I have great respect for Ive. But someone who doesn't code cannot possibly create the most beautiful software. The UI is one layer of any software. Because you and others are consumers, you'd consider it the most important layer. But it is sooooooooooooooooooooooooo far from being such.
Consider literature - the best prose is not necessarily that which is understood or appreciated by the masses. The masses are offended by this notion and would never agree. But it is what it is.
Utter rubbish. As a software engineer let me tell you that UI design is a totally different speciality. Apples look and feel has never been decided by engineers ( except perhaps for dev tools) but by designers. All that has happened here is a change in the guard of UI designers - if the rumours are true - from pro skeumorphic to pro minimalist.
UI has always been designer led. Apple is not Linux.
Good counter-example. In fact, has Apple ever produced a truly good mouse? Ive did redeem himself with the glass touchpad, assuming he was involved in its design.
I'd say the current crop of iPod Nanos simply fail to meet the standard of iPhones. I wonder if Ive has even paid attention to them.
I'd also like to chime in and argue that the current iPod shuffle is sub-par. A previous generation shuffle (of the same approximate dimensions) was a far better, more usable product.
Well, we are all anonymous though so how would you know? I have a degree in Industrial Design, but you may or may not believe me and no one seems to listen to me when I post about design issues anyway. :)
Fair enough. I don't have an engineering or design degree but I think I can distinguish nice looking from ugly (even if its well designed ugly). I guess my point was plenty of people who don't have engineering or design backgrounds have opinions on what iOS should look like and how it should function.
Can he metalwork? Has he wrought steel and iron with his bare (heat-gloved) hands, working a forge with the little accordion blower thing? And yet he makes works of art in hardware.
Does a painter crush his own berries, flowers, and minerals to make his paints? And yet he makes works of art on canvas.
On the contrary, software can be both beautiful in its simplicity and vast in its power. Ive's job is to funnel the power into a beautiful facade.
Two wrong analogies don't make a right.
A better one would be this - Does the framer of a painting get most of the credit for its artistic brilliance? What about the person who mounts it on the ball? Or the lighting guy? No. The essence of a painting is the painting itself.
Similarly, it is true that hair, makeup and clothes can make anyone look better, but none of it is what constitutes the true beauty of a woman, which is instead defined by geometry, complexion, proportions ...
Likewise, the essence of a software product is the underlying architecture and algorithms - . The UI may be part of the architecture but it does not exist for its own sake. Furthermore, the UI is easily replaceable.
Quote:
Originally Posted by asdasd
Utter rubbish. As a software engineer let me tell you that UI design is a totally different speciality. Apples look and feel has never been decided by engineers ( except perhaps for dev tools) but by designers. All that has happened here is a change in the guard of UI designers - if the rumours are true - from pro skeumorphic to pro minimalist.
UI has always been designer led. Apple is not Linux.
Yes, UI development is a specialty, and an important one at that. So are makeup, framing, lighting, fashion design, etc. Bad makeup can hide a woman's real beauty just as bad UI can make an app appear dysfunctional. But anyone who believes these components are more important than the core structure is not a software developer who gets it, and is further someone who appreciates true beauty.
Finally, it is absolutely false that UI has always been designer led. Absolutely false. Go tell Marissa Mayer that she is a designer and not a computer scientist. Furthermore, the designers involved in UI design are not the same class of designer as Jony Ive and the industrial designers he leads. You are misunderstanding and mixing up software design, industrial design, graphics design and UX design. Software developer my eye.
I'd also like to chime in and argue that the current iPod shuffle is sub-par. A previous generation shuffle (of the same approximate dimensions) was a far better, more usable product.
The best Shuffle remains the first one. I seem to recall Jobs referring to it as a stick of gum? I still have mine and recently delighted myself by confirming that it still worked fine. The follow-up designs, IMO, have been too small or cannot be plugged into a USB port.
Well, we are all anonymous though so how would you know? I have a degree in Industrial Design, but you may or may not believe me and no one seems to listen to me when I post about design issues anyway.
Fair enough. I don't have an engineering or design degree but I think I can distinguish nice looking from ugly (even if its well designed ugly). I guess my point was plenty of people who don't have engineering or design backgrounds have opinions on what iOS should look like and how it should function.
But your assessment is subjective - i.e. a matter of taste. A trained designer, however, knows more about standards and can discern rationales for choice of proportions, materials, etc.
But your assessment is subjective - i.e. a matter of taste. A trained designer, however, knows more about standards and can discern rationales for choice of proportions, materials, etc.
True. But the idea that Ive's background isn't software engineering therefore he shouldn't be overseeing software design doesn't make sense to me. Steve Jobs wasn't a software engineer. Also as far as we know Scott Forstall's lieutenants are still in their roles at Apple. So if anything Ive is playing the Steve Jobs role - setting an overall vision/direction and overseeing the development at a higher level. I don't think he needs a software background to do that.
I guess I'm the only person who likes the skeuomorphic design! I feel it adds character and worth to the OS. I don't mind it being toned down slightly but not removed all together just for the sake of it.
This seems to be the latest trend at the moment. I hope Apple have something special up their sleeve.
I'd rather more time was spent on adding more functionality to the OS and Apps.
Can't wait to see what they've been up to. Excited and nervous at the same time...
I know, I like it to and it is almost every app like in: Calender, Maps(standard view and 3d city[birds eye], and page flip), Passbook(cards and shredder) Notes, Reminders(notes), Clock, Newstand(book shelf), Game center(billiard explained in post) Settings(gears turning), Compass, Voice memos(old microphone) and more(Siri).
My big question is, what will Jon Ive come up with? We know he's a big Dieter Rams fan, so perhaps we should look at old Braun designs to get some ideas.
Hmm. Silvers, whites, greys?
In the meantime, I've gathered a few fan concepts of a "flat" style:
Notice some are dark, some light. My bet would be towards a light background scheme.
For one thing, Android has pretty much claimed darker colors for their AMOLED displays, which both excel at blacks and benefit power wise from them.
iOS, on the other hand, likes to be the chipper, brighter UI, and I think Ive would go that way to be opposite from Android as well.
My big question is, what will Jon Ive come up with? <span style="line-height:1.231;">We know he's a big Dieter Rams fan, so perhaps we should look at old Braun designs to get some ideas. In the meantime, I've gathered a few fan concepts of a "flat" style:</span>
[images]
Notice I alternated between dark and light versions. My bet would be towards a light background scheme.
For one thing, Android has pretty much claimed darker colors for their AMOLED displays, which both excel at blacks and benefit power wise from them.
iOS, on the other hand, likes to be the chipper, brighter UI, and I think Ive would go that way to be opposite from Android as well.
There's not enough contrast in some places, not enough depth in others, and it's not nearly as warm as I'd like.
The overall tone is pretty, though. I particularly like dropping ALL software references to the original Aqua, and have been confused for years at why they haven't done this by now. There's no reason for any UIImage to include faux glossiness when the physical hardware itself is, under all circumstances, glossy. I love the gradients that come from a matte finish where Apple has done them already, and I'd like to see that unified everywhere.
For one thing, Android has pretty much claimed darker colors for their AMOLED displays, which both excel at blacks and benefit power wise from them.
iOS, on the other hand, likes to be the chipper, brighter UI, and I think Ive would go that way to be opposite from Android as well.
Thoughts?
I wouldn't say android has 'claimed' the darker colors. Android, IIRC has both a holo dark and holo light theme, and google has been using the lighter theme a lot more lately, especially in their newer apps:
My big question is, what will Jon Ive come up with? We know he's a big Dieter Rams fan, so perhaps we should look at old Braun designs to get some ideas.
Hmm. Silvers, whites, greys?
In the meantime, I've gathered a few fan concepts of a "flat" style:
Notice some are dark, some light. My bet would be towards a light background scheme.
For one thing, Android has pretty much claimed darker colors for their AMOLED displays, which both excel at blacks and benefit power wise from them.
iOS, on the other hand, likes to be the chipper, brighter UI, and I think Ive would go that way to be opposite from Android as well.
Thoughts?
Great post. My thoughts: the Apple app icons are too abstracted (what is the app represented by the icon above the blue messages icon?) and flat (a bit of 3D effect and shading on the keyboard would be nice). I like the lack of gloss and texture on the app icons as well as the warm color tones, but the Apple apps should retain their current icon colors, at least in the short term. The Clock app interface is uninviting. The Safari (is that a Klingon weapon?) and Photos (I wouldn't want to touch that) icons are somewhat menacing.
Apple should be very careful not to "pull a Metro" and confuse their current users, which is why I doubt they'll go this hard in iOS 7. I can see something like this being a successful design scheme, but only after approximating toward it over 2-3 iOS versions.
Rams had a unique penchant for melding smooth minimalist surfaces with warm contours in a way that made his designs very inviting and appealing to the touch. I think Ive will go more minimal, but the aesthetic will be more warm. I can see a matte off-white background consistent use of round-recs, and fewer primary colors.
I wouldn't say android has 'claimed' the darker colors. Android, IIRC has both a holo dark and holo light theme, and google has been using the lighter theme a lot more lately, especially in their newer apps:
Google Keep:
Google Now:
The new play store:
Good point!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rogifan
KDarling do you ever get sick of mentioning Ive and Dieter Rams in the same sentence. It's getting a little tiresome.
Why would it get tiresome? Ive himself has many times stated what an admirer of Rams he is, and how great Rams' influence on him has been... just as with many other famous designers. Rams is the guiding light behind them all.
That's why I say that the biggest clue as to what iOS 7 would look like, will be to try to think about what Rams would've done.
In Ive's forward to the book "Dieter Rams: As Little Design as Possible", we see this very well, and how it even influenced the design of the iPhone's Home button:
"In so many ways Dieter Rams's work is beyond improvement. Although new technologies have since offered new opportunities, his designs are not undermined by the limits of the technologies of their time.
The concave button top, necessary to stop your finger from slipping as it made the long travel necessary for earlier mechanical switches, does not point to obsolete mechanisms. Instead, it reminds, us how immediately and intuitively form alone can describe what an object does and suggest how we should use it."
We get further clues as to what Ive is thinking about visual clutter when he says:
"It brings order and explanation to what is a far more complex problem than the user could possibly conceive. Simplicity, of course, is not the absence of complexity. Just removing clutter would result in uncomplicated but meaningless products. Rams's genius lies in understanding and giving form to the very essence of an object's being - almost describing its reason for existence..."
And finally, Ive talks about how Rams did not work in a vacuum, but with others in his company.
"For a designer to produce a couple of objects this significant and influential in their lifetime could define a movement. To produce more than 500 borders on the absurd.
This speaks to perhaps a less obvious but critically important attribute of Rams - his ability to collaborate. The fact we know Rams primarily by his beautifully engineered and mass-manufactured products rather than his credo of good design, speaks volumes about his extraordinary collaborations within Braun.
In defining individual products he also defined Braun. His was not an academic experiment in modernism. He lived every day with the commercial realities and consequences of what he and his team designed. Equally, he lived with the organizational and structural consequences of the way he and his team worked."
This internal collaboration is something that Ive is pushing for now that Forstall is gone.
So I say again, look to Rams to see what Ive will do.
Comments
Quote:
Originally Posted by majjo
This horrible mouse was actually Steve Jobs' idea and he was it's main cheerleader.
In his defence, Jobs held a mouse differently than about 90% of the public if you look at the old videos.
I don't have a problem with the way iOS looks now. It works great. However, I am looking forward to seeing what iOS 7 will look like.
Time for someone to make a music video. iPhone Jonny style.
Utter rubbish. As a software engineer let me tell you that UI design is a totally different speciality. Apples look and feel has never been decided by engineers ( except perhaps for dev tools) but by designers. All that has happened here is a change in the guard of UI designers - if the rumours are true - from pro skeumorphic to pro minimalist.
UI has always been designer led. Apple is not Linux.
Quote:
Originally Posted by stelligent
Good counter-example. In fact, has Apple ever produced a truly good mouse? Ive did redeem himself with the glass touchpad, assuming he was involved in its design.
I'd say the current crop of iPod Nanos simply fail to meet the standard of iPhones. I wonder if Ive has even paid attention to them.
I'd also like to chime in and argue that the current iPod shuffle is sub-par. A previous generation shuffle (of the same approximate dimensions) was a far better, more usable product.
Quote:
Originally Posted by stelligent
In fact, has Apple ever produced a truly good mouse?
I've owned many Apple mice (though none since maybe 2011) and nearly every single one I dumped in favor of someone else's that I liked better.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
Nonsense! Of course he can.
Can he metalwork? Has he wrought steel and iron with his bare (heat-gloved) hands, working a forge with the little accordion blower thing? And yet he makes works of art in hardware.
Does a painter crush his own berries, flowers, and minerals to make his paints? And yet he makes works of art on canvas.
On the contrary, software can be both beautiful in its simplicity and vast in its power. Ive's job is to funnel the power into a beautiful facade.
Two wrong analogies don't make a right.
A better one would be this - Does the framer of a painting get most of the credit for its artistic brilliance? What about the person who mounts it on the ball? Or the lighting guy? No. The essence of a painting is the painting itself.
Similarly, it is true that hair, makeup and clothes can make anyone look better, but none of it is what constitutes the true beauty of a woman, which is instead defined by geometry, complexion, proportions ...
Likewise, the essence of a software product is the underlying architecture and algorithms - . The UI may be part of the architecture but it does not exist for its own sake. Furthermore, the UI is easily replaceable.
Quote:
Originally Posted by asdasd
Utter rubbish. As a software engineer let me tell you that UI design is a totally different speciality. Apples look and feel has never been decided by engineers ( except perhaps for dev tools) but by designers. All that has happened here is a change in the guard of UI designers - if the rumours are true - from pro skeumorphic to pro minimalist.
UI has always been designer led. Apple is not Linux.
Yes, UI development is a specialty, and an important one at that. So are makeup, framing, lighting, fashion design, etc. Bad makeup can hide a woman's real beauty just as bad UI can make an app appear dysfunctional. But anyone who believes these components are more important than the core structure is not a software developer who gets it, and is further someone who appreciates true beauty.
Finally, it is absolutely false that UI has always been designer led. Absolutely false. Go tell Marissa Mayer that she is a designer and not a computer scientist. Furthermore, the designers involved in UI design are not the same class of designer as Jony Ive and the industrial designers he leads. You are misunderstanding and mixing up software design, industrial design, graphics design and UX design. Software developer my eye.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
I'd also like to chime in and argue that the current iPod shuffle is sub-par. A previous generation shuffle (of the same approximate dimensions) was a far better, more usable product.
The best Shuffle remains the first one. I seem to recall Jobs referring to it as a stick of gum? I still have mine and recently delighted myself by confirming that it still worked fine. The follow-up designs, IMO, have been too small or cannot be plugged into a USB port.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rogifan
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
Well, we are all anonymous though so how would you know? I have a degree in Industrial Design, but you may or may not believe me and no one seems to listen to me when I post about design issues anyway.
Fair enough.
But your assessment is subjective - i.e. a matter of taste. A trained designer, however, knows more about standards and can discern rationales for choice of proportions, materials, etc.
Originally Posted by ankleskater
Two wrong analogies don't make a right.
Good thing I used right ones, eh?
The UI may be part of the architecture but it does not exist for its own sake. Furthermore, the UI is easily replaceable.
That explains why we're still using a Menu Bar, cursor, folders, and windows after 30 years. And a Dock after 13.
"Easily", huh? Microsoft is sure having a time of it.
Originally Posted by Rogifan
Just curious what you mean here...
"Jonathan Ive does no work of any appreciable worth."
Blah blah blah.
My big question is, what will Jon Ive come up with? We know he's a big Dieter Rams fan, so perhaps we should look at old Braun designs to get some ideas.
Hmm. Silvers, whites, greys?
In the meantime, I've gathered a few fan concepts of a "flat" style:
Notice some are dark, some light. My bet would be towards a light background scheme.
For one thing, Android has pretty much claimed darker colors for their AMOLED displays, which both excel at blacks and benefit power wise from them.
iOS, on the other hand, likes to be the chipper, brighter UI, and I think Ive would go that way to be opposite from Android as well.
Thoughts?
I agree with all your points. Good post.
Originally Posted by KDarling
[images]
I'm…
…………………………………………………………………… Almost okay with this.
There's not enough contrast in some places, not enough depth in others, and it's not nearly as warm as I'd like.
The overall tone is pretty, though. I particularly like dropping ALL software references to the original Aqua, and have been confused for years at why they haven't done this by now. There's no reason for any UIImage to include faux glossiness when the physical hardware itself is, under all circumstances, glossy. I love the gradients that come from a matte finish where Apple has done them already, and I'd like to see that unified everywhere.
I wouldn't say android has 'claimed' the darker colors. Android, IIRC has both a holo dark and holo light theme, and google has been using the lighter theme a lot more lately, especially in their newer apps:
Google Keep:
Google Now:
The new play store:
Quote:
Originally Posted by KDarling
Blah blah blah.
My big question is, what will Jon Ive come up with? We know he's a big Dieter Rams fan, so perhaps we should look at old Braun designs to get some ideas.
Hmm. Silvers, whites, greys?
In the meantime, I've gathered a few fan concepts of a "flat" style:
Notice some are dark, some light. My bet would be towards a light background scheme.
For one thing, Android has pretty much claimed darker colors for their AMOLED displays, which both excel at blacks and benefit power wise from them.
iOS, on the other hand, likes to be the chipper, brighter UI, and I think Ive would go that way to be opposite from Android as well.
Thoughts?
Great post. My thoughts: the Apple app icons are too abstracted (what is the app represented by the icon above the blue messages icon?) and flat (a bit of 3D effect and shading on the keyboard would be nice). I like the lack of gloss and texture on the app icons as well as the warm color tones, but the Apple apps should retain their current icon colors, at least in the short term. The Clock app interface is uninviting. The Safari (is that a Klingon weapon?) and Photos (I wouldn't want to touch that) icons are somewhat menacing.
Apple should be very careful not to "pull a Metro" and confuse their current users, which is why I doubt they'll go this hard in iOS 7. I can see something like this being a successful design scheme, but only after approximating toward it over 2-3 iOS versions.
Rams had a unique penchant for melding smooth minimalist surfaces with warm contours in a way that made his designs very inviting and appealing to the touch. I think Ive will go more minimal, but the aesthetic will be more warm. I can see a matte off-white background consistent use of round-recs, and fewer primary colors.
Quote:
Originally Posted by majjo
I wouldn't say android has 'claimed' the darker colors. Android, IIRC has both a holo dark and holo light theme, and google has been using the lighter theme a lot more lately, especially in their newer apps:
Google Keep:
Google Now:
The new play store:
Good point!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rogifan
KDarling do you ever get sick of mentioning Ive and Dieter Rams in the same sentence. It's getting a little tiresome.
Why would it get tiresome? Ive himself has many times stated what an admirer of Rams he is, and how great Rams' influence on him has been... just as with many other famous designers. Rams is the guiding light behind them all.
That's why I say that the biggest clue as to what iOS 7 would look like, will be to try to think about what Rams would've done.
In Ive's forward to the book "Dieter Rams: As Little Design as Possible", we see this very well, and how it even influenced the design of the iPhone's Home button:
"In so many ways Dieter Rams's work is beyond improvement. Although new technologies have since offered new opportunities, his designs are not undermined by the limits of the technologies of their time.
The concave button top, necessary to stop your finger from slipping as it made the long travel necessary for earlier mechanical switches, does not point to obsolete mechanisms. Instead, it reminds, us how immediately and intuitively form alone can describe what an object does and suggest how we should use it."
We get further clues as to what Ive is thinking about visual clutter when he says:
"It brings order and explanation to what is a far more complex problem than the user could possibly conceive. Simplicity, of course, is not the absence of complexity. Just removing clutter would result in uncomplicated but meaningless products. Rams's genius lies in understanding and giving form to the very essence of an object's being - almost describing its reason for existence..."
And finally, Ive talks about how Rams did not work in a vacuum, but with others in his company.
"For a designer to produce a couple of objects this significant and influential in their lifetime could define a movement. To produce more than 500 borders on the absurd.
This speaks to perhaps a less obvious but critically important attribute of Rams - his ability to collaborate. The fact we know Rams primarily by his beautifully engineered and mass-manufactured products rather than his credo of good design, speaks volumes about his extraordinary collaborations within Braun.
In defining individual products he also defined Braun. His was not an academic experiment in modernism. He lived every day with the commercial realities and consequences of what he and his team designed. Equally, he lived with the organizational and structural consequences of the way he and his team worked."
This internal collaboration is something that Ive is pushing for now that Forstall is gone.
So I say again, look to Rams to see what Ive will do.