[HN Gopher] Making Software Fun
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Making Software Fun
Author : zdw
Score : 88 points
Date : 2025-02-07 23:45 UTC (3 days ago)
(HTM) web link (furbo.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (furbo.org)
| weikju wrote:
| I miss fun software. Great read!
| userbinator wrote:
| These sorts of "fun" things are only a good idea if your software
| is already good. Otherwise they'll just make your users hate your
| product even more ("what the hell did you spend your effort
| on!?")
| pplonski86 wrote:
| Agree. The software should be good and reliable. Then we can
| think about small and simple improvements like that.
|
| I would say that software should be first smart, then it can be
| fun.
| selcuka wrote:
| True, but at the same time "enterprise software" vendors keep
| changing their UI icons instead of fixing real, decade old bugs
| (I'm looking at you, JetBrains). Apparently there is some value
| in adding such features.
| Hamuko wrote:
| Product managers aren't seen to be shipping if all that they
| have to show are bug fixes that the actual engineers did.
| They need big projects that they can slap their name on.
| brabel wrote:
| Also, designers gotta justify their jobs.
| yarekt wrote:
| Well where do you think all that tech debt that "we'll pay
| off later" goes? new icons is the only thing they can ship
| quickly.
|
| In their defence who wants to be the first PO to ship nothing
| for extended period of time. Long term always takes a back
| seat to short term, IMO in any company pressure must come
| from the very top
| zelphirkalt wrote:
| Atlassian (broken Markdown parsers, incredibly sluggish/laggy
| UIs, update state issues on page without reload, and
| countless more)
|
| Microsoft Windows (bugs relating to icons "down at the clock"
| and tooltips of those icons, sound volume management, start
| menu lag, stupid search in start menu, where when you type 3
| letters it finds the thing you search, but when you type 4
| letters it is no longer there, worse and worse system
| settings dialogs, hiding everything behind 3 more dialogs to
| click, and many more)
|
| Salesforce Slack (buggy Markdown parser (what is it with
| these big companies always getting something like Markdown
| wrong???), laggy as hell, still no voice chat on FF, ...)
|
| All of these big companies make dysfunctional software, that
| they can only push down our throats, because of uninformed
| management levels and the sheer size of marketing budgets
| they spent.
| doix wrote:
| I used to work for a small SaaS that _really_ cared about
| quality/speed/usability. Unfortunately, it doesn't really
| sell well. People care about features and if you're missing
| a feature compared to a competitor people won't pick you.
| Even if the competitors feature is absolute garbage and
| probably a net-negative because people will try to use
| something broken, people will still pick it.
|
| We probably got a feature complete/working within less than
| a week then spent months as the CEO (who was a product guy)
| was nitpicking. We'd routinely throw away features if we
| felt they didn't fit well.
|
| In the end it didn't really matter. I liked the tool and
| was proud of it, but it in terms of making money, it didn't
| do well.
| Lanolderen wrote:
| I wanna hate it but I've done it. It's just tempting to go
| for the "this looks a bit wonky" or "add CSV import/export to
| X" ticket instead of the "weird bug, can't reproduce, here
| are some logs, reassigned 12 times in the past 3 years"
| ticket.
| dunham wrote:
| You're working on bugs? Sounds like there is room in the
| schedule for another feature.
| wink wrote:
| I think in this case it's about a beta of unreleased software
| (or right about launch), so that doesn't even apply.
|
| But I think the main factor is that it's not-business software
| by a relatively popular (and well-liked) "small" software
| company.
| trilbyglens wrote:
| Pre-salesforce Slack is probably the most clear example of this
| in my mind. Still to this day, their API documentation is a lot
| of fun to read.
|
| The Salesforce Behemoth Corporate Machine is slowly eroding the
| character of Slack, though, sadly.
| selcuka wrote:
| Their release notes [1] is still kind of fun.
|
| [1] https://slack.com/intl/en-au/release-notes/mac
| unfixed wrote:
| Haha didn't know about this.
|
| Honestly this is the tone that should have all release notes!
| smatija wrote:
| I really appreciate this one from 4.18:
|
| Certain menus were not being properly translated when
| switching languages in the app. You know what they say about
| menus -- they're most helpful when you can read them.
| plasticsoprano wrote:
| Codekit still has the best release notes,
| https://codekitapp.com/updates/
| Nevermark wrote:
| I once shipped a product whose app icon within the app
| disappeared if clicked, revealing a square "monitor" with a small
| version of Breakout you had better start playing with your
| left/right arrow keys because the game started upon appearance.
|
| EDIT:
|
| In a user's guide I introduced diagrams of calculations with
| points for scalar values, vertical bars for vectors, and then
| square 2-D grids to represent matrices, which I referred to as
| "waffles". With "waffle", referenced by page, in the index at the
| back of the guide.
|
| I wondered if anyone would register the mild ridiculousness, but
| I had people coming up to me in conferences later laughing about
| matrix waffles.
| stefs wrote:
| ah, i once worked on a website and photoshopped one eye of a
| customer for a testimonial shut. then i switched the images out
| for a few ms on a random timer: i.e., die testimonal was winking
| at you. it was tiny and only happened once every few minutes but
| led to a lot of amusement in the dev team (you mostly saw some
| movement in the corner of your eye, took them ages to pinpoint it
| down). removed it before going live, tho.
| FreezerburnV wrote:
| One of my absolute favorite pieces of software of all time is
| "Toot!", the Mastodon client on iOS. It's because it exemplifies
| this type of development extremely well, with most interaction in
| the app having some kind of fun little thing attached to it.
| Favorite a post? It starts an animation from the start turning
| the entire post gold, which persists and IIRC shimmers
| occasionally. Boost a post? It pops it out and moves the post up
| the screen before putting the post back. There are lots of little
| fun things it does, and it just makes it so _fun_ to interact
| with. We need more software that embodies this type of design,
| letting things be more fun or whimsical, instead of super serious
| or "corporate fun" (e.g.: Notion).
| rsyring wrote:
| FWIW, this is a very subjective sentiment. I really, really
| dislike things like you described. Software is a tool to me.
| Let me do my job with it as simply as possible. No distractions
| and don't get in my way.
|
| It would be like putting flashing lights on a hammer every time
| you hit a nail. Might sell well at Christmas but very few
| carpenters I know would want one.
| MeetingsBrowser wrote:
| Some software is a tool, but I think social media is solidly
| entertainment. Especially liking and boosting toots.
|
| Tools should be practical, entertainment should be fun.
| aloisdg wrote:
| For accessibility reason, this kind of features are often in
| opt-out.
| jccalhoun wrote:
| These things can be fun and help add a lot of personality but it
| is a problem if they get in the way of doing things. I'm reminded
| of old dvd menus where instead of just being able to hit play you
| had to sit through some swooping animation.
| testbreakfast wrote:
| this reminds me of the old meeting room ipads in pivotal labs
| offices. if you swiped diagonally downwards from the top corner,
| it would start flashing rainbow colours and play (iirc) September
| by Earth Wind and Fire.
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