Comment by ac2u | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ac2u | Hacker News Reader

When people make suggestions for this they underestimate how complicated their suggestion can be from a UX perspective.

Sometimes your user is someone who can't text, longs for the days when a telephone rang and the UX was to simply grip the receiver and put it to their ear.

Even a traditional tablet can be a pain because the user has to spend time finding the wake button when it's sometimes styled identically to the volume buttons. And they can't rely on location for memory as the tablet can be oriented different ways.

"Ohh that's not a real problem" you think.

Well, maybe not to you, but what if your eyesight is fading and you have arthritis in your hands? Then, even a touchscreen is a pain, I've watched folks use them where every tap happens three times to get it to "register"

I think an appropriate video device for OP's gran needs to have physical buttons (and not many of them aside from up/down answer(ring)/hangup, and have only one screen orientation.

Even when someone makes such devices they can't help but throw in the kitchen sink by letting it make phone calls as well. Great, now your UX is modal depending on whether you're making an audio or video call.

You’re quite right. I tried to give my grandparents an iPad, but a few months ago I spent two or three hours trying to get them to reboot it and logged into FaceTime (over the phone). About half of that was literally trying to get them to reboot the iPad. They just couldn’t find and then hold down the power button. They were struggling to see it, and then struggled to hold down the button for long enough without releasing it. It was really really hard for them. I eventually gave up, and they were very frustrated with the iPad and themselves.

FWIW, this can also be done with Settings -> General -> Shut Down.

I keep having this argument with family who keep trying to get my grandmother to move to a smart-phone or tablet.

It's the whole mental model of mapping down all the various functionality that makes this impossible for her.

Just some of the issues that we encountered:

- Holding this small thin device means touching at least part of the glass front. This registers as a touch, and/or activates some kind of other unintended functionality when shifting grips.

- Inconsistent UI - things appear and disappear depending on context. 'Pull down from the top/bottom/etc' just makes no sense.

- Inconsistent response times - a variety of applications require polling some server on the internet, which means waiting for dodgy wifi on crummy DSL to then connect to a server that's the best part of 16,000KM away (Sydney to US-East coast). Too many app developers test only against a server that's either on their machine, or on some close-by staging environment and never bother to see how their app responds (or doesn't) on anything less than an ideal connection.

- Single tap vs long tap vs double tap... They all do different things, and because not every application responds at a consistent rate, she gets frustrated and presses it again, harder (not knowing if it just failed to register the previous touch). Worse, because some apps now 'play' the second tap once the new screen has finished rendering ... well we've now clicked in some other random part of the application.

- Often things are delivered as webpages (or partly so) - and again, with content being loaded asynchronously, the page jumps around, often for quite a while.

- Two fingers pressing against the screen / palm rejection... she'll be tapping with the pointer finger, but the knuckles of another finger, or the palm or wrist will touch the screen... causing all sorts of bizzare behavior. Leads to frustration, leads to tapping repeatedly, see above.

Then there's the issue that every 12-18 months, the UI changes, functionality moves, changes, etc.

At least with some devices, you have a home button that's easily locatable, but then that seems to be dying in favour of soft buttons everywhere too, which means that it's yet another thing that you just have to know it's there, and when it's not.

All these smart devices that only have a touch-screen are a major usability problem.

I agree about physical buttons. I add that sliding is an unfamiliar concept (unlock or answer by sliding is novel) vs tapping (an entire life of pushing buttons.) And flat interfaces are very bad, they don't have any previous experience of things actively trying to hide controls for the sake of... well, I never understood the goal myself but I use them. Anyway, I spent hours explaining to my parents which button does what, if it's press or slide, how to activate the speakers, the camera etc. Every single app has its kwn share of problems. Probably the right device is a pair of old 3G phones with video call and a keyboard. Unfortunately those video calls were quite expensive.

I don't think it's necessarily fair to assume she "needs" that without further context.

My parents (late 70s; mother has severe arthritis) have an iPad that they use for video calling and they have been able to pick it up without issues. The only other thing they use it for is looking at photos we share to them on Google Photos.

They were actually fairly tech illiterate (if anything weird happened to the TV or VCR they would phone me), but maybe 5 years ago I setup a Linux PC for my father to send emails to relatives. I should note that this was the first time he ever used a computer or anything remotely technical (his career was as a carpenter). I expected him to get frustrated and never use it again after the first few times, but he has learnt and managed to pick it up fairly well.

I agree some things did take a while (e.g. explaining right clicking), but he persisted which was the main thing. The first few video calls usually resulted in me not seeing anything as they held their fingers over the camera, but they learnt how to do it. He has even started an online shop buying and selling Lego pieces (much to the detriment of my mother, as she barely sees him now).

Obviously, OP can give a better answer as it's closer to home.

I'm glad that your folks have taken to it quite well, but I'm just speaking from my own experience.

The thing is, if I can come up with design constraints for folks that struggle in my own experience, chances are, it's probably an easier interface for everyone.

A solution for physical buttons was less of a comment on OP's grandmother's situation, and more as plus point for the fact that physical interfaces trump touchscreens when the amount of total actions you wish to take are limited. It's the same reason I prefer physical knobs and switches when I'm driving as opposed to touchscreens.

I'm pretty tech literate, I work in the industry, and if this screen gives me pause to work out what the heck I want to press on it:

https://imgur.com/hTnnOmB

then it's a no go as a general solution for everyone.

I'd like to buy you a beer. Where are you located?

Ireland, but I appreciate the offer.

very valid points, even my siblings (in their 50s and 60s I might add) struggle immensely with even already aging tech, if i want to facetime my sister, I must first make a costly international telephone call to alert her to the incoming almost free video call, mostly so she can turn on the device (an iPad)! If she hands that device to my father, in his 90's, then it's a real struggle, as he doesn't relate the voice chat to the video chat, and to be honest he gets so little experience of it, he never will. My Uk resident siblings are a little slow on modern tech, and quite comically to me, believe they are up to the minute.... My brother for the longest time found it easier to send me a "linkedin" message than add my email address to his address book!!!! never mind use the WhatsApp he had all along! Slowly they're catching on....

as for Skype, well they missed that completely I think, yet I use it almost every time I make an international call....

oh yes, one more important thing, as my parents aged, we tried to get them to use a handphone (mobile phone), again, a huge problem, as they would never leave it turned on, and again, never knowing when the batteries had drained, so my father would take it cycling, if he needed help, turn it on (or try to) then try to use it, as far as i am aware, it sat its entire life beside a few similar hand me downs on the living room window sill, next to the coiled up charger, waiting for that time when it may be useful (if only it were charged), I am certain that none were ever used. I suggested an Ipad some years ago when they first appeared, my sibling simply cried that they were too complex, it seems even for them, never mind the parents!

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