First look: Apple's latest iOS 7 beta debuts on iPad
With Monday's release of iOS 7 beta 2, the next-generation operating system is now available for developers to test for the first time on the iPad and iPad mini.
iOS 7 is compatible with the iPad mini, third- and fourth-generation iPads with Retina displays, and the iPad 2. Unsurprisingly, its appearance is largely identical to its counterparts on the iPhone and iPod touch.
Here, AppleInsider offers a peek at what iOS 7, in its current beta form, looks like when running on the iPad.
iOS 7 is compatible with the iPad mini, third- and fourth-generation iPads with Retina displays, and the iPad 2. Unsurprisingly, its appearance is largely identical to its counterparts on the iPhone and iPod touch.
Here, AppleInsider offers a peek at what iOS 7, in its current beta form, looks like when running on the iPad.
Comments
Quote:
Originally Posted by AppleInsider
...
I don't see what the point of this kind of design trickery.
It replicates the 3D shelves with gradients and squares, but the shelves are still there. If the shelves are still there, why not just let them be shelves? Why try to pretend that they aren't there when they obviously are?
I hated the old wooden shelves, but while these are more attractive, WHY DO WE NEED VIRTUAL SHELVES AT ALL?
Why not just a simple grid of book covers, just like iTunes grid of album covers? F*ck the shelves.
I liked the shelves!!!! Much warmer ad inviting I think. But I like the redesign too. I wouldn't want shelves in ios7 unless they were a glass shelving or something
The quick settings panel looks a lot better on the iPad than it does on the iPhone.
I still think they are making a horrible mistake in eliminating all the buttons for Windows 8 style text instead. It violates practically every rule of UI design there is.
They say we are now more "mature" users of the system so we don't need the 3D cues anymore, but this is clearly just a lie or cover-story they tell themselves (or us) to smooth things over. No other OS I can think of has ever purposely reduced discoverability or legibility in this way.
Sure lots of mistakes have been made along those lines in the past, but I can't think of anyone who has purposely done such a thing and then tried to explain it away by saying that the users are "too sophisticated" to need that stuff anymore. It's just fluffy words to cover up decisions that have been made based on visuals instead of usability.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Timbit
I liked the shelves!!!! Much warmer ad inviting I think. But I like the redesign too. I wouldn't want shelves in ios7 unless they were a glass shelving or something
Well to each their own.
Personally, my most hated visual feature of any version of iOS is the glass shelving in iPhoto (and the associated virtual plastic binders that sit on the virtual glass shelves). I think they look really, really, tacky and the first time I saw them was the first time I seriously thought that the whole skeuomorphic thing had gone too far.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
The quick settings panel looks a lot better on the iPad than it does on the iPhone.
I still think they are making a horrible mistake in eliminating all the buttons for Windows 8 style text instead. It violates practically every rule of UI design there is.
They say we are now more "mature" users of the system so we don't need the 3D cues anymore, but this is clearly just a lie or cover-story they tell themselves (or us) to smooth things over. No other OS I can think of has ever purposely reduced discoverability or legibility in this way.
Sure lots of mistakes have been made along those lines in the past, but I can't think of anyone who has purposely done such a thing and then tried to explain it away by saying that the users are "too sophisticated" to need that stuff anymore. It's just fluffy words to cover up decisions that have been made based on visuals instead of usability.
totally agree with you. And I just wished the tech press/blog-o-sphere would focus more on these kinds of "improvements" than what the freakin' app icons look like. These basic UI changes are way more important than flashy colors, gradients and translucency.
It begins...
We were expecting to see the end of skeuomorphism: well good riddance. Except it isn't. The Contacts and notes icons are just naive (being kind) renderings of the old icons, the concept is identical. The camera icon is now entirely literal, the videos icon is a related artefact of the production of videos (as the camera icon used to be) and the photos icon has no relationship to photos at all that I can see (except perhaps it's ripped off from Snapseed which is a photos app).
The delicacy of touch of the old icons, love them or hate them, is gone. The unifying "gloss" effect is gone without replacementand the palette has regressed from 'realistic' to 'my first poster paints'. If you were trying to update the Human Interface Guidelines to describe the concept of the new icons, what would you say? Use random tasteless colours?
I look forward to the new functionality of iOS 7, I really hope Apple's exemplary graphic designers are allowed to fix the icons.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Robin Huber
Not crazy about new Newsstand "shelves" either. A little too stark. Can't we find a happy medium between ghastly cartoonish skeuomorphism (remember Myst?) and modern sterility--things that reference nothing?
Myst was awesome. I loved that game. I didn't find it cartoonish, probably because I was much younger (10) when I first played it. I had no strong feeling about the look and feel of it. It was what it was.
Riven was harder and darker in my opinion, but still great. I wonder if we will see the third title in the series (Exile??) on iOS one of these days? Off topic, I know but I'm feeling a bit nostalgic today.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Robin Huber
Not crazy about new Newsstand "shelves" either. A little too stark. Can't we find a happy medium between ghastly cartoonish skeuomorphism (remember Myst?) and modern sterility--things that reference nothing?
I think that's the inherent problem with digital UI. You have to reference something, because it's all just pixels anyway. How do you visually represent a series of digital publications in a GUI? you have to make them look like something familiar...otherwise you have various sized blobs or images with text in the middle. Oh, wait, that's Game Center. Apparently, not even Team Ives knows what games should look like. A magazine has to look like a magazine. A note has to look like a note. I love that the screen-cap for the notes App actually has the first entry titled "these are notes". Really? you have to tell your users what the hell it is because you've dumbed it down so far that it's just a bulleted piece of text now? Removing visual queues with text is the worst direction to take. If you have to make it a piece of text, you've failed. It's no longer a GUI. It's an instruction manual...and everyone knows nobody reads those. You have to create a series of glyphs or icons that are visually distinctive in such a way that in a split second you can glance down a immediately know what they are and what they do. Otherwise you've failed. What are they going to do in the German Version? Or the Chinese Version? Or any other foreign language where the text just doesn't fit the area they've designated for the tap target? when the text they've placed from the icons is too long to display in a single bar? If you have to explain in text what something does, you've failed in the GUI. Text should be supplemental information, not primary source.
I agree. The shelves were part of the old skeuomorphism. Since the end result is a grid of icon anyway, having any kind of stylized shelves might be unnecessary. OTOH, I don't think this looks bad. Just unnecessary. I noticed that some high end luxury cars are getting virtual spedometers and/or tachs made to look like the physical counterpart they replaced. Weird: you'd think with a LCD screen they could design displays that weren't limited by that skeuomorphism. I mean, what is the point of an all LCD instrument panel?
Does the iPad version have a weather app this time around?