Post AmlFbRhcHjn2SO1Zxo by janggolan@mastodon.cloud
(DIR) More posts by janggolan@mastodon.cloud
(DIR) Post #AmlBrbCmK4LKkH2zHk by futurebird@sauropods.win
2024-10-07T10:27:56Z
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Dear Silicone Valley,I know a thing or two about computers and have interacted with one or two of them in my time and I am begging you: focus on UI design and software more. I do not want a new device with a calendar app. I do not want AI in a calendar app. I want a better calendar app. I want my apps to be compatible with each other. Have your designers shadow people and find out where the frustration occurs and where the time is wasted and solve the problems that I know can be solved.
(DIR) Post #AmlCCvv8UxKn4fy4xs by albertcardona@mathstodon.xyz
2024-10-07T10:31:46Z
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@futurebird Couldn't agree more, but their business is not providing useful, integrated services. From their perspective, if they can't extract money from you, they couldn't care less. All are chasing the same dream: get millions, if not billions, of people to each give them $1. Ideally recurrently, monthly, as a subscription.
(DIR) Post #AmlChpmXN6uT0qgGZM by futurebird@sauropods.win
2024-10-07T10:37:22Z
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@albertcardona But they are going to be so sad when the smart glass they are all chasing now fail. Part of why Apple dominated *was* their attention to UI design. I have seen UI improve by leaps in my life. But, it's stagnated. That's what keeps anything from feeling like the future. Part of why people would buy a new 'kind' of product was the implicit promise of a new interface. Better software. They just keeping giving us the same buggy frustrating crap in different packages.
(DIR) Post #AmlCpxALnlpeEMgt1M by futurebird@sauropods.win
2024-10-07T10:38:50Z
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@albertcardona So I see "smart glasses" and the gadget fiend in me gets a little excited. Then I think about seeing the same horrible half-baked UI floating in my eye and I get a migraine. Show me you can make software that easier to use and integrated. They keep acting like this is a solved problem with no room to grow and that just isn't the case at all.
(DIR) Post #AmlD8xPf6k1iUyukQy by zl2tod@mastodon.online
2024-10-07T10:42:15Z
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@futurebird Big Tech is actively making things worse these days.cf. #enshittification per @pluralistic and all the "A.I." nonsense.We need to look to small enterprise for innovation, as we always have, but Big Tech exerts such complete control that any kind of innovation is very very hard.@albertcardona
(DIR) Post #AmlDIZsJTZ4sOQu2q0 by mensrea@freeradical.zone
2024-10-07T10:43:55Z
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@futurebird and use well defined and documented product design and development guidelines!? what are you? some kind of commie
(DIR) Post #AmlDNBhCni82qnuDEO by albertcardona@mathstodon.xyz
2024-10-07T10:44:48Z
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@futurebird MaxOSX 10.1 was a success because its UI was integrated. BeOS remains a legend because its UI was integrated. The first iPhone was a success because its UI was integrated across email, calendar, files, browser, phone, notes.Linux in the desktop never took over the world because it wasn't integrated. Now that it is – at least the Gnome desktop mostly is – it's too late, founder effects, winner-take-all effects, and network effects all come into play to entrench the incumbents. Plus wads of cash used in shady, questionable ways.In other words you have a point. The winner of the next wearable computing revolution will be recognizable early on for its integrated UI.
(DIR) Post #AmlDOIf8NuTEkMT25A by futurebird@sauropods.win
2024-10-07T10:44:49Z
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@mensrea I mean, probably. The way some conservatives react to me I think I must be.
(DIR) Post #AmlFbRhcHjn2SO1Zxo by janggolan@mastodon.cloud
2024-10-07T11:09:50Z
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You've prolly noticed the "Get-this-crap-out-the-door" through giveaways/updates without actually asking, "Would you like a bunch of RAM-eating mods that also suck your battery dry?"
(DIR) Post #AmlHdX89H6jnmLYe5g by futurebird@sauropods.win
2024-10-07T11:32:36Z
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@akareilly I saw a neat “executive computer” built into a desk from the 1980s— it had a calendar and … it would be about the same as what we all use now. It was maybe a little harder to use. but I think maybe some people don’t see all of the room for improvement. I still struggle with thins like simply viewing more than one week at a time. Or getting the correct notifications of upcoming classes — I could use the “executive calendar” and do just about as well.
(DIR) Post #AmlIPgF6hOwFwKlqrI by JonnyT@mastodon.me.uk
2024-10-07T11:41:17Z
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@futurebird I would be delighted if they just had a team that would consult with users to seek out and fix all the annoying little bugs and UI issues in their existing software that persist for years on end. The ones that lead to a slow death by a thousand cuts because of how aggravating and misery-inducing they become when you hit them on an hourly or daily or weekly basis. The stupid, "will they ever fix this one stupid thing, gaaaaahhh?" type of bugs that they never, ever fix.
(DIR) Post #AmlKAoVhsSSJ98Ze5Y by quatrezoneilles@mastodon.online
2024-10-07T12:01:01Z
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@futurebird I want to add my own pet peeve to this threadDiscrepancies betw keyboard shortcuts. They are a huge PITA in one's neverending quest to becoming a power userIf you start with Macs and switch to Linux, the former use a combination of their Command-key and Gnu (Control+key) conventions. The Linux standard is based on CUAMusic teachers have known for centuries that if you start learning a kbd piece and later change fingering, old one will keep coming back & aarghHear this, devs?
(DIR) Post #AmlLDEsUujqpSPxF7Q by profdc9@mastodon.social
2024-10-07T12:12:38Z
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@futurebird You don't need Silicon Valley to do this, you don't want them doing this, and they don't want to do it. The VCs are looking for startups that provide 100x return on investment. FAANG is desperately looking to validate their excessive valuations with AI smoke and mirrors BS. A software company that is small, owned by entrepreneurs and not private equity, and values a loyal user base is a better choice.
(DIR) Post #AmlMe6JaxVsUfm0AhE by catmisgivings@stranger.social
2024-10-07T12:28:43Z
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@futurebird I just want one thing. When I mark myself out of office on my Outlook calendar, I want it to prompt me to set my email out of office message. Bam!
(DIR) Post #AmlMkQvPFF2iKYhu3U by LJ@zirk.us
2024-10-07T12:29:51Z
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@futurebird and for the love of whatever anyone deems holy, don't change the interface unless it *actually* makes the user experience smoother & easier.
(DIR) Post #AmlMxR4U0nDMY79X6W by galoisghost@aus.social
2024-10-07T12:32:11Z
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@futurebird my views on AI as it stands are a bit scattered. I like using LLM to generate templates for things I struggle to write myself. I also don’t want “AI” in the applications that I use. Not the least because I know that it’s really all about siphoning up my data. However I would like adaptive algorithms that for example help me find apps on my phone, say it’s the weekend all of my sports apps are the first ones I see because that’s what I’m likely to use. Or helps me find my most used menu options in a desktop program. These can be done on device without the need to send it off to big tech.
(DIR) Post #AmlQWvFc63Qq9ByJvs by EthanCecchetti@discuss.systems
2024-10-07T13:12:14Z
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@futurebird Much of the problem seems to be lack of development of and support for open standards. Google calendar has a ton of great integrations and features...when everyone uses only Google products. Outlook calendar lets me see when everyone is free and is compatible with all sorts of other tools...when everyone uses only Microsoft products.If companies put the same effort into open standards they put into their walled gardens, we would have all sorts of great interplay. But that would hurt the bottom line.More attention to UI/UX from developers and PMs would be great, but I don't think that's the root of the problem. Then again, it's probably the easiest way to make headway right now. I shouldn't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
(DIR) Post #AmlXP7cGwCEdrPnWoy by laescude@mastodon.cr
2024-10-07T14:29:12Z
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@futurebird I’m a UX designer and let me tell you why it’s a tough time to be one:- Most of our leaders have been laid off. We now report to Engineering, Management or Marketing.- Professional associations are disintegrating or gone.- Design teams are shrinking and so it’s our scope.- Very few of us are allowed to conduct research, and even fewer get to work with UX research specialists.Solving actual user needs is our job! But constant improvement is not as valuable to capitalism.
(DIR) Post #AmlcFQPchQCX1w4pZQ by minimantis@mastodon.social
2024-10-07T15:23:32Z
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@futurebird Amen! If only our calendars could collaborate as seamlessly as tech companies throw around buzzwords.Let’s get those designers out of the boardroom and into the trenches; because a smooth user experience is worth a thousand new devices gathering dust.
(DIR) Post #AmlhhztWrzbkxKVbxw by Legit_Spaghetti@mastodo.neoliber.al
2024-10-07T16:24:43Z
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Silicone Valleygiggles uncontrollably@futurebird
(DIR) Post #Amm09AkIQr5zbUIXGi by apophis@brain.worm.pink
2024-10-07T16:51:58.133775Z
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@futurebird @albertcardona been thinking about why corporations keep seemingly intentionally making everything worse these past 15 years like they've got some categorical imperative to cause harm, and i have a theory"innovation" has become an obligatory buzzword for investors"new and improved" is a cliche and doing it honestly (and legally in some places) takes too much worknobody remembers old stuff, especially not old stuff that failedthere's only so many ways you can do any given taskthe only motivation therefore is to merely retrace steps that are doomed lead to all sorts of failed bad ideas, but everybody's doing it at once so consumers can't jump ship fast enough to discourage this behaviour - so the only selective pressure is to appease investors with more "innovation"
(DIR) Post #Amm0Po5tu3ymH3Kqa8 by prlg@mastodon.online
2024-10-07T19:54:11Z
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@futurebird @akareilly at a certain point, UX and Product people were deemed obsolete by nature of the sheer amount of data analytics provides.Problem being analytics can’t tell you “this sucks because you don’t have X” and the Execs who call the shots don’t have any desire to consider talking to actual users.
(DIR) Post #Amm17sujLPwdxq816e by bornach@fosstodon.org
2024-10-07T20:02:17Z
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@futurebird @akareilly Was it similar to the STC Executel?https://youtu.be/6QB0OinQkgA
(DIR) Post #Amm2K5wapCGhnzNyHw by cavyherd@wandering.shop
2024-10-07T20:15:43Z
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@futurebird We're currently working with a vendor to create a form that replaces one we'd been using Wufoo for, for a VERY simple & straightforward process.As of the last time I checked, fully half of the applications are abandoned unfinished, because the form is "too confusing." 🤦
(DIR) Post #Amm7dazo6AOTNr0V3Q by futurebird@sauropods.win
2024-10-07T21:15:16Z
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@bornach @akareilly Yes! That's the one. I look at that, and look at google calendar and shake my head.
(DIR) Post #Amm7f2uFoVQcEh6KtU by futurebird@sauropods.win
2024-10-07T21:15:31Z
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@bornach @akareilly That thing is nearly as old as I am.