Hacker News Reader

Comment by 2h | Hacker News Reader

you forgot Windows 11, the worst of them all.

1/3 the width of Windows 10, AND it auto hides. who in gods name could have possibly thought this was a good idea? what are you helping? width is RARELY the problem with desktop real estate, its always height. so you're freeing up space that doesn't need to be freed up. I get the thinking for a mobile device, but we are talking about Windows 11, its a desktop operating system. stop designing assuming everything needs to look exactly like an iPhone. for a desktop OS, its just objectively, scientifically worse:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=E3gS9tjACwU

View on HN

Seriously, this. We upgraded my nearly 93 year old Grandma to Windows 11 from Windows 10 and this was the most disruptive change for her. At least she quickly learned how to use a scroll wheel.

Your grandma does not uses her computer for 8 hours a day.

So she doesn't matter? Wow, our industry really has become a toxic cesspool.

What does that have to do with anything?

And she uses her computer a lot for someone of her age. Not 8+ hours like I do, but more than most people do. Keeps the boredom away.

There was no thought behind it. They just mindlessly copied from a mobile interface, where you don't need scrollbars nearly as much.

If there is a screen to the right you cant even push the pointer against the edge of the screen. I imagine at least some people must be using the scroll wheel to scroll 1000 pages down. Spending quality time with the interface.

I tell Windows that the screens are stacked vertically instead of horizontally for this.

Removing a useless UI element is a positive regardless of real estate constraints (and I wish it didn't flash over mouse scroll either as it usually does)

Though all of that should be properly configurable (which it isn't) so that other users liking other styles don't suffer

completely agree. the scrollbar has persisted for 40 years not because its useful, but because we just haven't figured out how to remove it yet.

thanks for your helpful comment.

QWERTY has persisted for X years because it's good. Thanks for your stellar logic

There's a difference between good and good enough. Something doesn't need to be perfect to be useful or popular, only good enough.

No, something doesn't need to be good to be useful or popular or persist, that presupposes a degree of pervasive thoughtfulness and rationality that simply do not exist in reality.

That's why you can't argue that a useless element (I'm using more convenient alternatives to scroll) is useful just because it's persisted for decades

but I CAN argue its useful because I USE IT every day and can attest to its usefulness, even in the face of other options such as scroll wheel.

so you are free to argue that its not useful TO YOU, but you should qualify that, as you dont speak for everyone, or even a majority of users.

How does qualifying help if you ignore it anyway like you ignored my 2nd sentence in the original comment?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com