{"id":2354,"date":"2013-12-25T12:16:16","date_gmt":"2013-12-25T03:16:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/2013-12-25\/2354"},"modified":"2013-12-25T12:16:16","modified_gmt":"2013-12-25T03:16:16","slug":"holy-cow-ios-7-has-some-really-horrible-design","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/2013-12-25\/2354","title":{"rendered":"Holy Cow, iOS 7 Has Some Really Horrible Design"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
<\/a>\nNikon D4 + Nikkor 24mm f\/1.4 — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>50 sec, f<\/span>\/5, ISO 110 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span>\nTimeless<\/span>\nSimple, elegant design is timeless\n(the Seifuso Villa (\u6e05\u98a8\u8358),<\/span> Kyoto Japan)<\/small>\n
Desktop-Background Versions<\/b>\n1280×<\/span>800<\/a>  ·  1680×<\/span>1050<\/a>  ·  1920×<\/span>1200<\/a>  ·  2560×<\/span>1600<\/a>  ·  2880×<\/span>1800<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
\n
\u201c<\/span>I hate<\/span> it beyond words.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n
\u201c<\/span>Worse than horrid.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n
\u201c<\/span>I just<\/span> really like the revamped UI.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n
\u201c<\/span>This is horrible! Can I go<\/span> back?\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n
\u201c<\/span>iOS 7 blows. Big time.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
—<\/td> My friends' and family's reaction to\nApple'slatest interface for its phones and tablets.<\/td><\/tr><\/table>\n\n

“<\/span>Beauty is in the eye of the\nbeholder<\/i>”<\/span> is perhaps most true when a well<\/span>-established convention\nundergoes a radical<\/span> change. Not only is<\/span> it then judged on its merits, but\nalso by how it differs to what came before.<\/p>\n\n

The user-interface (UI) design of iOS 7<\/span> seems\nto be of the radical variety. Not quite<\/span> as radical as the initial iPhone\nwas to the cell-phone world at the time, but also not as universally\nlauded. A lot of<\/span> people really hate iOS 7<\/span>.<\/p>\n\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D4 + Nikkor 24mm f\/1.4 — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>800 sec, f<\/span>\/1.4, ISO 100 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span>\nSpoiling My Shot<\/span>\nthe geiko and her patron walked into what had been a clear<\/span> shot of the temple\nat the Kurodani Temple (\u91d1\u6212\u5149\u660e\u5bfa),<\/span> Kyoto Japan\n
Desktop-Background Versions<\/b>\n1280×<\/span>800<\/a>  ·  1680×<\/span>1050<\/a>  ·  1920×<\/span>1200<\/a>  ·  2560×<\/span>1600<\/a>  ·  2880×<\/span>1800<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

(Except the first, the photos on this page have nothing to do with the text; they're just random photos I've taken recently.)<\/p>\n\n

Until recently I'd never actually used iOS 7<\/span>,\nbut from seeing it in news and advertisements over the last few months, I knew I<\/span> didn't like the new look. The same aesthetic<\/span> that I like<\/span> so much\nabout Apple hardware — a clean,<\/span> ultra minimal, uncluttered look\n— seems to me in the software of iOS 7<\/span> to\nbe flat, dead, lifeless.   Soulless.   It looks like Microsoft\ndesigned it. It would<\/span> fit right in with the new Windows® logo.<\/p>\n\n

To be clear, the look may not be my cup of tea, but that certainly\ndoesn't mean it's a bad<\/i> design, it's just one that I don't<\/span>\npersonally care for.<\/p>\n\n

However, I'll go ahead and say that for reasons I'll describe below,\niOS 7's<\/span> design is<\/i> bad.<\/p>\n\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D4 + Nikkor 85mm f\/1.4 — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>200 sec, f<\/span>\/4.5, ISO 1000 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span>\n“<\/span>No Parking”<\/span><\/span>\n“<\/span>Vehicles pass even at night”<\/span>\nat the Saginomori Shrine (\u9dfa\u68ee\u795e\u793e),<\/span> Kyoto Japan\n
Vertical Desktop-Background Versions<\/b>\n\n\n1050×<\/span>1680<\/a>  ·  1200×<\/span>1920<\/a>  ·  1600×<\/span>2560<\/a><\/small><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Having had the chance to actually play with iOS 7 recently while setting\nup a new<\/span> phone for my wife, I\nwas shocked<\/span> that Apple could introduce such gimmickry at the\nexpense<\/i> of function.<\/p>\n\n

The visual change in iOS 7 that got the most press is the dropping of\nmany of the gratuitous skeuomorphs<\/a>, such as\nthe “<\/span>stitched leather”<\/span> decoration of the calendar app. Some skeuomorphs\nmake a lot<\/span> of sense, tapping into the accumulated\nexperience users have developed in life so that basic things don't have to\nbe learned from scratch. That's why interactive buttons in computer\napplications, for example, have long looked like real-world buttons: the\nlook instantly explains what kind of control it is and how to interact with\nit. Others are just cutesy design embellishments, and Apple has gotten rid\nof most of those now.<\/p>\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f\/2.8 @ 42mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>100 sec, f<\/span>\/2.8, ISO 5600 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span>\nWaiting<\/span>\nto enter an evening lightup event\nat the Chion'in Temple (\u77e5\u6069\u9662), Kyoto Japan\n
Desktop-Background Versions<\/b>\n1280×<\/span>800<\/a>  ·  1680×<\/span>1050<\/a>  ·  1920×<\/span>1200<\/a>  ·  2560×<\/span>1600<\/a>  ·  2880×<\/span>1800<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

Another iOS 7 visual change that got a lot<\/span> of\npress was the “<\/span>simplifying”<\/span> of the look. Someone who likes the new look might\ndescribe it as “<\/span>clean”<\/span> and “<\/span>uncluttered”<\/span>.\nSomeone who doesn't might say “<\/span>uninspired”<\/span>, “<\/span>monotonous”<\/span>, “<\/span>flat”<\/span>, and “<\/span>dull”<\/span>. (An engineer\nwould say “<\/span>vectorizable”<\/span>, but that's just a\nback<\/span>-end implementation optimization.)<\/p>\n\n

But these design decisions are mostly a matter<\/span> of taste and not of\n“<\/span>good”<\/span> or “<\/span>bad”<\/span> design. Personally I find<\/span> the new app icons to be a bit<\/span> too\nvisually indistinct to recognize as easily as the old ones, therefore\nrequiring more conscious brain power to recognize. This is not a good<\/span>\nthing, but perhaps time and experience will remedy that.<\/p>\n\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D4 + Nikkor 24mm f\/1.4 — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>200 sec, f<\/span>\/1.4, ISO 100 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span>\nDiving into Shadow<\/span>\nat the Sento Imperial Palace (\u4ed9\u6d1e\u5fa1\u6240),<\/span> Kyoto Japan\n
Desktop-Background Versions<\/b>\n1280×<\/span>800<\/a>  ·  1680×<\/span>1050<\/a>  ·  1920×<\/span>1200<\/a>  ·  2560×<\/span>1600<\/a>  ·  2880×<\/span>1800<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The quantitatively worst aspect of iOS 7's design that I've noticed is\nthe incessant use of transparency for zero practically-useful effect. It's a visual<\/span> gimmick that can be done now because the hardware has enough\nhorsepower to support it, but “<\/span>because we can”<\/span> has never been a good<\/span> design\nprinciple. There are times where transparency in one window (allowing you to\nsee what's both in it and behind it at the same time) is useful, but\nI didn't<\/span> notice such an instance on iOS 7's<\/span>: every\ntime transparency was used, the result was a less<\/span>-clear UI.<\/p>\n\n

Here's an example from Apple's own marketing:<\/p>\n\n

<\/div>\n\n

What leaks from behind is the field of app icons and the background\nimage behind them. There is absolutely no benefit to seeing that\ninformation at this point in the user's interaction, so at best it can be\n“<\/span>not a distraction<\/span>”<\/span>, but at least to me the blobs of color are a horrible<\/span>\ndistraction, and the text is more difficult to read where the blobs are\nbright white. And this is<\/span> the example they chose for product marketing...\nit could be much, much worse, depending on what happens to be in use for\nthe icon-screen background.<\/p>\n\n

In other areas of iOS 7, the transparency had different levels of impact,\nbut in every case I noticed,<\/span> it was a detriment.<\/span> Transparency seems to be\nto iOS 7<\/span> as a curved<\/span> screen is to\na cell<\/span> phone<\/a>: worse than before.<\/p>\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D4 + Nikkor 24mm f\/1.4 — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>50 sec, f<\/span>\/11, ISO 1800 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span>\nOutside Hallway<\/span>\nat the Seiryoji Temple (\u6e05\u6dbc\u6642), Kyoto Japan\n
Vertical Desktop-Background Versions<\/b>\n\n\n1050×<\/span>1680<\/a>  ·  1200×<\/span>1920<\/a>  ·  1600×<\/span>2560<\/a><\/small><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Another bad design chose of iOS 7 is that in its drive to remove as many\ndesign elements as possible (“<\/span>more clean, less cluttered!”<\/span>), important\nvisual clues that helped direct the eye were removed, such as visual clues\nto isolate individual items in a list.<\/span> Lists of friends in the Find my\nFriends app used to be clear and obvious, now became jumbled masses of\npixels that one must spend neurons on to decipher.<\/p>\n\n

Feature wise, the theme of iOS 7 seems “<\/span>more features; harder to\ndiscover”<\/span>. Discoverability<\/i> is normally a big<\/span> part of interface design...\ngreat features mean nothing if users don't even notice that they're\navailable.<\/p>\n\n

Prior to iOS 7, one could access the whole-device search feature by\nmoving to the zeroth screen of app icons, advertised by the standard\n“<\/span>search”<\/span> magnifying-glass icon at the left of the line of dots that\nrepresent each screen of app icons. Even if you somehow missed the search\nicon, in normal use of the device you'd sometimes overrun the home page\nwhile swiping around and quickly learn how to get to the search screen.<\/p>\n\n

Now in iOS 7, the search screen simply seems to be gone, at least until\nyou get frustrated enough to do a web<\/span> search to learn where it went. Once\nyou learn it, it's quite useful, but completely non-intuitive and hidden\nuntil you do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D4 + Nikkor 85mm f\/1.4 — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>2500 sec, f<\/span>\/1.4, ISO 100 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span>\nConsultation on the Go<\/span>\nat the Nishi Hongwanji Temple (\u897f\u672c\u9858\u5bfa),<\/span> Kyoto Japan\n
Desktop-Background Versions<\/b>\n1280×<\/span>800<\/a>  ·  1680×<\/span>1050<\/a>  ·  1920×<\/span>1200<\/a>  ·  2560×<\/span>1600<\/a>  ·  2880×<\/span>1800<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

It used to be before iOS 7 that you could get to the “<\/span>notification\ncenter”<\/span> (list of alerts like new messages and email) by swiping from the\ntop of the screen down. This wasn't easily discovered unless your finger\nhappened to bump the top area of the screen, in which case a skeuomorphic<\/span>\nset of “<\/span>grip ridges”<\/span> would show up letting you know that there was\nsomething to pull down. It's worse<\/span> in iOS 7<\/span> in\nthat what you get when you swipe down like that depends on where you start.\n(If you have iOS 7<\/span>, give it a try<\/span>: swipe down\nfrom the very top, and from some place that's not the top. Also, for a\ngreat<\/span> feature, try swiping from the bottom of the screen.)<\/p>\n\n

Another gimmicky bend to iOS 7 is the use of meaningless “<\/span>because we\ncan”<\/span> animation. Many animations are actually useful, such as the\n“<\/span>disappearing genie”<\/span> effect in OS X<\/span> when you hide\na window,<\/span> because it shows you where the window has gone, which in turn\nteaches you how to get it back. The animations<\/span> in iOS\n7<\/span> that I noticed<\/span> are not of that variety: they add no information,\nmerely frustration.<\/p>\n\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D4 + Nikkor 24mm f\/1.4 — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>100 sec, f<\/span>\/9, ISO 100 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span>\nSundrenched Rice Paddies<\/span>\nat the Shugakuin Imperial Villa (\u4fee\u5b66\u9662\u96e2\u5bae),<\/span> Kyoto Japan\n
Desktop-Background Versions<\/b>\n1280×<\/span>800<\/a>  ·  1680×<\/span>1050<\/a>  ·  1920×<\/span>1200<\/a>  ·  2560×<\/span>1600<\/a>  ·  2880×<\/span>1800<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

“<\/span>Change”<\/span> is neither necessarily good nor bad... only the result should\nreally matter. I only suggest<\/span> that if you're going to change something well\nestablished, be sure to have a good<\/span> reason. It seems<\/span> to me that many of the\nUI changes to iOS were not done for a good<\/span> reason.<\/p>\n\n

(I should point out that for the most part I, like the iOS 7<\/span> team, am bad at design... heck, just look at my\nblog's visual design. But you don<\/span>'t have to be an opera singer to recognize\nwhen someone else can't carry a tune.<\/span>)<\/p>\n\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D4 + Nikkor 85mm f\/1.4 — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>200 sec, f<\/span>\/1.4, ISO 2200 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span>\nPure Enjoyment<\/span>\nmy friend Kataoka-san enjoying his teeny tiny baby-cup of espresso\nat Restaurant La Verveine<\/a>, Kyoto Japan\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The user-interface (UI) design of iOS 7 seems to be of the radical variety. Not quite as radical as the initial iPhone was to the cell-phone world at the time, but also not as universally lauded. A lot of people really hate iOS 7.<\/p>

(Except the first, the photos on this page have nothing to do with the text; they're just random photos I've taken recently.)<\/p>

Until recently I'd never actually used iOS 7, but from seeing it in news and advertisements over the last few months, I knew I didn't like the new look. The same aesthetic that [...]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,14,1,2,6,4,10,25],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2354"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2354"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2354\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}