Something that strikes me is that the name of his new design studio LoveFrom was inspired by a quote by Steve Jobs. It just shows how deep the relationship was between Ive and Jobs. I am not sure actually if it is very healthy for someone to be so strongly linked to a great man who passed away. I am sure Ive has been trough an incredible personal struggle to define himself as a man outside the Apple system.
Like the 2013 Mac Pro, Ive's notable errors reflect a preoccupation with beauty that eclipses functionality. His worst work is in building mice that are refined down their most basic design elements until they are just really shitty to use. Perhaps a fresh approach would create an entirely new kind of pointer that worked exceptionally well, even if it didn't look like a beautiful mouse at all.
Reductio ad absurdum
I liked that mouse. No, not for the sake of saying something controversial but really it was a pleasure to use it provided that you are not "holding it wrong". The mouse moves mostly in circular paths on the table, this might be the reason of why the shape of the mouse matches its movement. It is relatively easier to move a circular mouse in circular movements than a rectangular mouse. One downside is that you may lose the orientation of the mouse during that movement, but no, this is not a totally free movement, it is controlled by the orientation of the cable, it was easier to reacquire orientation than losing it.
But then enter people's habits and muscle memory... Just like today's users stroking their keyboards to the extreme because mechanical typewriter keys had a long travel path, the users of that mouse were trying to "grab" or "catch" it to the extreme, because they were used to PCs' brick size mice. You don't grab that mouse, you don't hold it in the palm of your hand, it moves freely under your fingers. Your wrist rests on the table, then your fingers move to drive the mouse: a way to prevent carpal tunnel syndrome because your wrist is not elevated. It is one of Ive's most clever creations not appreciated by the "clients"... But, that's business, ingratitude is part of it.
They should make the update to that mouse. Wireless, charging port in sensible position, full touch top surface, laser tracking plus gyro tracking.
you could then just push it around the mouse would sense where your hand is and set the orientation based on based on those inputs.
Sure maybe not as brilliant as Apple Pencil on any surface to replace mouse but better than current default mouse.
You discard all the decoration and you expose pure functions. So what is “function” and what is not can be easily discerned.
You can go too far.
Take the interior of the Tesla Model 3. No traditional instruments at all. Just a screen that looks like it was added as an afterthought. i.e. not integrated like the Model S.
Almost everything is done through the screen. The U/I is good but many things require you to take your eyes off the road. That is not good even with Autopilot (sic).
The thing is bland to the point of being totally dull and uninspiring.
Ease of use is poor if you have to take your eyes off the screen to adjust the fan speed or A/C temp. In my car, I can do that with one control and without watching the road ahead.
The way Tesla is going... as in minimalist means less build cost is not for me.
Disagreed 100%. I have a Model 3 and I don't ever want to go back to 100-mechanical buttons and knobs. It's super easy to understand and it's much more inviting than other cars where it feels like information overload. Also, in the future you can reassign the knobs on the steering wheel to adjust temperature controls via software update. It's like going from a Blackberry to an iPhone. Sure you lose the tactile feel of a keyboard, but the UI on giant touch display can always be updated.
The way Tesla going is full self driving. In a few years, you don't even need to have eyes on the road.
I want a wooden iPhone and MacBook. Oak, walnut, teak... and an aluminium/rubber MBP that you can perch on a wet truck bonnet and drop in the creek... But the new 2019 Mac Pro is a step in just the right direction for me. Things that work to make stuff with.
Right with you on Gruber, Daniel. The posting you reference seemed to me so small-minded (and potty-mouthed) that I've unsubscribed from DF, which I've followed for not a few years.
“Contrast that with the new Mac Pro that debuted at WWDC19, which looks like it was designed by Sun or perhaps Dell's Alienware, with a focus on performance and functionality that eclipses its intelligent but utilitarian design.“
Perfectly stated and characterized. I wish I could click the Like button next to individual paragraphs in an article. This article would have gotten nearly as many likes as it has paragraphs. Dead on point, all the way through!
Contrast “design focused” what with the new Mac Pro? The 2013 Mac Pro was not Ive’s design-focused idiosyncratic creation, it was an engineering-focused solution. Simply the industry couldn’t keep-up with multiple GPU design and Thunderbolt expansion, so “thermal core” architecture they focused on has been proved as being not the only architecture available, “thermal core” became a “thermal corner” with Federighi’s saying. Proven right or wrong their initial concern was functionality, not design aesthetics. It is irrelevant to relate that engineering issue to Jony Ive.
I disagree. The 2013 Mac Pro was designed to a particular aesthetic and then the engineering team worked hard with the design team to arrive at a working solution. If that was not the case then why did the aesthetic change from the 2012 "cheese grater" form factor? Engineers (mostly) don't like changing things for the sake of change; the tower case was perfectly suitable for a new version of the machine (this is why the latest Mac Pro has a very similar case) and could have been adjusted to provide greater cooling with less fan noise, be constructed with the same shell as the 2013 MP, and make use of dual GPUs (or quad GPUs) to deliver on the design goals in a less-constrained package.
The 2013 Mac Pro is a perfect example of Apple's approach: design something that not only looks awesome but is practical and elegant, and then try as hard as possible to use high performance, high quality components so that it doesn't get derided as a "toy" or "under-powered" machine. In other words, figure out how you want it to work as the first step, then figure out how to build it so it works that way.
This is where I agree with Gruber: DESIGN (which is "how it works") should be the primary authority, and having the design team report to the operations lead is going to result in bias towards "it's too hard to build it that way" - which is not how I want Apple to operate. By all means, make sure your designs are practical: I'm not saying engineering should never push back, or that designers don't make mistakes, or that you should sacrifice value for capability. But, as Jony said in one of the videos, the goal is not to make money - making money is a consequence of operational competence - the goal is to make beautiful things. People want, and will buy, beautiful things.
Apple is absolutely one of the most operationally competent institutions on this planet, and they have grown into a corporate behemoth because of it, but I don't buy and use Apple products because of the company's operations - I buy and use the products because they are beautiful and they do the jobs I need them to do.
Comments
Wireless, charging port in sensible position, full touch top surface, laser tracking plus gyro tracking.
you could then just push it around the mouse would sense where your hand is and set the orientation based on based on those inputs.
Sure maybe not as brilliant as Apple Pencil on any surface to replace mouse but better than current default mouse.
Disagreed 100%. I have a Model 3 and I don't ever want to go back to 100-mechanical buttons and knobs. It's super easy to understand and it's much more inviting than other cars where it feels like information overload. Also, in the future you can reassign the knobs on the steering wheel to adjust temperature controls via software update. It's like going from a Blackberry to an iPhone. Sure you lose the tactile feel of a keyboard, but the UI on giant touch display can always be updated.
The way Tesla going is full self driving. In a few years, you don't even need to have eyes on the road.
The 2013 Mac Pro is a perfect example of Apple's approach: design something that not only looks awesome but is practical and elegant, and then try as hard as possible to use high performance, high quality components so that it doesn't get derided as a "toy" or "under-powered" machine. In other words, figure out how you want it to work as the first step, then figure out how to build it so it works that way.
This is where I agree with Gruber: DESIGN (which is "how it works") should be the primary authority, and having the design team report to the operations lead is going to result in bias towards "it's too hard to build it that way" - which is not how I want Apple to operate. By all means, make sure your designs are practical: I'm not saying engineering should never push back, or that designers don't make mistakes, or that you should sacrifice value for capability. But, as Jony said in one of the videos, the goal is not to make money - making money is a consequence of operational competence - the goal is to make beautiful things. People want, and will buy, beautiful things.
Apple is absolutely one of the most operationally competent institutions on this planet, and they have grown into a corporate behemoth because of it, but I don't buy and use Apple products because of the company's operations - I buy and use the products because they are beautiful and they do the jobs I need them to do.