Context menus are simple and easy to remember. This multitouch gimickery with a half bazilion ways to use unnatural and finger twisting gestures on a 3" pad isn't simple or easy to remember.
Does anyone remember the special alphabet used for Palm devices 10 years ago? It wasn't *that* difficult to learn -- took an afternoon to memorize and a week to become second nature. I suspect this'll be the same. On Day One it'll be novel, Day Three it'll be annoying, by Day Seven it'll be so natural you'll accidentally drop your regular mouse when you go to paste something...
"multitouch gimickery with a half bazilion ways to use unnatural and finger twisting gestures on a 3" pad isn't simple or easy to remember."
First of all, the existing multi-touch functionality present on the iPhone and new Macbook Air is actually very intuitive and incredibly easy to master in a short time. I'm sure the more advanced gestures will take a little bit of extra practice to learn, but will definitely enhance the user experience. If *ANYONE* can move us away from the current stagnant desktop metaphor to an entirely new intuitive interface that finally exploits our five digits, it would SURELY be Apple. Even the most fanatical anti-apple fanboy will admit that they are literally the best in the world at creating mainstream intuitive software interfaces.
Stick to context menus? are you serious? Context menus are the scurge of software. Yeah let's stick with 25 year old technology and not dare challenge the status quo because the existing system "works". Back when Bell Labs created the first GUI, you would have been one of the guys ridiculing the concept of a mouse with crap like "why change it? The keyboard works great!".
Besides, no matter whether any new idea for an interface paradigm ever gets adopted, wouldn't you agree it is much better to attempt to innovate than to sit back with the "ain't broke, don't fix it" mentality? Good god, I can only imagine if every R&D center was run with that attitude.
For IT pros, designers, developers, and geeks, keyboard shortcuts allow very fast use of specialized software. However, this requires a lot of time to be invested, and with each new application or operating system, you have to learn them all over again. Worse yet, only a small amount of key combinations have been somewhat standardized across different apps, making for a real headache. This is the best we got and for most people, AKA the 90% that don't use a computer 10 hours/day, this is not an option. They have only the mouse cursor and end up drowning in menus and toolbars.
I don't know if or how a multi-touch paradigm will overcome these existing problems, or whether it will truly become the next generation of computer interfaces or will be relegated to a few select entertainment uses. But in the end, I sure am hopeful that at least some companies are working on it. And for that, I give Apple big props!
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Matt @ Feb 19th 2008 2:55PM
How about just using context menus? I know, it's a weird idea...
oGMo @ Feb 19th 2008 2:58PM
Perhaps we should also stick with a horse and buggy.
Matt @ Feb 19th 2008 3:02PM
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Context menus are simple and easy to remember. This multitouch gimickery with a half bazilion ways to use unnatural and finger twisting gestures on a 3" pad isn't simple or easy to remember.
phanbouy @ Feb 19th 2008 3:06PM
context menus are for mice. i think the existing gestures are great, and i welcome more. or *gasp* have both
oGMo @ Feb 19th 2008 3:14PM
Horses and buggies aren't broke, either.
DorianGray @ Feb 19th 2008 3:57PM
Does anyone remember the special alphabet used for Palm devices 10 years ago? It wasn't *that* difficult to learn -- took an afternoon to memorize and a week to become second nature. I suspect this'll be the same. On Day One it'll be novel, Day Three it'll be annoying, by Day Seven it'll be so natural you'll accidentally drop your regular mouse when you go to paste something...
Chris @ Feb 19th 2008 8:37PM
"Horses and buggies aren't broke, either."
Mine are.
Sam Winter @ Feb 20th 2008 5:29AM
"multitouch gimickery with a half bazilion ways to use unnatural and finger twisting gestures on a 3" pad isn't simple or easy to remember."
First of all, the existing multi-touch functionality present on the iPhone and new Macbook Air is actually very intuitive and incredibly easy to master in a short time. I'm sure the more advanced gestures will take a little bit of extra practice to learn, but will definitely enhance the user experience. If *ANYONE* can move us away from the current stagnant desktop metaphor to an entirely new intuitive interface that finally exploits our five digits, it would SURELY be Apple. Even the most fanatical anti-apple fanboy will admit that they are literally the best in the world at creating mainstream intuitive software interfaces.
Stick to context menus? are you serious? Context menus are the scurge of software. Yeah let's stick with 25 year old technology and not dare challenge the status quo because the existing system "works". Back when Bell Labs created the first GUI, you would have been one of the guys ridiculing the concept of a mouse with crap like "why change it? The keyboard works great!".
Besides, no matter whether any new idea for an interface paradigm ever gets adopted, wouldn't you agree it is much better to attempt to innovate than to sit back with the "ain't broke, don't fix it" mentality? Good god, I can only imagine if every R&D center was run with that attitude.
For IT pros, designers, developers, and geeks, keyboard shortcuts allow very fast use of specialized software. However, this requires a lot of time to be invested, and with each new application or operating system, you have to learn them all over again. Worse yet, only a small amount of key combinations have been somewhat standardized across different apps, making for a real headache.
This is the best we got and for most people, AKA the 90% that don't use a computer 10 hours/day, this is not an option. They have only the mouse cursor and end up drowning in menus and toolbars.
I don't know if or how a multi-touch paradigm will overcome these existing problems, or whether it will truly become the next generation of computer interfaces or will be relegated to a few select entertainment uses. But in the end, I sure am hopeful that at least some companies are working on it. And for that, I give Apple big props!