Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, OS
Apple's inconsistent interface
Sean over at Ditto asks, "...why does Apple keep seemingly arbitrarily changing the interface for specific apps?" It's a legitimate question. He has posted a screenshot of Safari, iTunes 5, Mail, VoodooPad, SubEthaEdit and GarageBand all running at once, their windows stacked one on top of the other. Granted they aren't all Apple applications, but the difference between iTunes 5 and Mail alone is significant. I certainly understand that Apple has the opportunity to tweak and adjust the interface to their applications, and that they can't revise all the applications to "match" changes made to one. Still, enough people have complained about it to confirm that it's more than just Sean and me.
So, what's your take, TUAWers? Does this type of thing drive you nuts?
[Via Ditto]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Lach said 5:43PM on 9-08-2005
This stuff drives me nuts. Even Quicktime and iTunes look different from each other. iPhoto is a disaster, you dind't mention that little app. iSync is a mess, and they're all different from Safari and Mail. At least in Windows the design is CONSISTANTLY crappy.
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scott Seifert said 5:10PM on 9-08-2005
I think that apple will move to make all its apps look like the iTunes 5.0 interface how great would email be if that were the case. it is a compromise between auga and metal. the iTunes interface is just about perfect and the Search bar is a great filter feature...
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Rick Montero said 5:14PM on 9-08-2005
It doesnt bother me that much but would be NICE to have them all similar at least. The brushed metal look of Safari I think is getting old. Would be nice for Apple to make OSX easy to work with themes.
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djones said 5:25PM on 9-08-2005
No, I don't think it would be good to be 100% consistant across the board. I understand that it's easy to have the initial reaction of "What?!" and to assume that the dev teams don't communicate with each other during development of each Apple app.
But logically, you need some sort of visual indication of which application you're in. It doesn't need to scream it, but the subtle variations in Apple's first party apps are enough to tell you that they're a family, but you won't mistake one for the other.
Not to mention that one application's UI needs are not going to be the same as another application, so some variety in both look and function are necessary for each app to Be All It Can Be. In fact, the easy way out would be to design one UI, one set in interface gizmos, and whack all the apps together as a unified, uninteresting suite.
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CyBeR said 5:33PM on 9-08-2005
And let's not forget about the Pro apps, which are different still. (Granted, they need special widgets and tend to want to maximise screen real-estate).
It is a little weird. They have a Human Interface Guidelines (HIG) document, and apparently never use it. Though the interfaces are, IMO, usable. Just somewhat inconsistent. At least the pro-apps, while inconsistent with the OS, are consistent between eachother.
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Craig said 5:42PM on 9-08-2005
I mostly agree with djones' post... I'm not a purist for consistency, and some apps may be more efficiently or intuitively presented if they aren't required to conform to a rigid appearance standard. As long as similar buttons perform similar functions accross different apps, I think that this is a case where a sort of competition among different appearances benefits all apps in the end. What I don't like is how much us Mac-types tend to obsess on things like this, as a whole.
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Mike said 5:44PM on 9-08-2005
Some inconsistency isn't so bad, but inconsistency between apps of the same visual type is just galling. Mail having curved top corners yet iTunes having curved bottom corners (and vice versa with the bottom ones) is one small example.
The thing that gets me the most is the new menu bar in Tiger - it's a lovely glossy white, looks great. But the Aqua windows next to it aren't the same white, and in comparison they look a horribly dirty grey. Sums up pretty succinctly the lack of care in my eyes, put together they really do look jarringly horrible.
I'm all for having different styles - I'm not against brushed metal, I'm not against plastic etc - because it makes Expos?my favourite feature of OS X so much more useful than it would be if all the apps were white Aqua windows. But if Apple just aren't going to even try and makes things consistent, how can they have the gall to make a UI Guidelines rulebook they expect other developers to adhere to, when they don't even adhere to it themselves
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Chris L W said 5:44PM on 9-08-2005
I'm not a bells-and-whistles kind of guy, which "appearance" definitely falls under. I run quite a few third-party apps on my iMac, so even the inconsistency between Apple apps really doesn't bother me. Maybe with the next iLife rollout, or update, they'll get all the apps looking the same as our beloved iTunes.
Speaking of bells-and-whistles, it's also why I probably won't be getting Moto's ROKR... though I DID salivate initially, even going so far as checking T-Mobile to see if they were getting it sometime (they said "beginning of next year"! I was burned by Cingular...).
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fra said 5:52PM on 9-08-2005
OSX is going though it awkard puberty phase, it's growing into OSEleven.. now let it be. just KNOCK the door when you wan't to use it.
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Eno Compton said 5:54PM on 9-08-2005
What's so great about one look? Isn't that a reason why Mac people hate Windows? Yes, the buttons need to be the same (minimize, expand, close), but why care about anything else?
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Don Incognito said 6:10PM on 9-08-2005
I needed to boot into OS 9 a few days ago to network with an older Mac. It surprised me how refreshingly unobtrusive the old interface was, how it followed all HIG consistently, how much easier it was on the ice, and how I seemed to have much more monitor real estate. OS X needs a simple, unified theme. It also needs to decide between a spatial and a browser-type Finder.
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Jim Vonkas said 6:14PM on 9-08-2005
I think Apple is on the right track! Who wants to get bored with their main Entertainment device? Always something new, always something different is just what we want from our favorite gizmo. The productive crowd can just stick with boring old Windows! No, no, we want to be part of the new generation of Time Wasters - the ultimate label of wealth. I have just recently disposed of my friends who stick with OS9 - what a bore!
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Jamison said 6:15PM on 9-08-2005
I just couldn't take it. The new metal, the odd corners, the hideous sidebar, replacing filtering with that ugly filter bar...
I returned to 4.9, disabled Software Update and wrote Apple a letter telling them I was sorely disappointed with them.
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narco said 6:17PM on 9-08-2005
I think that since Mac users can't complain about frequent updates, spyware and viruses, we have to nit-pick every little thing. I can't believe the design inconsistencies of application windows is a popular complaint. Seriously, who the hell cares. I usually have a billion windows open and push the inactive ones to the bottom so I can pull them up later. I think it's nice that the windows are different because I can automatically tell which is which.
I think those that complain about the window styles should either get out more, or actually use their computer for what it was meant to do. Be happy that the different windows is your only complaint.
Fishes,
narco.
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paul said 6:24PM on 9-08-2005
The same inconsistancy that is running wild in Apple applications is also running wild on the Apple site. Has anybody noticed that every interior page of the site is starting to have it's own look? What's up with that? I wrote a post about it yesterday... http://www.onedigitallife.com/?p=750
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Illtron said 6:41PM on 9-08-2005
I was son angry with iTunes 5 that I shot myself in the head. Unfortunately, I survived, and now I'm missing half my cranium AND I'm stuck using iTunes 5. What a bummer.
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Tupper said 6:53PM on 9-08-2005
I like being able to see a corner or side protruding from under the app I am using and tell right away what program it is.
Either way it doesn't matter to me what color/shape it is, what you can do with it is what is important to me.
Then again, I never was much for fashion...
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Tony Ward said 6:59PM on 9-08-2005
The down side to Apple's design inconsistency is the un-HIGish multitude of interfaces one's mind has to be on top of when using these apps... personally, my least favorite UI is GarageBand, which simultaneously hogs monitor space and forces me to remember crappy mixer boards from my "garage band" days, thanks to the stupid wooden thing. The upside to this apparent anarchy of design standards is that in the process of optimizing each app's functionality we see, on occasion, a new UI element that dramatically improves all apps (for example, the dramatic influence iTunes has had on other OS X apps). I believe there will be a unified standard, but if we can all buckle up (as if the ride weren't SO damn cool) and weather these minor annoyances, the innovations that the standard includes will be breathtaking.
That said, nix the damn GarageBand wood. I mean it.
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Joshua Ochs said 7:06PM on 9-08-2005
Apple's devs instead go out of their way to be different and unique, when that means spending additional development time just so your NOT consistent with the rest of the interface. How long do you suppose it took for the iTunes team to create that interface, given that they had to forgo all of the standard interface widgets and classes? How much additional testing and bug fixes do you suppose were required? Which is more likely to work properly - API's that every application uses and get tested billions of times a day, or some fancy code you wrote for your application because it "looks neat"?
THAT is what pisses me off. It's not only wasted time and effort, it's watsed towards an end goal that is more error-prone and inferior to the simpler route. It is IGNORANT design. But hey, some manager (or developer who lacks any oversight) thinks is "looks neat".
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Savanna said 7:24PM on 9-08-2005
wow, you guys must be soooooo bored to complain about this....
seriously...what's up with that? i keep reading these 'the ui sucks' articles in my netnewswire and i'm like...wtf?
my take? it should all be *pink*. =) no, wait, wrong complaint comment. okay lemmme start over:
my take? i don't know about you but i think pretty much every single mac program looks...wow, nice? hello? have you *used* a pc lately? i mean, there's something to be said for everything not looking exactly the same.
right?
wow, i never thought i'd see 'creative mac people' bitch and complain about how programs on the mac have different looks - and all of them great! it's like saying 'wow, nothing fits the cookie cutter! that's not apple at all!'
huh? these are *mac* people talking? like, are you guys for *real* or something? or did bill gates get to you?
why do they all have to look exactly the same? i don't *want* them to look exactly the same. that's such a windows idea that it makes me sick.... i love the way each one of my programs look on my mac. you know what? i *love* brushed metal. =) i think brushed metal kicks butt! and unified on mail is soo kewl. it's nice and smooth. i haven't gotten used to itunes 5 yet but i can see the appeal. it's different. it's kinda fresh and more contrasty, which can be good.
to the people who are complaining, you guys have *got* to get out more. like, experience the *real* world for a bit? i know you're all talking about computers as experts, but maybe that's why you just don't get it. most people who use computers aren't experts, and i've never, ever, heard them devote hours and hours of conversations about how one app's program's windows are rounded slightly more than the other....
you know what? come to think of it, i wouldn't even have noticed most of those differences myself if it weren't for people constantly swamping my rss stories with the complaints in the first place. =)
not that i'm telling you to *really* stop - i can use the entertainment sometimes. =)
*muahs*
sav.
p.s. don't go to my blog unless you're not at work or something. it's not work safe. =) but ya, i do write about some mac stuff there. *muahs*
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