they can be with it.
It completely misses the whole point of UI. *IF* users could customize the width to *their* personal liking, THEN custom width scroll bars would be a good thing.
> And this is nothing compared to what Vista/Win7/Server2008 require to keep operational - an active Internet connection that regularly (every 7 days) checks the activation status of the assigned license. (And yes, I've had Server 2008 de-activate itself because of missing the sufficient checks).
Now *that* is total bullshit.
"You have added more RAM. Please authorize your computer with MS so you can continue to use it." When will people get fed up with this licensed not owned crap.
One of the nice things about OSX is that it doesn't have any of this DRM crap.
>> "When you have a "flat" UI you have no *secondary* _visual_ cues to tell you what you can interact with or not." >But isn't that self-evident with a tile-based interface? It depends, but usually the answer is no. What are the visual indicators that some tiles can be pushed, flipped, moved, or rotated? Using a different lighting on widgets you can interact with helps the user at the subliminal level that they can interact with them, and they don't need to spend too much time thinking about how to interact with them.
> Live tiles, or even live icons are a step up because at-a-glance info can be shown right on the tile. Agreed. Dynamic icons (if the visuals are kept to a minimal) are awesome!
i.e. The calendar app icon on the iPhone is a perfect example. It shows me the day of the week, Wednesday, and the numeric day in the month, 19.
The best option would be to give users control over what they want to be dynamic. i.e. Do you want the clock icon to be accurate, and/or the compass to be updated in real-time, or do you want to save battery life and show static icons.
> I also waste a lot more time reconfiguring Windows 7 to the way I like it than XP.
Completely agreed. That is one area where MS constantly fucks it up.
Some power users use spatial organization. i.e. Taskbar looks like: app1 web1,2 cmd1,2,3 app2 web4,5 cmd4,5,6 web6
Where cmd# is the command prompt, and web# is the web browser tab #.
By using the *position* of the app on the Taskbar it server to help as a visual mnemonic for different tasks.
Windows has 2 brain-dead options * Group no windows * Group all windows
Power users want: * Group *some* windows together
The second area MS screws up in Win 7 is UI scaling. In the Control Panel, Appearance & Personalization, Display, "Make Text And Other Items Larger or Smaller" I can set percent scaling to be one: * 100% * 125% * 150%
Why the fuck is there no X% *smaller* options, like 50%, 75%, or heck *user-defined* percentages. Instead, they are hard-coded values.
Third, there is no way to use different DPI on separate monitors, you know because sometimes you have different sized monitors and want the text to be displayed bigger or smaller. The Windows 7 DPI scaling is global -- it is all or nothing.
Typical example that Microsoft doesn't have a clue what *actual* users want; instead it is focused on some imaginary case.
Yeah, sadly that is true of Politics and Religion in general. People *don't* want to hear the truth because that would mean they would have re-think their mental foundation. Most people would rather crucify the messenger instead of listening to the message.
Human nature really hasn't changed in a few thousand years.:-/
Agreed. The problem is most people don't understand the reason WHY Metro is a horrible UI -- hint: it has to do with context.
When you have a "flat" UI you have no *secondary* _visual_ cues to tell you what you can interact with or not. You see this effect in many iPhone apps where they will have this absolutely beautiful graphics (and backgrounds) and you have no clue what the hell is an actual UI "widget" that you can push, slide, etc.
OSX Mountain Lion is starting to fall for this trap by hiding scroll bars. When I need to scroll, such as dragging the slider up/down, I can't even tell where it unless I first do a dummy scroll. This is retarded.
With a more "traditional" approach with *some* 3D elements such as drop shadows, beveled corners, these widgets "stand out" so we have a more natural intuitive sense to make the *critical* distinction between 2 UI elements:
* what is purely static which conveys information
* what can I interactive with.
UI is *supposed* to be about making it EASIER for users by *helping* them think less and act more by streamlining their judgement process. 3D Buttons are a perfect example of this: Users internally are thinking "Ah, here is a button I can push -- OK, what does it do? Does it do what I think it does? Does it do what I need it to do?"
ALSO note that TOO many 3D elements is a hinderance. 3D Studio, Blender, etc, are HORRIBLE UI's simply because they *overload* the user with too *many* widgets. It is an design art-form to maximize minimalism and minimize functionality. Sadly, too many UIX don't have a freaking clue about the fundamentals.
Without recognizing this deep contradistinction UI designers are completely screwing users over making them play the what-can-I-interact-with-game. This is 5 steps backwards. *sigh* Somebody everyone will realize we need to change the computer to fit US, instead of trying to change humans to fit the computer.
Because most/.'ers are smart enough to know that Copying a number (which ALL software, digital music, digital video, etc. are) is not the same as Stealing it; you seem to be unable to tell the difference.
> for the same reason you will never reach a wall by moving in increments of 1/2. Why are you confusing the fact that the universe is digital, aka, quantized (see Planck Length http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck_length ) with take-overs?
> there is too much money to be made to have something as valuable as energy become a low-cost commodity. False. There are 3 ways to understand money. At its highest level Money IS simply an exchange of energy. When the ENERGY *itself* replaces the token that we call money then our paradigm of "low-cost" will be forced to shift. Free-Energy will be the catalyst in this transformation. This will eventually happen within 50 years.
Ah, to be young and naive and not have any credibility again.
The S/N ratio at/. has always been relatively higher then other sites. Sure we get our share of troll articles, but compared to crap over at Digg, or the circle-jerking at the main page of Reddit (the sub-reddits are [mostly] great),/. has consistently had an informed community. I don't see that anywhere else where so many geeks of manner of interested have come together.
Irony: An AC complaining about the lack of community, posting nothing of value!
> People complain about comments being un-editable and static but I love that. It makes this feel permanent, it allows me to verbally pin people down, etc.
That is very true, but if we could "append" a one-liner (say limit it to 120 chars) to address typos that would help. I believe there is an optimal balance between static and dynamic./. is too far static and reddit is too far dynamic.
Ideally though I'd love to see that after the thread is closed for someone with super-mod points to summarize the comments. I've done that on Reddit say "What's your favorite Sci-Fi movie".. instead of late-comers having to waste their time reading ALL the comments they can just read one post which is a summary.
You mean like ALL the shitty JS engines that get faster: a) when you use pre-increment vs post-increment, and b) the fewer characters in the variable names you use the faster they execute?!
Add: - - - 8< - - - function copy4() {
var i = 0x4000-1, j = 0x4000-1, k = 0x8000;
while (i--) dst[++j]=src[++k]; } function copy5() {
var d = dst, s = src;
var i = 0x4000-1, j = 0x4000-1, k = 0x8000;
while (i--) d[++j]=s[++k]; } var t1=new Date(); for (var i=0; i < 1000; i++) copy4(); document.write('copy4: '+(new Date()-t1)+' ms. <br>');
var t1=new Date(); for (var i=0; i < 1000; i++) copy5(); document.write('copy4: '+(new Date()-t1)+' ms. <br>'); - - - 8< - - -
With Firefox 15 copy4() is about 10 ms faster then copy2(), and copy5() is about 10 ms faster then copy4() ?!
While Javascript is a fun toy language (especially with WebGL), its performance still sucks ass because of its stupid typeless "everything is an object" system.
Because of their importance in encryption algorithms such as RSA encryption, prime numbers can be important commercial commodities. In fact, R. Schlafly (1994) has obtained U.S. Patent on the following two primes (expressed in hexadecimal notation): 98A3DF52AEAE9799325CB258D767EBD1F4630E9B... and 93E896DAFD9DFECFD00B466B68F0EA68AF5DC9.
The fact that the fashion industry operates without copyright, and the for the last, you know, a few *hundred* *thousand *years* WITHOUT copyright, patents, and trademarks is proof that it is *ONLY* because of greed that we have these legal fictions in the first place.
When are you going to grow up and stop drinking the imaginary Kool-Aid (TM).
Uhm, no. We *already* have plenty of safe "free" energy.
* wave (Why do you think our planet even has a moon in the first place!) * geothermal * solar
The problem with wind and most energy solutions is NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard).
Plus if we were really smart we could launch small low-weight satellites that were fitted with solar cells to capture energy 24-7.
Nuclear is too high-maintenance and the negative risks FAR out weight ALL the other alternatives. How many more Chernobyl and Fukushima "incidents" before we learn that we are not smart enough to safely run nuclear reactors.
> God is a feeling or a state of mind, nothing else She would beg to differ.
As I've said, you have *only* _started_ your Journey. Don't confuse the destination with the journey. i.e Enlightenment IS the journey.
To give you another analogy: You are a neuron in the mind of the God. How can you know god when you don't even know yourself? i.e. Unless you first find your True Self you will never find God, that is the old axiom: Know Thyself.
Lastly, don't worry about finding God. You'll get all the proof you could ever want once you have left your physical body behind after your death.
The problem is you are looking outward instead of inward.
There are as many paths to find God as there are religions, that is, infinite ways.
Here is but one path: When you have a hobby where you are so caught up in the pure enjoyment that time seems to stops, you are *starting* your journey.
There is no *single* right answer, because everyone has the ability to experience god in their own unique way.
Slashdot Mirror
> between 128kbps mp3 and 24bit 96khz uncompressed.
128kbps mp3 sounds like shit compared to 24/96
The problem is most people are listening with shitty earbuds, not proper circumaural headphones, so both sound like crap.
> and that is how it works with a scroll wheel too right?
Correct.
Notice how we have "worked around" the UI problem - by having a (standard) hardware we can simply the UI :-)
That's why dedicated calculators are examples of great design -- you have dedicated buttons that enable / empower the user to focus on the task-orientated processes without thinking about how to do it.
I concur with you assessment.
Apple has always had its "flavor of the month" philosophy. I just wish they would fix their previous UI mistakes instead of tossing them out and making even more new ones!
Tog wrote this back in 2004:
"Finally, Exposé needs to add a tiny delay before opening when the mouse is thrown into a corner. The corners are such pointer-magnets that users often arrive there by accident. Users, under OS 10.3, are now learning to slow up their mouse activities in general to avoid accidentally triggering Exposé. A delay of between 1/20th of a second and 1/10th of a second should be sufficient and will result in a significant speed increase in other nearby activities, such as accessing the Apple menu."
Even in 2012, 8 years, this issue is constantly ignored. ;-(
The fact that Apple can't natively to do WindowShadeX tells me they are not interested in adding _useful_ functionality.
References:
http://www.asktog.com/columns/044top10docksucks.html
http://kevinyank.com/blog/archives/workaround-mac-os-x-leopard-docked-folder-icon-madness
Why are UIs stuck in the 1990's ???
> Microsoft's solution? Use your Volume License - except we don't have one. :-( Sadly because all MS seems to care about profits, except when things get a little *too* inconvenient. Pity they can't seem to focus on streamlining the tasks users do; if they did they would automatically have profitability.
To be expected.
> On the other hand, Microsoft is kind of helping themselves out of my way. :-)
Agreed. Anything that gets people to consider alternatives, Linux, BSD, OSX, etc. is a good thing.
> Just on that I use the touchpad with two fingers on my Macbook
Yes, IF you are using a trackpad (or tablet) then the design is OK.
However, if you are using a mouse, the design is absolutely stupid and ignores everything we learnt about UI design, starting with Fitt's Law.
Yeah it does.
It is a problem for 2 reasons:
It demonstrates the Apple designers are completely failing to understand Fitt's law. As I get older I don't want to waste time trying to "hit" a skinny UI element because the darn thing is too small. The size of a target is THE primary metric used to determine how efficient they can be with it.
It completely misses the whole point of UI. *IF* users could customize the width to *their* personal liking, THEN custom width scroll bars would be a good thing.
> And this is nothing compared to what Vista/Win7/Server2008 require to keep operational - an active Internet connection that regularly (every 7 days) checks the activation status of the assigned license. (And yes, I've had Server 2008 de-activate itself because of missing the sufficient checks).
Now *that* is total bullshit.
"You have added more RAM. Please authorize your computer with MS so you can continue to use it."
When will people get fed up with this licensed not owned crap.
One of the nice things about OSX is that it doesn't have any of this DRM crap.
>> "When you have a "flat" UI you have no *secondary* _visual_ cues to tell you what you can interact with or not."
>But isn't that self-evident with a tile-based interface?
It depends, but usually the answer is no. What are the visual indicators that some tiles can be pushed, flipped, moved, or rotated?
Using a different lighting on widgets you can interact with helps the user at the subliminal level that they can interact with them, and they don't need to spend too much time thinking about how to interact with them.
> Live tiles, or even live icons are a step up because at-a-glance info can be shown right on the tile.
Agreed. Dynamic icons (if the visuals are kept to a minimal) are awesome!
i.e.
The calendar app icon on the iPhone is a perfect example. It shows me the day of the week, Wednesday, and the numeric day in the month, 19.
The best option would be to give users control over what they want to be dynamic.
i.e. Do you want the clock icon to be accurate, and/or the compass to be updated in real-time, or do you want to save battery life and show static icons.
Oh wow - that is the best feature and the most under-rated and under-documented tip! That helps streamline managing the bazillion guns you find.
Please mod parent up as informative!
> I also waste a lot more time reconfiguring Windows 7 to the way I like it than XP.
Completely agreed. That is one area where MS constantly fucks it up.
Some power users use spatial organization.
i.e. Taskbar looks like:
app1 web1,2 cmd1,2,3 app2 web4,5 cmd4,5,6 web6
Where cmd# is the command prompt, and web# is the web browser tab #.
By using the *position* of the app on the Taskbar it server to help as a visual mnemonic for different tasks.
Windows has 2 brain-dead options
* Group no windows
* Group all windows
Power users want:
* Group *some* windows together
The second area MS screws up in Win 7 is UI scaling. In the Control Panel, Appearance & Personalization, Display, "Make Text And Other Items Larger or Smaller" I can set percent scaling to be one:
* 100%
* 125%
* 150%
Why the fuck is there no X% *smaller* options, like 50%, 75%, or heck *user-defined* percentages. Instead, they are hard-coded values.
Third, there is no way to use different DPI on separate monitors, you know because sometimes you have different sized monitors and want the text to be displayed bigger or smaller. The Windows 7 DPI scaling is global -- it is all or nothing.
Typical example that Microsoft doesn't have a clue what *actual* users want; instead it is focused on some imaginary case.
Also see Custom DPI below 100%
http://superuser.com/questions/80151/how-to-setup-custom-dpi-below-100-on-windows-7
Yeah, sadly that is true of Politics and Religion in general. People *don't* want to hear the truth because that would mean they would have re-think their mental foundation. Most people would rather crucify the messenger instead of listening to the message.
Human nature really hasn't changed in a few thousand years. :-/
> XP will be "around" but no longer supported after April, 2014, when Microsoft ends security updates for Windows XP.
Question for the /. crowd. Does anyone know if you can still activate XP *after* April, 2014?
i.e.
Let's say I change my hardware enough that XP thinks I need to re-register it. How long is Microsoft keeping XP activation around for?
TIA.
Agreed. The problem is most people don't understand the reason WHY Metro is a horrible UI -- hint: it has to do with context.
When you have a "flat" UI you have no *secondary* _visual_ cues to tell you what you can interact with or not. You see this effect in many iPhone apps where they will have this absolutely beautiful graphics (and backgrounds) and you have no clue what the hell is an actual UI "widget" that you can push, slide, etc.
OSX Mountain Lion is starting to fall for this trap by hiding scroll bars. When I need to scroll, such as dragging the slider up/down, I can't even tell where it unless I first do a dummy scroll. This is retarded.
With a more "traditional" approach with *some* 3D elements such as drop shadows, beveled corners, these widgets "stand out" so we have a more natural intuitive sense to make the *critical* distinction between 2 UI elements:
* what is purely static which conveys information
* what can I interactive with.
UI is *supposed* to be about making it EASIER for users by *helping* them think less and act more by streamlining their judgement process. 3D Buttons are a perfect example of this: Users internally are thinking "Ah, here is a button I can push -- OK, what does it do? Does it do what I think it does? Does it do what I need it to do?"
ALSO note that TOO many 3D elements is a hinderance. 3D Studio, Blender, etc, are HORRIBLE UI's simply because they *overload* the user with too *many* widgets. It is an design art-form to maximize minimalism and minimize functionality. Sadly, too many UIX don't have a freaking clue about the fundamentals.
Without recognizing this deep contradistinction UI designers are completely screwing users over making them play the what-can-I-interact-with-game. This is 5 steps backwards. *sigh* Somebody everyone will realize we need to change the computer to fit US, instead of trying to change humans to fit the computer.
Because most /.'ers are smart enough to know that Copying a number (which ALL software, digital music, digital video, etc. are) is not the same as Stealing it; you seem to be unable to tell the difference.
> for the same reason you will never reach a wall by moving in increments of 1/2.
Why are you confusing the fact that the universe is digital, aka, quantized (see Planck Length http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck_length ) with take-overs?
> there is too much money to be made to have something as valuable as energy become a low-cost commodity.
False. There are 3 ways to understand money. At its highest level Money IS simply an exchange of energy. When the ENERGY *itself* replaces the token that we call money then our paradigm of "low-cost" will be forced to shift. Free-Energy will be the catalyst in this transformation. This will eventually happen within 50 years.
Uh, what do you think a "symbol of power" is if the force doesn't need to be used ??
Ah, to be young and naive and not have any credibility again.
The S/N ratio at /. has always been relatively higher then other sites. Sure we get our share of troll articles, but compared to crap over at Digg, or the circle-jerking at the main page of Reddit (the sub-reddits are [mostly] great), /. has consistently had an informed community. I don't see that anywhere else where so many geeks of manner of interested have come together.
Irony: An AC complaining about the lack of community, posting nothing of value!
> People complain about comments being un-editable and static but I love that. It makes this feel permanent, it allows me to verbally pin people down, etc.
That is very true, but if we could "append" a one-liner (say limit it to 120 chars) to address typos that would help. I believe there is an optimal balance between static and dynamic. /. is too far static and reddit is too far dynamic.
Ideally though I'd love to see that after the thread is closed for someone with super-mod points to summarize the comments. I've done that on Reddit say "What's your favorite Sci-Fi movie" .. instead of late-comers having to waste their time reading ALL the comments they can just read one post which is a summary.
> Like all the decent JS engines out there?
You mean like ALL the shitty JS engines that get faster:
a) when you use pre-increment vs post-increment, and
b) the fewer characters in the variable names you use the faster they execute?!
i.e. Using this as a base ...
http://codebase.es/test/copytest.htm
Add:
- - - 8< - - -
function copy4() {
var i = 0x4000-1, j = 0x4000-1, k = 0x8000;
while (i--) dst[++j]=src[++k];
}
function copy5() {
var d = dst, s = src;
var i = 0x4000-1, j = 0x4000-1, k = 0x8000;
while (i--) d[++j]=s[++k];
}
var t1=new Date();
for (var i=0; i < 1000; i++) copy4();
document.write('copy4: '+(new Date()-t1)+' ms. <br>');
var t1=new Date();
for (var i=0; i < 1000; i++) copy5();
document.write('copy4: '+(new Date()-t1)+' ms. <br>');
- - - 8< - - -
With Firefox 15 copy4() is about 10 ms faster then copy2(), and copy5() is about 10 ms faster then copy4() ?!
While Javascript is a fun toy language (especially with WebGL), its performance still sucks ass because of its stupid typeless "everything is an object" system.
> No one is born a good writer, programmer, or auto mechanic.
Total nonsense and completely ignorant of your True Self.
There are many, many child prodigies which demonstrate this is totally false.
Gee, lawyers & judges would *never* have a vested interested in MORE laws to provide work for themselves. /*cough* bullshit
Sadly Shakespeare's wisdom "The first thing we need to do is kill all the lawyers." won't solve the problem of greed.
Imaginary Property is neither real, nor property. Stop pretending it is, because I have a patent on two *numbers* to sell you ...
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/PrimeNumber.html
The fact that the fashion industry operates without copyright, and the for the last, you know, a few *hundred* *thousand *years* WITHOUT copyright, patents, and trademarks is proof that it is *ONLY* because of greed that we have these legal fictions in the first place.
When are you going to grow up and stop drinking the imaginary Kool-Aid (TM).
> I'd rather build hundreds of nuclear reactors
Uhm, no. We *already* have plenty of safe "free" energy.
* wave (Why do you think our planet even has a moon in the first place!)
* geothermal
* solar
The problem with wind and most energy solutions is NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard).
Plus if we were really smart we could launch small low-weight satellites that were fitted with solar cells to capture energy 24-7.
Nuclear is too high-maintenance and the negative risks FAR out weight ALL the other alternatives. How many more Chernobyl and Fukushima "incidents" before we learn that we are not smart enough to safely run nuclear reactors.
> God is a feeling or a state of mind, nothing else
She would beg to differ.
As I've said, you have *only* _started_ your Journey. Don't confuse the destination with the journey. i.e Enlightenment IS the journey.
To give you another analogy: You are a neuron in the mind of the God. How can you know god when you don't even know yourself? i.e. Unless you first find your True Self you will never find God, that is the old axiom: Know Thyself.
Lastly, don't worry about finding God. You'll get all the proof you could ever want once you have left your physical body behind after your death.
> Most every active poster with a UID 6 digits has at least 30 stalkers.
Eh? Maybe a big list of foes .. but stalkers? Geeks don't have better things to do ??
> Care to explain how someone can "find" God?
The problem is you are looking outward instead of inward.
There are as many paths to find God as there are religions, that is, infinite ways.
Here is but one path: When you have a hobby where you are so caught up in the pure enjoyment that time seems to stops, you are *starting* your journey.
There is no *single* right answer, because everyone has the ability to experience god in their own unique way.