Comment by gfodor | Hacker News Reader

Comment by gfodor | Hacker News Reader

This is definitely one of those usability things that Microsoft is oh-so-famous for like this:

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/uibook/chapters/fog0000000059....

Basically by trying to make it simpler, they're making it harder. Not only do you have one more part to break, but the first question people immediately ask when opening up a battery compartment is "which way do I insert the batteries?"

Now, there is going to need to be a disclaimer stating clearly that they don't need to put them in any particular way. Next, the user is going to be forced to digest this message. Then, with some unease, put the batteries in without regard to their direction, despite the fact that the hundreds of other times they've used batteries they've had to do this.

Microsoft has introduced another branch in the decision tree: "does this device require I insert batteries in a certain direction?" To answer this, I still will probably have to rely upon information printed on the device, since remembering which device fits this criteria will likely not be memory I can trust since I change batteries rarely. (And, if I mis-remember it, I could break an expensive device, so I will have to check to be sure.)

So, what Microsoft in the end is saving here is not the need to check the indicator on the device. It's still necessary for me to check until the entire world uses this in every device. All they've done is make it so I don't have to physically rotate the battery in my hand (50% of the time :)) after doing so.

Additionally, troubleshooting now becomes harder if the device does not turn on. If it doesn't turn on, are the batteries dead, the device broken, or did the magical asymmetric battery compartment break?

Disruptive isn't always such a bad thing. Give them some credit for coming up with an idea a lot of people will wonder why they never thought of.

A much better idea would be to come up with a battery compartment shaped in such a manner that the direction the batteries go is self evident. This means the user does not have to make any additional decisions. This is a technology hammer applied to a problem that requires a different type of fix. The user now has to make an additional mental leap. It is not simplifying the world for people, despite what it does at first glance. It's making it at worst harder at best no harder than it is now.

All compartments (I could find around me) have the spring which holds the battery on the flat side of the battery... thats the indicator I use, without searching and reading any tiny diagrams

See, there you go. This was never a problem. Microsoft is trading the time you spend rotating the battery with your hand for time in which you have to read the damn instructions on the device.

I would never have thought of it because I've seen many, many different styles of endcaps at the positive ends of 'AA' batteries alone.

The way this would have to work, given the use of 'no additional components', would be by tying the center contacts together at both ends of each cell, and doing the same with the outer contacts. So if a cell's positive endcap isn't perfectly flat, it would be likely to make contact with both terminals at that end, which would short out the whole cell.

IMO, Microsoft's patent attorneys are only the first of many attorneys you'll be paying if you implement this scheme in a mass-marketable consumer device.

I think this is quite a stretch. It seems like a pretty nice idea and someone that goes to the trouble of buying the battery before it is widespread will probably not be confused, and even if they are as long as they put in the battery somehow it will work just fine.

Why is there a need to put a label on the device? If it doesn't have a label, you can put it either way. If it has a +/-, use that as indicators. It doesn't have to be as complex as you're describing.

No, I have seen so many devices with tiny labels or even no label at all that I wouldn't just assume I could insert it in any way.

Yeah, oddly, the intro text says what the problem is:

Users do not have to search for a hard to read diagram to determine how to insert the batteries.

Make the diagram easier to read. Don't make the diagram in thin raise lines embedded into the plastic at an angle that it's hard to shine light on them and look into the device at the same time.

But really, I like it when batteries are keyed so they only go in one way. No directions at all.

Make the diagram easier to read. Don't make the diagram in thin raise lines embedded into the plastic at an angle that it's hard to shine light on them and look into the device at the same time.

That's a nice dream, but taking a lot at most of my children's small toys, I'd say it's an impossible one. At the least, it's an incredibly hard nut to crack.

On the other hand, a small symbol that meant "insert the batteries any way you wish" would do wonders.

Challenge: depict "insert the batteries any way you wish" with a "small symbol" that people will actually understand.

That's a branding issue. You define it once, industry-wide, and blanket products with it. It's a challenge, but significantly different (and easier, in my opinion) than expecting that each separate device clearly labels which way the batteries need to be oriented in that device, in such a way as to be clear, and readable at an angle, like the parent post requested.

The problem is often that the directional indicators are not in a readable place. Often you have to have a light shining on them, but they are in a cavity in the device that you can't look into and easily shine light into at the same time. This is what I meant by "at an angle that it's hard to shine light on them and look into the device at the same time", in case it was ambiguous.

But I really think having them keyed is the way to go. You can put cylindrical batteries in either way, and that's the problem. You can't even reliably attach a 9-volt the wrong way, and often times the 9-volt battery compartment won't close unless the contacts are fully attached.

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