Small UX complaint in Pages (and other programs): I want to be able to click the “View” and then type an “I” to jump right to “Invisibles.” But since all the options are prefixed with “Show” or “Hide,” this doesn’t work. These words also make the menu hard to quickly scan.
Pretty slick idea and concept video.
Screenshot from this page of Mirlyn search results:
Notice the words used next to the checkboxes under the helpful “No Image” images: Select for the unselected boxes and Selected for the selected ones. The problem here is that the words are describing different things depending on the mode. One is a mode and one is an action. In order to be consistent, the boxes should say either “Select”/”Unselect” or “Unselected”/”Selected.” But really both of these are silly, because all of this information is already conveyed with the checkbox. People know that items are selected when the box is checked, and that clicking the box will change the state.
I have more complaints with this page, but I’ll save them for later.
For serious UI geeks, one way to see an intelligent control interface is as a false affordance – like a knob that cannot be turned, or a chair that cannot be sat in. The worst kind of false affordance is an unreliable affordance – a knob that can be turned except when it can’t, a chair that’s a cozy place to sit except when it rams a hidden metal spike deep into your tender parts.
Mencius Moldbug, from an article about Wolfram Alpha’s interface.
Some blogs I’ve been reading:
