Hulver's site || Fads in Interface design

Diaries
Everything
Who's Online?
FAQ / Help

Fads in Interface design

By cam (Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:03:31 AM EST) (all tags)

Seems it has become a fad to op stuff everywhere as a reminder to the user. For instance I cannot shut Firefox without it warning me I have tabs open or querying me if "I really want to close it?". Eclipse does the same, though I know I can turn it off but am too lazy. Outlook in windows has tooltips that obscure the actual email header that I want to read.

Too much. Time to stop that fad IMO.

It is quote annoying. I think it is akin to all the warnings cars have these days. As an example my (a 2 seater) has a warning that airbags can kill little kids and babies so if you want to transport a kid in the car put them in the backseat. It is meaningless. The car has no backseat, doesnt even have trunk space, but they still get put on each and every car.

There is the assumption that you must be an idiot. Worse you cannot remove the signs on the visors, they are moulded into the sun visors themselves. M told me that there was some doctrine too, where if I sell the car and remove those visors I can assume liability for a person not being warned of the issue.

Same with interface design on web pages and applications. They are constantly querying me, asking me if I really want to do that? I am pretty sure I clicked the button. I am also pretty sure it was a conscious decision to click the button. So do it.

< I really admire... | Fiction >

Login

Related Links

Google

Hit Counter

80 Husi users have viewed this.

Comment Controls

Fads in Interface design | 33 comments (33 topical, 0 hidden) | Trackback

I disagree by ad hoc (4.00 / 3) #1 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:09:55 AM EST

The assumption is not that you're an idiot. It's that you're an idiot and you'll sue.
--
The three things that make a diamond also make a waffle.

No, I think the assumption is just that you'll sue by lm (4.00 / 3) #3 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:13:30 AM EST

A smart guy could just pretend to be an idiot, sue, and retire.

There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

Are you sure you want to retire? by Herring (4.00 / 2) #10 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:00:58 PM EST

Actually, retiring is a bit dangerous. Statistics indicate that retired people are more likely to get ill and die that people who haven't retired yet.

At least when the Tories got in, they didn't say their priorities were "Mining, Mining, Mining" - Mark Steel
[ Parent ]

If you pretend to be an idiot by ad hoc (2.00 / 0) #19 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:50:57 PM EST

with the intention of injuring yourself, then you are an idiot.
--
The three things that make a diamond also make a waffle.
[ Parent ]

: I've been accused of being an idiot before by lm (2.00 / 0) #30 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 03:54:13 PM EST

But in this case, I think it's a matter of your lack of imagination. Consider the case of someone else closely related enough for you to have standing to sue injuring his or herself.
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

Maybe with the car visor by cam (2.00 / 0) #6 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:27:55 AM EST

but I could sue because I put my baby in the little ledge behind the two front seats, as per the visor instructions, and then the baby went through the front window (along with my golf clubs) when I hit the brakes.

Firefox/Outlook/(website I could name)/etc having popups, dialogs, galore etc dont have the culpability of being sued. They just assume that any button you click is not what you really meant and feel the need to question every decision you make with the application. What next a popup after each letter typed, "Did you really mean to type a capital A there? Did you mean lowercase a? OK/Cancel." It is getting to that point.

cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

WTF dude!?!? by ObviousTroll (4.00 / 1) #16 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:28:50 PM EST

You can't keep your baby in a golf bag! What were you thinking?

--
Has anybody seen my clue? I know I had it when I came in here.
[ Parent ]

: Sir! Excuse me, SIR! by Rogerborg (4.00 / 5) #17 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:41:22 PM EST

Can you show me where on the golf bag where it says "Do not insert baby". Can you point at it, sir?

-
Metus amatores matrum compescit, non clementia.
[ Parent ]

Firefox by lm (2.00 / 0) #2 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:11:51 AM EST

Tools -> Options -> Tabs -> deselect `warn me when closing multiple tabs'

I think having such user configurable options is good. The folks you should be torqued at is the authoritarian git who installed Firefox on your machine and thought you were an idiot and, consequently, left all the `beat user with cluestick' options turned on.

There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic

There is always one by cam (4.00 / 1) #4 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:18:35 AM EST

of the "works for me" posts.

It is not just firefox, it is becoming common; popups, tool tips, something else to obscure your workspace, questioning your decisions, etc, etc.

It is unnecessary IMO.

cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

: I think you missed my point by lm (2.00 / 0) #28 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 02:49:03 PM EST

I think such warnings are good when they optional. When the user has the ability to easily turn them off, they are very different animals from the permanent warning on your visor. Different people like different behavior and forcing everyone to follow the same convention is a bit ridiculous. It's far better to let the users decide for themselves.
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

honestly, i like that warning by gzt (4.00 / 2) #11 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:07:20 PM EST

because I almost never close firefox. when i do, it's because I mis-clicked when trying to close something else or I dropped my mouse and it clicked or something. but, in general, I agree.

one of those things I really hate is when I first install a browser or something and they're like, "you know, I can remember all your passwords or at least form entries for you..." and I have to struggle through all the byzantine machinations to make sure that they remember nothing at all about me ever and yes I really do want them to forget these things and please don't ever ask again about remembering my passwords (yes, I really mean it).

[ Parent ]

if you miss click on close by cam (2.00 / 0) #14 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:20:23 PM EST

doesnt Firefox ask to restore your session? That is a really useful feature. The "zmfg you have tabs open" is a stupid feature.

cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

: yes, it does by gzt (4.00 / 2) #22 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 01:02:51 PM EST

but I may be logged in to a couple things which, quite rightly, don't restore and I'd have to log in again, or there may be works in progress on some of the tabs that won't restore properly.

[ Parent ]
: Actually, I like that warning too by Scrymarch (4.00 / 2) #24 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 01:31:10 PM EST

Similar reason to gzt. Partly because I use the close window shortcut very aggressively to get rid of things, but I don't want to get rid of Firefox or Eclipse most of the time.
Warnings like this usually shit me, but you managed to land on the two examples I actually appreciate :)
_{The Political Science Department of the University of Woolloomooloo}
[ Parent ]

optimization for first time use by wiredog (4.00 / 2) #5 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:25:51 AM EST

As described at The Atlantic, with reference to Clippy.

A little more generically:

The Dreaded "Optimization For First Time Use" Problem
The very first time you are using the product, you might possibly be grateful for advice and/or warnings about how to use the various features of that product. The next billion times the advice or warnings pop up you want to scream.

Earth First!
_{(We can strip mine the rest later.)}

It is rare I want to get it right the first time by cam (2.00 / 0) #7 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:30:21 AM EST

maybe with a form for the government, I dont want to have to do that again (ironically the DHS cannot confirm for me that a change of address went through - I am not kidding) but firefox? Outlook? websites and email are cheap, I can do it again. Pretty sure we little apps with help links that no-one looks at for first time use. Most people learn by clicking around and seeing what happens.

cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

No they don't by Breaker (4.00 / 1) #8 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:44:41 AM EST

Most people learn by clicking around and seeing what happens.

Should read:
Most computer savvy people learn by clicking around and seeing what happens.

Both use cases you described by cam (2.00 / 0) #12 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:18:25 PM EST

involve people clicking around and seeing what happens.

cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

Nope by Breaker (4.00 / 1) #31 Thu May 01, 2008 at 04:45:19 AM EST

Non-computer people are terrified of experimenting.

: current place I work for by cam (4.00 / 1) #32 Thu May 01, 2008 at 11:18:03 AM EST

would be broke if non-computer people didnt experiment and click around.
cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

Intuitive interfaces are difficult by wiredog (4.00 / 1) #9 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 11:46:18 AM EST

Impossible when there's any complexity involved. So we stick tooltips, pop-ups, and random warnings all over in order to make it easier for the first time (or infrequent) user who wants to get the job done without lots of exploration.

But then you need to turn it off so it doesn't infuriate the experienced used.

Except that I'm currently working in an app where you don't know if the user is experienced or not. Several different people ~~may~~ will be using it from the same location.

Earth First!
_{(We can strip mine the rest later.)}
[ Parent ]

I think adding tooltips by cam (2.00 / 0) #13 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:19:21 PM EST

warnings, etc, is laziness.

cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

Laziness on whose part? by wiredog (4.00 / 2) #15 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:28:00 PM EST

We've got people working on the deck of a ship, using touch screens, having to enter data in real time. They have no time to crack a manual. If the interface is complex, then there better be tooltips and warnings. Otherwise data is lost.

Earth First!
_{(We can strip mine the rest later.)}
[ Parent ]

In those instances by cam (2.00 / 0) #18 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:46:56 PM EST

you can project/budget for training. Laziness on design/development's side.

cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

project/budget for training by wiredog (2.00 / 0) #20 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 12:59:49 PM EST

I wish. But given the turnover in the people who will be using it (mostly researchers and grad students), significant training funding is unlikely. Better to spend more up front to eliminate some of the need.

Earth First!
_{(We can strip mine the rest later.)}
[ Parent ]

Budget?!?!?!?! by ad hoc (2.00 / 0) #21 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 01:01:04 PM EST

Hahahahahahaha.

Training?!?!?!

Hahahahahahaha.

I was going to post an image of the idiotically complex spreadsheet style queue screen I'm writing for $client. If I put everything on there they require it would be one big black smudge.

Tooltips can be valuable. One example: this queue screen, among other things, lists titles of papers to be published. These are scientific papers, so the titles can be obscenely long. And there can be hundreds in the queue. So I truncate the title at 79 characters and an elipsis, then put in a tooltip with the entire title if they need it for some reason. They rarely need the whole thing, but they can see it they need to (like proofing).

--
The three things that make a diamond also make a waffle.
[ Parent ]

I am not saying they dont have their place by cam (2.00 / 0) #23 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 01:04:26 PM EST

I am arguing that they are over-used, intrusive and assume you are incapable of decision making. A lot of the popups are information clutter and overload.

cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

: I agree with that. by ad hoc (2.00 / 0) #27 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 01:38:36 PM EST

I think. Maybe. Or not. I don't know, I can't decide.
--
The three things that make a diamond also make a waffle.
[ Parent ]

meh by MillMan (4.00 / 2) #25 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 01:32:15 PM EST

firefox gives you the option to turn the warnings off right within the warning box, and the default selection is to disable them.

When I'm imprisoned as an enemy combatant, will you blog about it?

: It is indicative of design now by cam (2.00 / 0) #26 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 01:33:32 PM EST

Firefox is just a common example of it.

cam
Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic
[ Parent ]

not so new by clover kicker (4.00 / 1) #29 Wed Apr 30, 2008 at 02:55:33 PM EST

I remember thinking WTF? when I first installed slackware on my 486 and found rm aliased to rm -i

firefox warnings by coryking (2.00 / 0) #33 Mon May 05, 2008 at 08:00:12 PM EST

I love them... sometimes I get click happy without them I might kill an hours worth of documentation research.

Scary as it is, I even added such an option to a windows clipboard spy program because I kept closing the spy window and not the application window.
We are Siamese if you please. We are Siamese if you don't please.

Fads in Interface design | 33 comments (33 topical, 0 hidden) | Trackback