ble52 | 6 years ago | on: Mac OS Catalina: more trouble than it’s worth (Part 2)
ble52's comments
ble52 | 6 years ago | on: Mac OS Catalina: more trouble than it’s worth (Part 2)
ble52 | 6 years ago | on: Flutter: UI platform designed for ambient computing
Whenever I see Slack, Spotify, VS Code, or any other "universal" app, it always strikes me as a completely out of place it looks and behaves, no matter what OS it's running on. Yes, it's relatively easy to make a multiplatform app with these technologies, ticking all the boxes specified by bean-counters, but in the process it usually completely sacrifices all the little details, integrations, patterns, etc. that make platform-specific apps such a pleasure to use. If you're used to apps behaving in a predictable manner, e.g. having similar shortcuts, similar icons having the same meaning (and other way round - similar actions having the same icon), then e.g. seeing a Material Design on macOS is just weird and looks completely out-of-place, not mentioning event UX aspects.
I know it's hard to quantify this in an Excel spreadsheet, but in my opinion following interface guidelines of the target platform and properly using its native technologies makes for a much better user experience (I'm talking here about the basic meaning of this phrase). For example, just look at Google Docs app for iPad - for sure it's written using some Google's weird "universal" technology, but every time Apple announces new iOS (now iPadOS) features, like split screen, multiple windows, etc. it taks Google months to provide support for them. At the same time, developers that follow Apple's guidelines and recommendation, they usually get these features in their apps "for free" or with relatively small amounts of work required.
I'm simplifying the whole situation here, of course, but I think trend of making all apps in Flutter et al. might be good for some people, but end-users are usually not one of them.
ble52 | 6 years ago | on: In Its First Funding in 14 Years, 1Password Raises $200M Series A
ble52 | 6 years ago | on: In Its First Funding in 14 Years, 1Password Raises $200M Series A
ble52 | 6 years ago | on: DNS Cookies – Identify Related Network Flows
ble52 | 8 years ago | on: Show HN: TablePlus – A macOS client for relational databases
And for those whining about "macOS-only" - take a look at Tower, a Git client that was initially macOS-only as well. They later released a dedicated, native Windows version, just like the developer of TablePlus wants to do, and it's awesome. True native experience will always win in my heart with cross-platform solutions and that's where I'm putting my money.
ble52 | 10 years ago | on: Google’s Eddystone – a flexible, open-source iBeacon alternative
I think this whole "System <PutYourOsHere> is shit" is more of a user problem than a software problem ;-P