Is W10P entering a pure features battle and losing its distinct design identity?

[tiziano27]

You are entitled to your opinion, however I think many would disagree that Metro was awful. It may not be that refined in its first iteration, but by wp8.1 it was pretty good. It's functional, useable, and aesthetically unique.

And don't get hung up on the hamburger/pivot example, that is just one possible way to map the hamburger menu to a more useable form for the phone. All I'm trying to illustrate is that a consistent experience across devices doesn't mean they have to use identical controls.

That's obvious. What It's not obvious, apparently, It's that any mapping implies abstraction. As the abstraction becomes more complex, It takes more time or effort to understand the mapping, and that affect other objectives for the user experience, for example, the buying process.

Microsoft has to find an equilibrium.

 

[Sagar Limaye]

How hard is it for a developer to design in metro style?
Im learning app dev on WP, and it really isn't that hard to design a good metro UI in visual studio. There are convenient templates to get the job done. And even if a developer wishes to design his own UI, not following metro, he can do that as well. I don't think the metro design language is a reason for the lack of apps.

 

[a5cent]

How hard is it for a developer to design in metro style?
Im learning app dev on WP, and it really isn't that hard to design a good metro UI in visual studio. There are convenient templates to get the job done. And even if a developer wishes to design his own UI, not following metro, he can do that as well. I don't think the metro design language is a reason for the lack of apps.

I don't know of any other UI technology that is so easy to use while still offering the flexibility of a XAML based UI (XAML is the UI presentation technology. Metro is the design language. Those are two different things).

However, I don't think that XAML being hard is an argument anyone is making. It's not about XAML being hard. If anything, it's about Metro being too different. I don't buy into that line of thought, but you can find plenty of posts in these threads where that reasoning is explained.

 

[2tomtom]

Agreed. Pivots work well on touch, but not well on keyboard and mouse. Hamburger icons work okay on both (everyone knows what they do). Also you have to remember the main reason why Windows 8 was thrashed was because of its' unusual (read:not typical) design language. With Windows 10, MS wants people from ANY platform to be able to quickly pick up the UI in W10 and apply that to any version. If you don't make the OS familiar, you're going to scare some users.

I don't see Android and iOS fans suddenly jumping to WP because of these changes. I do see WP fans moving elsewhere because the uniqueness has gone from WP and Microsoft software is now on all platforms, mix that with more apps and games on other OS's, why use WP?

I would propose that WP never got above 4-5% is more to do with people being tied into other ecosystems and the lack of needed apps, mixed with total lack of available WP's worldwide, rather than the design of WP up to 8.1.1.

 

[2tomtom]

Windows Mobile had the drop down menus and people loathed them. WP7 came along and introduced the Metro UI, but nobody bought it. Now they bring the menus back and call them Hamburgers or Sloppy Joes, whatever. Let's face it, this is what the majority wants. Personally, I prefer the Enyo sliding panels design of webOS but we all know how that ended up.

Sounds like you are saying WP and webOS are failures because of the design. I would propose that Android and iOS are popular because of the app and games on offer. Apple phones became popular because of the design AND the availability of iTunes, Apps and games.

 

[manicottiK]

According to Microsoft's telemetry of the WP7 app, 91% of the users only open the app to go to the camera roll.

91% of Windows Phone clicks were only for Camera Roll, urging Photos Hub redesign in 8.1 | Windows Central

Sadly, you were mislead by a bad WP Central headline and story, misrepresenting what Joe B. and the graphic explained. What Microsoft said was that 91% of taps on that page were for items on the first panel. That panel was navigational only -- it had no content. What MS did in WP8 was "promote" Date and Albums to their own panels (with Date being renamed to All). At the same time, Microsoft dropped Camera Roll and People as direct choices. (Camera Roll is available as a choice on the Albums panel. However, the photos on the camera roll are also shown on the new All panel.)

It makes sense to move functions that aren't frequently used to the hamburger menu, and get more space for content and a cleaner UI.

That might make sense, but it's not was Microsoft did with the W10 Photos app. The initial view is "Collection" (renamed from "All" in WP8 and from "Date" in WP7). Changing to Albums, which used to require a simply swipe from anywhere on the screen (or tap on a large header), now requires a tap on a small graphic in a far corner of the screen followed by another tap in the small label that appears in the menu.

I and others have said it before, the issues relating to "hamburger" use growth are, in order of importance, navigation model changes, content (is it to be for all items, for infrequently used items, or just for settings), placement/reachability/accessibility, and only then shape, which virtually no one is specifically offended by.

 

[Jazmac]

Hamburger, hamburger, hamburger ---- I personally think Microsoft nailed it on the head wit the hamburger menu in WinRT apps & its new app UI design. I say this because it's basically the perfect layout to make WinRT apps make sense on the Desktop, which we need to happen badly to have any chance of getting more support for universal apps for the Desktop & Phone. Microsoft's plan was to make your phone's UI an "extension" of your Windows desktop, laptop & tablet by keeping the core of the user experience extremely similar and the hamburger icon works like the "File" button in Windows, users just know to tap or click it it to activate the app[lication] menu. Swyping through pivots with your thumb on a phone works fine, but not so much on a desktop or even a tablet --- seriously, for those of you who have non-touch laptops & desktops with Windows 8.x, how awkward do you feel scrolling your vertical mouse wheel to go through an app's horizontal content?

So how do you suppose Microsoft better create a similar experience across devices?

I will say, that Microsoft should include a gesture based action to activate the hamburger menu list. I'm happy to see Microsoft dialing back a bit on the "swype" crazed (and hidden) navigation that came with Windows 8.

I never looked at this debate from this prospective but I think I agree with this. I personally never had an issue with the hamburger but I think I want to see what they have planned. So far, I like it direction.

 

[manicottiK]

Menus at the top are more intuitive for first time users and buyers, more familiar according to conventions, and more consistent with Universal apps in tablets and PCs. So, this could have a good impact in SALES. The prospective buyer has a couple of minutes to take the buying decision, there is no time to re-train the 'neural network', or to get into deductions about the benefits of the location of UI elements. You want the prospective buyer to feel at home and confident in the product.

I think that this is what is driving Microsoft in this direction. Cynics might say that it's a "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" approach, but there's more benefit to familiarity than those cynics might initially realize.

That said, so far Microsoft has approached this standardization in a way that seems to abandon many usability benefits that they created in WP7. Rather than continue this line of thought within the "pure features" thread, I started another one on Maintaining effective UX while improving user familiarity. I hope to see you there.

 

[boltman2013]

Lots of Android fans are annoyed with Android as in sometimes even the Dialer does not work and its seems to be geetting worse not better...many are ready to jump ship and will choose either IOS or W10M...my wifes Android just randomly pays Pandora its janky .. This lack of cohesive quality will get many to jump ship.

I've seen many posts of those wanting to switch

 

[manicottiK]

^ But Google is starting to push for more cohesive design. Back in 2010, when we started a project to bring our university portal to six platforms (Android, Blackberry, iOS, webOS, Windows Mobile, and Windows Phone), we joked that Google's only UI guidance for Android at the time was "use pixels." Material Design is a whole lot more defined than that.

 

[rockstarzzz]

^ But Google is starting to push for more cohesive design. Back in 2010, when we started a project to bring our university portal to six platforms (Android, Blackberry, iOS, webOS, Windows Mobile, and Windows Phone), we joked that Google's only UI guidance for Android at the time was "use pixels." Material Design is a whole lot more defined than that.

On the other hand Microsoft is killing cohesive design and making it clunky

 

[tgp]

Lots of Android fans are annoyed with Android as in sometimes even the Dialer does not work and its seems to be geetting worse not better...many are ready to jump ship and will choose either IOS or W10M...my wifes Android just randomly pays Pandora its janky .. This lack of cohesive quality will get many to jump ship.

I've seen many posts of those wanting to switch

Yeah, this explains why Android's market share is growing even though it's already over 80%. It makes perfect sense.

 

[tiziano27]

Sadly, you were mislead by a bad WP Central headline and story, misrepresenting what Joe B. and the graphic explained. What Microsoft said was that 91% of taps on that page were for items on the first panel. That panel was navigational only -- it had no content. What MS did in WP8 was "promote" Date and Albums to their own panels (with Date being renamed to All). At the same time, Microsoft dropped Camera Roll and People as direct choices. (Camera Roll is available as a choice on the Albums panel. However, the photos on the camera roll are also shown on the new All panel.)

This is what Belfiore wrote:

On PHOTO HUB ... we changed the design because we got actual telemetry data on what people ACTUALLY CLICKED. By far, the most clicks when people opened Photo Hub were to go to the camera roll -- and only .5% of clicks were to a 3rd party app. The re-design in WP8.1 addresses this, putting the FREQUENT task right up front and making the other tasks generally available but in a different place.

I think you're right, partially. 91% was clicking the first page of the WP7 app, but still "the most clicks when people opened Photo Hub were to go to the camera roll".

That might make sense, but it's not was Microsoft did with the W10 Photos app. The initial view is "Collection" (renamed from "All" in WP8 and from "Date" in WP7). Changing to Albums, which used to require a simply swipe from anywhere on the screen (or tap on a large header), now requires a tap on a small graphic in a far corner of the screen followed by another tap in the small label that appears in the menu.

I and others have said it before, the issues relating to "hamburger" use growth are, in order of importance, navigation model changes, content (is it to be for all items, for infrequently used items, or just for settings), placement/reachability/accessibility, and only then shape, which virtually no one is specifically offended by.

If Camera roll in WP7, or the "All" tab in WP8 (awfully named Date in WP7), is receiving most of the activity, It makes sense to move the less used functionality to the hamburger menu.
Placement, reachability and accessibility of functions that aren't used often have an insignificant impact. And as you probably know, user experience has to satisfy much broader set of objectives.

I don't see the problem in changing the navigation model, and again, this is for functions that aren't frequently used.

The benefits are more space for content and a cleaner UI, consistency and familiarity.

 

[Sagar Limaye]

I don't know of any other UI technology that is so easy to use while still offering the flexibility of a XAML based UI (XAML is the UI presentation technology. Metro is the design language. Those are two different things).

However, I don't think that XAML being hard is an argument anyone is making. It's not about XAML being hard. If anything, it's about Metro being too different. I don't buy into that line of thought, but you can find plenty of posts in these threads where that reasoning is explained.

Well, some of the posters here said that Microsoft is changing the UI so it's easier for developers, that it's meant to invite more devs.

 

[manicottiK]

Not sure if this has been brought up already, but it might also be easier for devs to not have to redesign their app logic completely when porting their app to WP10. If all UI elements from iOS and Android get a WP equivalent, maybe some degree of automated porting could even be done. If this helps close the app gap, I'll have all you can eat hamburgers please.

It's been brought up repeatedly, but don't worry about that -- virtually everything on the W10 threads is repeated! :wink:

The debate usually looks like this:
[table="width: 500"]
[tr]
[th]Pro Metro folks[/th]
[th]Anti-Metro folks[/th]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]WP8 shouldn't mimic iOS and Android patterns simply because they are iOS or Android patterns.[/td]
[td][/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td][/td][td]
But users already know those patterns, so they'll have an easier time coming to WP.[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]But then there will be nothing distinctive about WP![/td]
[td][/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td][/td]
[td]It doesn't need to be distinctive, it needs to be popular.[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]No, it needs to be better.[/td]
[td][/td]
[/tr]
[/table]

It would be great if we can find a way for WP to be both easier for users to embrace and be better than iOS and Android in terms or usability.

 

[matt john2]

Things change man. I really dont get MS and the users for example, users want change but when MS did changed something users will react some in negative ways. As for MS, I dont get why they have to remove something and replaced it with new stuffs that sometimes have lesser functionality; wp8 messaging app for example( I dont know if they brought it back in win10). I wish MS packs more features in the future updates without sacrificing a lot of the old signature/unique features they did.

 

[white_Shadoww]

Well, some of the posters here said that Microsoft is changing the UI so it's easier for developers, that it's meant to invite more devs.

Devs don't develope for Windows Phone is because of low marketshare and not the UI. For increasing marketshare they had to give features to Windows Phone in Windows 10 and not scrape away all the UI (the UI which made many people buy Windows Phone even while key apps like Instagram and Subway Surfer were absent). Sure, they could evolve the UI, adopting bigger screens, but changing it completely and that too in a backward step is not the solution to increase marketshare. And remember, devs won't develope for Windows Phone unless it gains marketshare regardless of what the UI is. So, scraping Metro was completely unnecessary.

 

[white_Shadoww]

Only the bit of Metro that is remaining in the new UI is besides flat design is, the font Segoe WP. Everything else is changed with something ugly. If you put Segoe WP on a lollipop phone, even it would look more Metro than Windows 10. Windows 10 is more like Kitkat.
Sent from my Lumia 920!

 

[Dk92]

I never looked at this debate from this prospective but I think I agree with this. I personally never had an issue with the hamburger but I think I want to see what they have planned. So far, I like it direction.

I share this sentiment. Let us at least wait and see what they have planned before everyone jumps the gun.

 

[white_Shadoww]

It's been brought up repeatedly, but don't worry about that -- virtually everything on the W10 threads is repeated! :wink:



The debate usually looks like this:

[table="width: 500"]

[tr]

[th]Pro Metro folks[/th]

[th]Anti-Metro folks[/th]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td]WP8 shouldn't mimic iOS and Android patterns simply because they are iOS or Android patterns.[/td]

[td][/td]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td][/td][td]

But users already know those patterns, so they'll have an easier time coming to WP.[/td]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td]But then there will be nothing distinctive about WP![/td]

[td][/td]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td][/td]

[td]It doesn't need to be distinctive, it needs to be popular.[/td]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td]No, it needs to be better.[/td]

[td][/td]

[/tr]

[/table]



It would be great if we can find a way for WP to be both easier for users to embrace and be better than iOS and Android in terms or usability.

See, answering your question. UI was always a strong point of WP compared to Android and iOS and it was easier too. So, there it goes 'easier for users to embrace'.

Now, coming to being better than Android and iOS in terms of usability. We would need apps for that. Okay, third party apps, MS had no control over them. What about first party apps. When Skype, office and nearly every app of Microsoft is better on competitive platform, how it could be better in terms of usability. If MS had to achieve that, they would need to put WP users ahead of others, which they couldn't. Even the lockscreen aol for Android by MS got frequent updates while our 'Live lock screen' app never got any. By doing this, MS showed other companies, it is not worth to develope for WP. This goes for every app. Xbox music, videos, games hub, email app, no features like WiFi direct, USB OTG, external keyboards and gamepads and etc etc. They need to fix this first, but they are so busy fixing the unbroken UI.