Comments on: When everyone starts designing interfaces…

By: Sam

Sam — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 21:28:34 +0000

I don’t know KDE and am not a designer. Nor do I need to read this post past the title and the following sentence “If this blog post wouldn’t exist, I’m quite sure very few people would know what it does.” to know that this post will be a learning experience for Cocoia.

A war on bad design is great when it provides tangible alternatives. A war on bad design is lame when it complains about others.

Continue to lead by example, Sebastiaan. Don’t worry about others.

By: Vide

Vide — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 09:50:33 +0000

Cocoia (sorry I don’t know how to address to you), a couple of things:

“bouncing icons”…I’m sorry but the concept they express both in KDE and OSX it is the same: they give feedback on application’s launch. Additionaly, OSX dock uses bouncing icons to capture user attention, whilst KDE uses (a la Windows) flashing panels.

You’re right about context menus in OSX, it has never been the main paradigm, but nonetheless they are used (for example, while lesser discoverable, it’s quicker to use a context menu on a file to show its information rather than going to the top bar menu, Fitt’s law doesn’t apply here).

And for things like this, I found this Plasma idea simply great. It is discoverable, it is quick, and if they implement larger hover icons it’s even fitt’s law compliant.
And remember we are talking about DESKTOP icons, where you have a few, selected and often used documents

By: KDE Plasma Icons : David Paul Robinson

KDE Plasma Icons : David Paul Robinson — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 04:29:48 +0000

[...] Cocoia on the KDE Plasma icon rollovers: When everyone designs user interfaces… [...]

By: Christophe T

Christophe T — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 18:39:46 +0000

I like it. Adds functionality. You failed to mention the hover part :)

By: Aaron J. Seigo

Aaron J. Seigo — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 15:37:59 +0000

There’s a proverb I’m sure you’ve heard which goes something like: “it is better to stay silent and have people wonder how stupid you are than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.”

See, if you had actually looked at the plasma interface rather than gone spinning off and written this blog you would know that pretty much everything you wrote in your pompous little self-congratulatory entry is incorrect.

But hey, I suppose it’s more fun to just show us all how arrogant you can be in your ignorance. Good job, now we don’t have to wonder.

For the interested:

- there are not 3 coloured icons on every icon on your desktop
- there is no relevance to a mail app here, though the writer does a textbook job of setting up and knocking down the strawman on that one
- the self-proclaimed designed failed to get the connection between hover activated interfaces versus the banality of right click menus

Personally, I don’t mind if the author here doesn’t like KDE (or any other piece of software). I do take mirth in listening to the petulant whinges of “it’s not usable” all the while our user base not only grows but we achieve usability certifications in Europe and test quite well in real world situations. =)
From the editor:I’ve condensed your two comments into one.