I took a moment to analyze something I encounter on an hourly basis a while ago. Ever since the moment of realization that followed, I’ve been filling others in every now and then, and I have yet to find somebody who isn’t totally enlightened after the big reveal (@verneho almost BSOD’d).
Perhaps I’m ramping this up too much. Recognize this bad boy? Find yourself constantly checking the symbols and their meanings when you’re trying to decrypt a keyboard shortcut for use? Guys, it depicts a choice. A fork, a switch. The name of the key is ‘option’ (or ‘alt’, which is also accurately represented, alternative).
See it? Assuming this is your first realization, I’ll allow you to draw your own conclusions about the other symbols used for control and command.
Have a great weekend!
A few screenshots of OS X 10.7 Lion popped up today, and the interface depicted has me pondering.
ALL images in this post are credited to macstories.net
Finder has gone the way of iTunes, totally grayscale. I get the decision to some extent, unifying everything, but this oversteps design boundaries – it’s excessively sterile. I intentionally keep all installs of OS X I control on the original OS theme (with the ‘traffic light’ window controls), because I find Graphite (which effectively grayscales those icons) borderline depressing. I think a grayscaled Finder should come with the selection of the grayscale OS theme, and otherwise they should remain colored.
Also worth noting is the new button style for the finder views. This change appears in multiple screenshots of Lion. Clearly it’s very resemblant of a touch (iOS) interface, but the connect isn’t there for me – mice, even trackpads, are not on the same level as touchscreen devices. There’s no tactile simulation, which a slideable element implies. Why are they trying to meddle with this before they’re ready to go touchscreen in any sense with OS X? Additionally, I think the UI feature makes zero sense on menus with more than two items. This is a toggle-specific interaction as far as I’m concerned – true/false, on/off, enabled/disabled. Not list/icons/details/coverflow.
Also, why the bloody crap is Coverflow still in Finder?
I’ve been using Letterbox for well over a year, perhaps two. All it effectively does is change the orientation in Apple Mail from displaying message previews above the mail list to beside it, to its right. This allows for greater vertical message list length and message preview length (and if you’re like me, you only view messages in ‘preview’ mode. In short, it makes better use of widescreen monitors. This is now unnecessary, as Apple has rethought this in Mail 5, changing the orientation and making other iPad-like interface adjustments. This, I’m excited for.
Yes, I know about Post Box and the like – to be honest, I can’t properly explain why I’ve never made the switch, though I have tried. There you have it.
I have only one thing to say about the revised TextEdit: Holy shit, TextMate supports list writing (properly)! Welcome to nearly two decades ago. I hope the OS’s global font/formatting chrome has been significantly improved as well.
Finally, one of the oddities I encountered. Quick look has always been very much a keyboard access UI for me – tap space, see if it’s what I’m looking for or scan for a piece of information in the document I was looking for, tap space again to dismiss. I don’t like that they’ve introduced a clickable button to the quick look interface here, as this is one of the last places I’d want to use a mouse. Odd.
