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Comment by andrewljohnson | Hacker News Reader

There is a gigantic difference in how an Android and iPhone navigate. Develop the same app for both and you will see that clearly.

The big difference is Android uses a standard back button for all applications. This leads Android users to end up mashing a lot of buttons at random, to try and get what they want - it's actually quite a bad UI, and it was just translated from the web clumsily.

On iPhone, each app has its own navigation method, based on the requirements of the app. The main nav options for an iPhone app are:

* a navigation bar that stacks a series of views, with a back button.

* a tab bar which gives a 4-5 ever-present options on bottom

* a single view with buttons for menus

Even when you implement a nav bar for an app, which is similar to Android, it's much better, because the stack of views is deterministic. You can never tell what the Back button will do on an Android app.

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The Reality Distortion Field is strong in this one. So if I understand what you're saying, android's back button causes users to randomly mash buttons in frothy fits of delirium, yet iOS's back button provides zen like enlightenment and happy endings.

Pushing the back button on an android phone, by default ALWAYS goes to the previous activity, or cancels context menus. Of course, it's possible to make the android back button do something else with the onPause method, just as it's possible to make that happen in the viewDidUnload method in iOS.

The dropbox and imdb android apps use tabs perfectly well.

Countless android apps use listviews to navigate.

I'm actually not biased one way or another - we make apps for both, and I carry a Nexus and an iPhone wherever I go. But it's simple truth:

* The iPhone back button always takes you to one, and exactly one, screen.

* The Android back button can take you to many different screens, based on where you last were.

That's a gigantic difference, and leads to the button-mashing I describe.

But when pressing some UI element gets you to other apps like browser, facebook etc, that Android back button behavior is what makes my life easier.

> Pushing the back button on an android phone, by default ALWAYS goes to the previous activity.

Good if it is the only apps you are using. But what if you switch to use others app for a while and switch back to this app. Can you remember the activity stack as of all the apps good as the OS does? Can you predict where back button is going to take you after not using the phone for half an hours?

So, you don't like the back button in browsers either? The Android back button does the same, but for the whole OS.

The point is consistency versus relative consistency.

At least you always know where that back button on Android.

The screen of the device is not that big that you won't know where the button is; it's either on the top or the bottom.

Also, if you know where the button is but you don't know what exactly it is going to do, do you really know where the button is?

>The big difference is Android uses a standard back button for all applications

And this is the first thing I mention about why I like Android better.

edit: Ah, I had totally faulty memory on this issue.

The new navigation guidelines have back behaving as previously, but call for an "Up" button that navigates the app's hierarchy.

http://developer.android.com/design/patterns/navigation.html

-wrong below!-

I think the updated design guide for ICS Android calls for the back button to ascend up the hierarchy of the app, rather than taking you to whatever screen you were last on. (So it is now supposed to be deterministic.) There are also better guidelines for how to provide in app navigation.

It'll probably take quite a while to catch on.

This is seriously one of the most W.T.F. comments I've ever read on HN. No exaggerating.

The Android back button is incredibly consistent, and the only people it causes in any confusion in are people too accustomed to the iPhone, mentally configured to always look to go to the top of the stack. There are a few apps that break the model, but by and large they work perfectly.

On iOS -- and yes, I use both daily with an iPad 3rd gen and an GS II running ICS -- it is essentially mystery meat in most apps. There is no universal model beyond some basic behaviors. As one aside, it is a PITA when you're lounging with the iPad and you have to go to the top to do every navigation.

There is no universe where the iOS model is better, but through completely acclimation.

I've found the back button on Android and Windows Phone to be inconsistent. Sometimes it will dump me back to the home screen when I expected it to take me to the last screen I was on in the app. It's not that terrible, but it happens more often than it should.

>There is a gigantic difference in how an Android and iPhone navigate. Develop the same app for both and you will see that clearly.

Still, both Android and iOS are more similar to each other and this than anything else:

http://images.yourdictionary.com/images/computer/_PROGMAN.GI...

Meanwhile Metro is completely new take on UI and much more different than the "gigantic" difference that you speak about.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpI8252TieM&feature=relmf...

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