[Jaffa Software]

Wednesday 23 July 2008

OpenMoko UI "train wreck"

Picked up from Internet Tablet Talk, there're a couple of videos showing how bad the OpenMoko UI is on basic usability challenges.

What's interesting is that the small comparison with the iPhone shows how poor hardware (pressure-based touchscreen, bezel around the screen) combines with poor software implementation (separate apps => slow start-up times, little thought to the size of a usable target area) to emphasise the poor user experience. And, frustratingly, how many of the issues raised cut quite close to the bone for Maemo devices too :-(

Hopefully the UI changes in Fremantle (for example, #2564) will be a big help; and a concentration on finger usage may allow a more sensitive, different, touchscreen technology to be used in the N900. Will be very interesting to see the UI talks at the summit - see you there!

8 comments:

  1. Oh noooo... not this "finger friendly" thing again. Do you realize how much potential is wasted by making UIs "finger friendly"? Using your fingers should be possible for those who don't mind, but stylus input is so much more efficient and superior, I cannot understand why ppl. fall for this "grease on touchscreen"-thing again and again.

    I hope we'll see a version of the Tablet-OS again that drops the large menus and scrollbars in favor of the original ones.

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  2. The problem with stylus driven UIs is that they're very difficult to use whilst moving and, no matter how much they try, it's more intuitive for people to use a direct pointing implement (i.e. their finger) rather than a proxy for it (i.e. a stylus).

    Of course, if one isn't trying to use a tablet whilst on a train, plane or walking this isn't an issue - and so the ultimate stylus UI would work... have we seen it yet, though? ;-)

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  3. Mhm... I do use my tablet on the train and in the cab a lot, I never found the stylus difficult there. (And there must be a reason people buy "touch pens" for their iPhones; they shouldn't if using fingers were so much better.)

    Anyway, it's fine if there's an additional finger friendly mode for people like you. The real problem is that the way it is now, pseudo-solutions like those mega-menus and scrollbars drive me nuts whenever I see them. Choosing an appl. from the old menu was so much faster and more efficient than it is now. I'm so angry about the amount of space taken away from the big elements in the home screen applets (RSS, contacts) and the large scrollbars.

    About your last comment ("have we seen it yet, though?") and the remark in the original post ("how many of the issues raised cut quite close to the bone for Maemo devices too") ... I think the maemo UI is quite consistent, intuitive and easy to use. I realize it every time I stumble across an application that's not properly hildonized. If Nokia asked me here and now what to change in the maemo UI, going back to small screen elements would be the only thing I could answer. No more wishes, thank you, I'm happy with it the way it is.

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  4. The more I've been using my N810 recently, the more I realise how bad an idea it is to attempt to implement applications on a mobile platform using a desktop-like UI, eg. Modest or Media Player with their small icons, lists of text/folders and multiple panels - they simply don't work well and look dated. The web browser on Android is light years ahead of the Maemo browser UI, while the fruity competition are showing that a coherent/consistent finger friendly menu-less UI can be attractive and accessible - the public are lapping it up and it's proving to be very usable. Nokia will ignore this at their peril.

    Even though Freemantle (the OS at least) may launch with finger friendly enhancements, unless ALL of the stock applications are given a wholesale redesign the launch of Freemantle will be yet another missed oppurtunity for this project. At least FIC/OpenMoko has the excuse that this is the first real release of their UI, Nokia/Maemo have had many oppurtunities to get Hildon/Maemo/Whatever right and still haven't - what did Ari Jaaksi say, that only corporations can design effective user interfaces? I'm not seeing any evidence that Nokia/Maemo are capable of such a feat... :( But I live in hope, at least until Freemantle arrives!

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  5. > I cannot understand why ppl. fall
    > for this "grease on touchscreen"-thing again and again.
    That's simple.Because you do not need to grab stylus to do the things.This saves time and allows to do things quicker.So I think that good device should be somewhat "dual mode".It should be comfortable with fingers and gain more power and features when stylus used.This is a hard challenge however.Creation of good man-machine-interface is always a decent challenge.This task is even more than that.

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  6. > The more I've been using my N810
    > recently, the more I realise how
    > bad an idea it is to attempt to
    > implement applications on a mobile
    > platform using a desktop-like UI

    I see the N800 as a small laptop. I expect it to look and act like one. I expect it to have a full-blown desktop UI. And I expect desktop-application can be ported easily and don't look much different on the tablets.

    Applications like Vagalume, Modest, the Browser, Chat etc. etc. show that a ghood UI can be done. I don't see what could possibly be wrong with them. They look good, are easy to use, and more important: You can use them efficiently. No unnecessary scrolling or flipping through pages. (I agree that mplayer is a disaster, but that's not related to the toolkit.)

    Canola, OTOH, is an example of how it shouldn't be done. It might be good for even smaller devices like cell phones, but on an N800, I feel somebody's constantly pulling my leg. Up, down, left right, back, settings, downs again... How much easier would all this be with *one pulldown menu*??

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  7. I think the problem is that N8x0 is so powerful ;) Most of the time I appreciate my stylus and the UI - there are more possibilities for the stylus than for the finger on the typical use. However, when I am walking or driving, and my device "shakes", it is really hard to use stylus, and I often make wrong choices with it. At that times I wish some applications (like maemo mapper) had "finger mode" UI.
    So I hope that for N8x0 both modes will be available eventually.

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  8. Try to use your tablet with small scrollbar in a train ... a french train ... :) (specially transilien)

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