undefined | Better HN

0 pointsburntcaramel2mo ago0 comments

This is why Steve Jobs demoed software. Watch when he unveils Aqua, there’s a couple of slides of the lickable visuals and then he sits down and demos it. He clicks and taps and shows it working. Because that’s what you the user will do.

He’ll show boring things like resizing windows because those things matter to you trying and if he cares about resizing windows to this degree then imagine what else this product has.

Apple today hides behind slick motion graphics introductions that promise ideal software. That’s setting them up to fail because no one can live up to a fantasy. Steve showed working software that was good enough to demo and then got his team to ship it.

0 comments

halapro2mo ago

> He’ll show boring things like resizing windows

If you use something long enough, you'll get used to its idiosyncrasies. Jobs would have clicked and dragged 10px away from the rounded corner here instinctively. This is why the owner of an old car can turn it on and drive away in a blink while his son has trouble: hold the accelerator 10% down, giggle the key a little while turning, pull the wheel a bit, ... all comes natural to the owner.

eviks2mo ago

So why would he have different instincts?

> This never happened to me before in almost 40 years of using computers.

> If you use something long enough, you'll get used to its idiosyncrasies.

Or you don't and get constantly annoyed by some basic thing that is broken (the owner of an old car would curse it every day when giggling the key)

SoftTalker2mo ago

Yes, and Mac owners will do the same thing. I don't use MacOS but people will just figure out the new behavior, be briefly annoyed by it, and then get used to it and move on. Apple could have done better here but users acclimate to much worse UX than this.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse