Topic: Unforgivable Sins of UI Design (Read 25817 times)

Thad · « **on:** October 03, 2008, 10:46:06 AM »

Apple's given us some pretty good keyboard shortcuts based on physical proximity -- putting the major Edit functions on Z, X, C, and V was a great damn idea.

Putting Close next to Quit? Not so much.

Yes, Cmd-Q makes a fuck of a lot more sense than Alt-F4. And due to the close association of closing a window and quitting a program, putting the two functions side-by-side is a good idea for human memory association.

But it's a BAD FUCKING IDEA for ACCIDENTALLY QUITTING OUT OF THE PROGRAM WHEN YOU ONLY MEANT TO CLOSE ONE TAB.

If I hit Ctrl-V instead of Ctrl-C, that's usually easily fixable (generally with Ctrl-Z). Quitting out of a program is only easily fixable if you put up a "Are you sure you want to quit?" prompt -- which, the 99% of the time I DO quit the program intentionally, is obnoxious.

McFrugal · « **Reply #1 on:** November 02, 2008, 09:57:56 PM »

Losing two pages of a fucking post.

I hate it when Firefox doesn't close properly, and my Session Manager plugin loses track of the session. Wowwiki seems to glitch the browser up a lot and this happens as a result.

Zaratustra · « **Reply #2 on:** November 24, 2008, 04:18:29 AM »

I just got a Serial-to-USB cable for some work related crap.

It has an install CD.

AN INSTALL CD FOR AN ADAPTER CABLE.

And it only supports Windows and 'Macintoch'.

Thad · « **Reply #3 on:** December 02, 2008, 03:13:53 PM »

...If a program is going to ask me a yes/no question as part of regular operation, it should fucking-well give me a "Don't ask this question again" checkbox.

Case in point: Safari asking me "Are you sure you want to quit the program?" every time I try to quit when there's more than one tab open. Firefox does the same thing, but there's a "disable this" checkbox.

(In fairness, it's a good idea to keep it on in Safari, or any other Mac app, because of the proximity of the Q and W keys. Putting "close tab" next to "quit program" is a great idea from a memorization standpoint but a fucking awful one from a "people should never be able to quit out of a program by accident" one. As stupid and arbitrary a key combination as Alt-F4 is, nobody has ever pressed it by accident.)

Classic · « **Reply #4 on:** December 02, 2008, 03:24:31 PM »

I am going to have to contradict you there Thad. Though in my defense, I was trying to refresh and a cat was involved.

Thad · « **Reply #5 on:** December 21, 2008, 10:17:41 PM »

Shortcut keys that don't make any fucking sense.

The current version of OpenOffice has changed from File -> Recent Documents to File -> Recent Documents or somesuch similar insane bullshit. I don't remember what they reassigned "R" to, but it's something I never fucking use.

Kazz · « **Reply #6 on:** December 21, 2008, 10:32:43 PM »

Today in DOTA I tried to cast Witch Doctor's "Death Ward" as I was running away and I kept hitting "W" but the key was actually "D" and I died.

Thad · « **Reply #7 on:** December 27, 2008, 12:54:03 AM »

Obvious missing features in cell phones. (We've been here, right?)

I can't find my cell but I still have my Bluetooth earpiece. The phone's probably in the living room since I can get the earpiece to pair there but not from my bedroom, and there aren't really any other spots it would be likely to fall out of my pocket. But I've picked up couch cushions and haven't been able to find it.

So, okay. Why the hell isn't there a voice command I can use from the earpiece to just make the goddamn phone ring so I can find it?

Ted Belmont · « **Reply #8 on:** December 27, 2008, 12:59:28 AM »

Why don't you just have someone else call your phone?

Norondor · « **Reply #9 on:** December 27, 2008, 12:59:58 AM »

Yeah, just call them up and ask them to call your phone.

Thad · « **Reply #10 on:** December 27, 2008, 01:17:04 AM »

Also, it's two in the goddamn morning.

(And anyway, I leave my phone on vibrate. There should be a hands-off way to switch it to ring for cases like this.)

Anyway, I found the phone.

But, while I'm thinking about obvious missing voice commands, I can't pull up my fucking voicemail with a voice command. Of course, the voicemail service itself doesn't have voice support either, so I need the handset out to delete each message anyway, but that's just one MORE obvious place to put voice commands.

EDIT: While I could of course devote hours to every interface flaw with MySpace, I will take this moment to note the latest annoyance about it: it consistently tells me I have a new message, but when I go to the inbox I don't. There must be one marked "unread" somewhere in my 40 pages of E-Mails, but I can't find it.

To sort messages by status, you need to install Google Gears.

Which is not available for 64-bit Linux.

François · « **Reply #11 on:** January 21, 2009, 03:31:13 PM »

More and more often, when I click to go read something that interests me, I find out it's actually a video I would have to watch.

You know what? FUCK THAT SHIT. I read much faster than assholes talk. I don't want to watch some guy's lips flap or whatever superfluous visual filler they got. I just want the god damned information.

Mongrel · « **Reply #12 on:** January 21, 2009, 05:09:56 PM »

Quote from: ZedPower on January 21, 2009, 03:31:13 PM

More and more often, when I click to go read something that interests me, I find out it's actually a video I would have to watch.

You know what? FUCK THAT SHIT. I read much faster than assholes talk. I don't want to watch some guy's lips flap or whatever superfluous visual filler they got. I just want the god damned information.

Man, I hear THAT. Obama excepted, I love when there's a transcript to cut to.

Brentai · « **Reply #13 on:** January 21, 2009, 08:33:25 PM »

I'll usually click video links and just start flipping to other pages and reading ahead while I listen. If it doesn't catch my attention as background noise I let it just bugger off when I close the page.

Brentai · « **Reply #14 on:** February 13, 2009, 01:07:21 PM »

CAPTCHA is starting to piss me off.

Congratulations, Google. You've finally generated an image that only a spambot could ever read. Give yourselves a (browser) cookie.

ALTERNATE JOKE: You cannot grasp the true form of Google's CAPTCHA!

Romosome · « **Reply #15 on:** February 13, 2009, 01:18:14 PM »

I liked the Captcha idea where it would show a bunch of animal pictures and you'd have to click on the kitten, or the pig, or whichever because a machine can't tell the images apart.

Rosencrantz · « **Reply #16 on:** February 13, 2009, 01:21:31 PM »

Pretty soon we're going to have to display some sort of emotion because machines do not understand this feeling we call "love".

François · « **Reply #17 on:** February 13, 2009, 02:18:55 PM »

thnsmu

Did I just sit on a genius?

Beat Bandit · « **Reply #18 on:** February 13, 2009, 03:04:25 PM »

Prick self. If you bleed, check here.

Classic · « **Reply #19 on:** February 13, 2009, 03:13:14 PM »

All that's going to do is have the Russian mob bleed out unloved Siberian peasants to fuel their attacks.

News:

Author Topic: Unforgivable Sins of UI Design (Read 25817 times)