[Qt-creator] Lost in 4.2

[Mike Jackson]

"Fashion" is the issue. Just because somebody made something fashionable 
does not mean it is correct or easy to use. The younger generation have 
never had it easier because they have only known to just tap/click 
everywhere until something happens. Let's introduce them to how things 
are supposed to work. Go against fashion and with ease of use. We can 
cite UI design rule after rule where those rules in the past were based 
on meticulous human-computer interaction research. The new generation of 
UI/UX designers seemed to have just tossed out all that research for no 
good reason.

Example: Information density in icons. We now have access to "retina" 
class displays capable of displaying a LOT of information in an icon. 
Icon designers have been waiting 30 years for this to occur. And what 
happens? All the fashionable designs use an "outline" icon. Really? 
Those designers make the user work harder to attain the same information 
that a properly designed icon could store.

Basic Color use: Why does everything have to be the same color? (I am 
looking at you Apple and your monochrome Finder). Some where after OS X 
10.6.8 Apple decided that actually having nicely colored icons in the 
Finder was somehow "bad" so now every folder is the same shade of blue. 
That makes it really hard for users to distinguish between the 
"Downloads", "Home", "Pictures" or some other important folder that we 
pinned to the side of the Finder.

Postbox (An Email Application) recently released a newer version. They 
used outline icons and low contrast typography all over the UI. There is 
even a point where I have a white outlined folder on a nearly white 
background. This just should NOT happen.

Moral of the story. Don't be fashionable. Be correct. Be easy. Back up 
your designs with actual user research.

--
Mike Jackson  [mike.jackson at bluequartz.net]


Ariel Molina wrote:
> Thing is that what's "easy" is hard to define, it tends to come and go
> as fashion goes. For example, current trend (from several years now) is
> that youngsters find "flat" easy and skeumorphic ugly simply because
> they are used to see things like that. So the UI team have to balance
> three things: ease for hardcore veterans, be appealing and "modern" for
> the new wave, and being easy to use. So they try hard, and I wish them
> the best.