Look at the Maps app window. You say form follows function? The traffic-light window control has always been attached to the window bar. Look where it’s attached now. How do you drag that Maps window around now? I’m asking. Because I don’t know. I don’t have macOS 26 installed yet. Can I drag from anywhere across the top? Do I have to grab from within the title area of the left area? Can it also be from the next similarly tinted area next to it? I don’t know.
There’s first order confusion about window dragging. On a Mac. 41 years after its introduction.
It took me ages to work out what just seemed “wrong” with the finder icon. It’s been flipped around and looks wrong, put it back to how it should be Apple!
So, AI's writers seem to be having trouble distinguishing what is Liquid Glass and what is not. Liquid Glass is specifically a full cosmetic makeover, including some changes in the way UI elements behave and react, that is being applied simultaneously to all of Apple's OSs. The Spotlight changes — e.g., a clipboard manager — you reference above, apart from the appearance and behavioral changes in the controls themselves, are not part of Liquid Glass.
Likewise, not every enhancement to every OS is necessarily related to Liquid Glass. Yes, these new features do appear with Liquid Glass UI elements, but that doesn't mean they depend on Liquid Glass to exist. Apple could have added a clipboard manager even if they had not included Liquid Glass in this release. So, basically, if you are looking at enhancements that are, "more than skin deep," they are probably not part of Liquid Glass, even if you have never seen them using any other "skin".
It’s both ui and UX. Comprehensive UI and only changing some UX.
I think apple took a nice balanced approach here. Didn’t try to reinvent the wheel but made enough useful chsnged to how things work as to improve where it was needed.
In the ui front, affecting UX to a degree, is the readability drawbacks in some areas. Hopefully those get resolved by launch. And if not, I assume an update addressing such matters will not be far behind.
It reminds me of Aqua launch in that sense where some things were way overdone and reigned in by the time Jaguar launched, finally achieving peak form in Tiger before switching to more of a plain look and ditching most of the obviously Aqua UI elements.
So, AI's writers seem to be having trouble distinguishing what is Liquid Glass and what is not. Liquid Glass is specifically a full cosmetic makeover, including some changes in the way UI elements behave and react, that is being applied simultaneously to all of Apple's OSs. The Spotlight changes — e.g., a clipboard manager — you reference above, apart from the appearance and behavioral changes in the controls themselves, are not part of Liquid Glass.
Likewise, not every enhancement to every OS is necessarily related to Liquid Glass. Yes, these new features do appear with Liquid Glass UI elements, but that doesn't mean they depend on Liquid Glass to exist. Apple could have added a clipboard manager even if they had not included Liquid Glass in this release. So, basically, if you are looking at enhancements that are, "more than skin deep," they are probably not part of Liquid Glass, even if you have never seen them using any other "skin".
It’s both ui and UX. Comprehensive UI and only changing some UX.
The point was that there is no connection between Liquid Glass, and changes to Spotlight or Clipboard managers. Rather these are separate things that are only coincidentally associated because they are in the same release. That Liquid Glass almost literally is in fact only skin deep.
I liked most of the look of Liquid Glass when watching the Keynote. But here, icons don't have a glass-like 3D look to them. That bothers me.
I like that the menubar is invisible. As someone else asked, how do you move a window around? Can you just click and drag anywhere? That can't be done in Sonoma. Are title bars goon for other windows?
The current volume icon is far more preferable to me. It's clear, easier to see, and only there when you need it, and you can't miss it. The new one "being displayed right where all Mac notifications go" isn't a particular advantage.
Over the years Apple has decreased contrast more and more in some areas. Trying to adjust it in Prefs is not a satisfying experience. I see it as an even bigger problems for a lot of users in 26. That's change for the sake of change, and definitely not an increase in functionality or usability.
And what's up with the poor captioning of pics? So far, every site I've seen has the caption in a smaller typeface than the body of the article, often in Italics, and centered under the pic. AI makes captions look like part of the body of the article. It's really annoying. Is this a new design ethic, a time saver, or a bug.
I really really dislike the iOS style of System Preferences, or the continual name change of them. I must Search for them because Apple makes in necessary to find so many of them. This is much worse than the constant rearranging of them in System Prefs in the old palette display.
So, AI's writers seem to be having trouble distinguishing what is Liquid Glass and what is not. Liquid Glass is specifically a full cosmetic makeover, including some changes in the way UI elements behave and react, that is being applied simultaneously to all of Apple's OSs. The Spotlight changes — e.g., a clipboard manager — you reference above, apart from the appearance and behavioral changes in the controls themselves, are not part of Liquid Glass.
Likewise, not every enhancement to every OS is necessarily related to Liquid Glass. Yes, these new features do appear with Liquid Glass UI elements, but that doesn't mean they depend on Liquid Glass to exist. Apple could have added a clipboard manager even if they had not included Liquid Glass in this release. So, basically, if you are looking at enhancements that are, "more than skin deep," they are probably not part of Liquid Glass, even if you have never seen them using any other "skin".
It’s both ui and UX. Comprehensive UI and only changing some UX.
The point was that there is no connection between Liquid Glass, and changes to Spotlight or Clipboard managers. Rather these are separate things that are only coincidentally associated because they are in the same release. That Liquid Glass almost literally is in fact only skin deep.
Exactly. They could have made all of the changes without the liquid glass appearance. Conversely, they could have applied the liquid glass appearance to Sequoia without changing how it functioned.
The one area where all of this transparency or translucency falters, though, is in readability. If you can't read what you need or you can't find the app you want, Liquid Glass would be sap productivity.
And it's possible to get into just that situation.
This is the critical flaw with Liquid Glass. None of the examples in the article seem to improve usability at all and often seem to hinder it. That, folks, is simply poor design.
Comments
I like that the menubar is invisible. As someone else asked, how do you move a window around? Can you just click and drag anywhere? That can't be done in Sonoma. Are title bars goon for other windows?
The current volume icon is far more preferable to me. It's clear, easier to see, and only there when you need it, and you can't miss it. The new one "being displayed right where all Mac notifications go" isn't a particular advantage.
Over the years Apple has decreased contrast more and more in some areas. Trying to adjust it in Prefs is not a satisfying experience. I see it as an even bigger problems for a lot of users in 26. That's change for the sake of change, and definitely not an increase in functionality or usability.
And what's up with the poor captioning of pics? So far, every site I've seen has the caption in a smaller typeface than the body of the article, often in Italics, and centered under the pic. AI makes captions look like part of the body of the article. It's really annoying. Is this a new design ethic, a time saver, or a bug.
I really really dislike the iOS style of System Preferences, or the continual name change of them. I must Search for them because Apple makes in necessary to find so many of them. This is much worse than the constant rearranging of them in System Prefs in the old palette display.
This is the critical flaw with Liquid Glass. None of the examples in the article seem to improve usability at all and often seem to hinder it. That, folks, is simply poor design.