Forstall Out; Ive Up
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iOS is stagnant, reviews of recent Apple designed skeuo-heavy apps bemone the lack of functionality -- while noting what must be hundreds of hours of graphics work -- and not seeing that the tradeoff is worth it. With finite development hours the general public realizes that they'd rather get shit done then look really great sorta getting some things done.
So who makes the money at Apple? It's two people, Cook and Ive -- supply chain and product design. Let's give turning the entire device design over to a holistic human interface designer a try instead of running hardware and software as two disjoint efforts.
Between Siri and the maps screw up the decision made itself.
iOS only seems stagnant because they don't have to trumpet every year about how they've finally gotten rid of ui lag or completely overhauled the system appearance. These are points in it's favor to most people.
Or another evolutionary analogy: crocodiles have more or less been around forever -- they don't have to trumpet about solving calorie intake problems, or overheating in the summer, but it took mammals to invent fire and get to the moon.
Saying more or less "iOS is fine" is also saying "we're not interested in pushing the envelope anymore".
I acknowledge that that's not necessarily an entirely worthy goal in and of itself, but keeping a design focused product fresh does have its merits.
Here's iOS 1 and 5 side by side
http://pocketnow.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/ios1ios5.png
Other than the obvious lack of a wallpaper I'm not really sure that there's been any fundamental work on improving the user interaction and look & feel of the thing in 5 years.
I find it unbelievable that there's nothing that could be done better and that iOS was launched with perfect interaction design, fully formed from the heads of the designers, or perfect visual design, reverently propagated to the modern day and on into the future.
Is this really the penultimate in volume slider design? There's no more work to be done here?
http://www.uiparade.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/clean-ios...
I think this recent shakeup is Apple signaling that it's time to evolve again and that excites me much more than the last 2 or 3 product launches have.
If anybody can put out a new way of pushing electrons around and making it "just work" it's going to be Apple and I want to see what they come up with.
Don't get me wrong, it's not that I think it can't be improved, because I can think of a few needed improvements myself. But I hear people continue to say this about Apple -- "They aren't innovating lately." -- without saying what needs to change.
So, without just comparing iOS1 vs. iOS6, what about the current state of iOS needs to change?
I have both an iPhone and Nexus 7, and I keep forgetting on N7 that sharing to Evernote doesn't require laborious app switching and cut and pasting. It's a very real, important piece of the puzzle that Apple hasn't even bothered trying to attempt.
Then there are a ton of stupid UI issues they have, like when I open a new tab in mobile Safari, I don't want it to gain focus.
I'd like to be able to update the software on it without needing to rearrange apps into the order I want them yet again, I don't have any idea if that is possible or not.
I suppose you could put Favourites as a folder on the home screen, but that would defeat the purpose since you're back to two taps for a call.
http://dribbble.s3.amazonaws.com/users/3331/screenshots/1108...
is getting old (OS X is even worse)
I'm not a visual designer so I'm not sure I'm entirely qualified to offer suggestions, but there are other button styles, even completely new ones that would work.
Some ideas:
How about some variation on the one in the upper right here?
http://www.colourbox.com/preview/2584456-712013-exit-beautif...
VST interfaces are usually choking with ideas
https://www.google.com/search?q=beautiful+buttons&hl=en&...
Or why buttons at all? I should just be able to interact with the direct metaphor of what I want.
Or a pop-up circular button system like in Palantir? http://www.palantir.com/wp-content/static/techblog/2007/08/s...
The interface looks like candy, instead of trying to outshiny the competition, maybe it should be matte? Then use shiny bits sparingly.
http://remodelista.com/img/sub/uimg/Janet_Images/suga-black-...
etc. etc. etc.
Let's not go for shiny kitsch, let's go for expensive sports car with a matte paint job.
Other than that, cross app communications (intents) and resolution independent layouts as an option would be nice and get Apple out of this weird resolution multiplier lock it seems to be trying to bust out of (with the exception of the iPhone 5).
How about other interface bits? There's a button and the screen, how about capacitive edges that can be used for interface sliders or other things? I love capacitive buttons on Android phones (when they had them).
Or let's get crazy, a completely disappearing product all together. Jam the guts into a watch, and a small wireless earpiece, or maybe ear/eyepiece and voice controls and a capacitive touch panel on the watch, don't make it look gaudy like Google Glass, get top eyewear designers to pump out different headpieces (lots of upsale potential there) etc. etc. and top watch designers to design the handpiece and turn computing into ubiquitous wearable fashion driven computing (with sales cycles as fast as the fashion industry -- seasons) and people will buy 4 sets of devices a year instead of one every two years.
> How about some variation on the one in the upper right here? http://www.colourbox.com/preview/2584456-712013-exit-beautif....
Yup, the 90's want their design inspiration back
The only cars I see with matte paint jobs are car modder's econoboxes, which look pretty kitsch.
(A) Probably can't tell because iOS 6 is on all the phones, zing!
(B) If he's trying to cut and paste he can tell. iOS 2 won't let him do it, iOS 3+ will force him to copy the entire body text randomly, iOS 5+ will randomly offer a handful of options that generally do not include the one the user is looking for.
(C) Ok, so it's visually stagnant. I guess I'll agree here. Turns out, there's usually less to disagreements than first glance might indicate.
"any fundamental work on improving the user interaction and look & feel of the thing in 5 years."
There are certainly new gestures and there's voice. There's new functionality in the buttons and from the lock screen. I would not say this is totally accurate.
"I find it unbelievable that there's nothing that could be done better and that iOS was launched with perfect interaction design, fully formed from the heads of the designers, or perfect visual design, reverently propagated to the modern day and on into the future."
I don't see anyone claiming it's perfect but there's a good argument to be made that Good Enough + Consistent > Better. Which is to say that Apple users, who do get updated to the latest patch, might be jarred if Apple constantly yanked the UI here and there for the sake of slight benefits or "keeping the look fresh".
https://www.google.com/search?q=android+home+screen&qscr...
you'll get a cacaphony of different interfaces. Android may be "converging" on the right design, a potentially better design, but meanwhile people are suffering through all sorts of inconsistencies. For the vast majority of people who want their phones to "just work", Apple's approach is better [design it right, up front, in a way that can be used for years].
Though your point is clear. Mac OS X is very clearly reminiscent of this interface.
This would also be a smart move for Apple as de-privileging Twitter & Facebook would mean that they wouldn't be helping support the lockin for those services – if Google Plus came back from the dead and started eating Facebook's marketshare, Apple would benefit without changing a line of code.
Home screen and notification center widgets don't interest me. But if you could put something like widgets/live tiles/google now-ish space on the lock screen? Particularly with the increased vertical space? That'd be slick.
And intents/services are overdue. Particularly now that they're basically "in" with twitter/Facebook integration. I'm all for having more app store approval scrutiny for third party "services" submissions. But it needs to be in.
while we're asking, it wouldn't hurt to add the "taller"/redesigned task switcher UI that made the rounds recently.
I'd call that all a decent update.
That's not our job to think about what Apple could do to improve our lives. Personally, I've loved Don't Disturb Me since it came out but it sure wasn't an iOS-exclusive feature. Neither has been turn-by-turn navigation.
I don't want iOS to play the keep-up game. I want it to continue being the industry leader, the game changer, the OS everyone else looks up to.
And surely, you cannot disagree that iOS has kind of lost that status since iOS 4.x.
What matters is the quality of the directions, not that they are marketed with a lower case "i".
What's amazing is that an original iPhone and iPhone 5 look and feel largely identical for basic uses, even though the latter is a far more capable device. That's a testament to the strength of the original design.
this is the same thing thats spouted by fans of the iphone. We don't need a smaller ipad 10" is the perfect size. We don't need a bigger phone screen, this fits the perfect size for all hands. All this is said till Apple actually does it.
The only "bad" design elements, in my opinion, were notifications and Siri. They fixed notifications but I had to turn Siri off.
And I think Apple is betting on a "conservative" majority that does not want change for the sake of change (I'm certainly part of it) - just observe how similar all the iPhones look, or all the laptops, displays... The only exception I can think of are the cheaper iPods.
(1) Maps is probably the biggest thing they've done since the original phone's launch;
(2) they are moving more and more of the interaction to voice every year;
(3) they are moving more and more of the users' data to the cloud every year.
Since the very sentence I was responding too was about apps ("iOS is stagnant, reviews of recent Apple designed skeuo-heavy apps bemone the lack of functionality") I fail to see how talking about app functionality is some huge leap of logic on my part.
"he was talking about visual design and interaction. None of the things you list here are in that domain"
How is voice control not about interaction?
1 - replaced what they already had and then moved it up to feature parity with the competitors
2 - pioneered it then let it sit, is Siri really that much better and personally assisting me today then at launch?
3 - which appears to be only a response to the competition's great cloud integration
perhaps stagnation is too strong a word... tread-milling perhaps?
Most people, though, just want to use technology to accomplish other things. For them, radical interface changes reduce rather than improve value.
Sure, there's more precise releases than it's competitors, but that doesn't negate the fact that Windows has a more functional-looking (whether or not it is, is an entirely different matter) phone.
The Notification centre was a step in the right direction, but people are wanting data quicker more and more, and the notificiations aren't great for every app. After all, a big reason people cite for going for Android is customisation.
When the iPhone was released it was the absolute leader in mobile iOS among other things. Now it's a solid competer but it lacks the originality it once had.
By contrast Microsoft have some interesting design ideas but they abandon them in the very next major version in favour of trying something else, which is jarring for users and doesn't inspire trust.
Android was listing screen capture as a new feature not long ago which hardly suggests a breakneck pace of change across the board.
Windows phone tiles are interesting but they don't feel game changing.
Is this an iOS thing or wider than that? Genuine question because if it was iOS alone then surely it would be eating Android's dust right now and that doesn't feel like it's the case, it feels like they're pretty much on a par.
(Just say I'm not wild about the word stagnant given that this is a market that has gone from nought to sixty in about the same time as it takes MS to get a version of Windows out, but it does feel like that pace has somewhat plateaued in the last 12 months or so).
Windows Phone 8 has a totally different and new paradigm going with merging start screen and "notifications bar" with the live tiles. Rooms with its "all sharing feature". Kids stuff. Lockscreen apps. All of these are a totally new approach to the mobile platform.
I feel the "new Microsoft" is really innovating(i hate that word) atm.
Kids corner I would love on my iPhone but it's a more polished version of what I can do with restrictions so I'm not really sold on it being that revolutionary.
You might not notice it, but, there is an eighth-of-a-second-ish delay between when you tap on most buttons and when the action occurs. An obvious (to me) example is when you tap on the back button on a navigation controller, and it takes a split second before anything happens..
It isn't much, but it is consistent across the OS, and it drives me crazy.
I'm not perceiving much lag between touch up and animation start on the back button of the UINavigationController.
Care to explain what is the issue with Siri? I use it every day to organize my day (with dozens of meetings and reminders) and it works perfectly fine.
I can kind of see your point with iOS6 Maps. But only to a point. Yes, it did start out really badly. I reported 3 issues that got fixed the next day (literally). One of those issues was also on Google Maps and is still broken there. Since then I haven't seen any problems with quality of data. I do miss Street View, but day to day, the app is fine.
Speaking of maps, when Tim Cook wrote the maps apology letter, he mentioned the Waze application. I've never heard of it till that day and, man, what a great app. Whenever I find myself in a traffic situation, I always fire it up. As far as point to point direction, it is second to none, routing me around traffic jams and standstills of the LA area.
I'm not sure I understand it in the context of device design.
Edit: or are they talking specifically about app design?
Thanks.
Software just doesn't get enough respect, and there are few people who realize how important it is. Steve Jobs was one of them, as was proved when he was running NeXT. When things started to go downhill, he made the right decision to turn NeXT into a software company. He knew that software was the most important thing.
He brought the best software people over to Apple, including Forstall, who was the key figure behind one of the most important business decisions that Apple ever made -- using OSX as the basis for the iPhone.
Software needs to have a strong advocate inside of a company, and there's no substitute for having someone like Forstall -- a real programmer who can fight for the Right Thing, instead of having the developers overrun by the other units of the company.
When software stops being so important, the other parts of the company overrule the developers and make bad decisions, like releasing software before its ready (eg. iOS6 maps).
Now that the future of Apple is being lead by the hardware people like Cook and Ive, I think we're going to see less innovation on the software side. We're going to see more hardware-only product launches like the iPad mini. More shinier and thinnier cases, and fewer killer apps.
What we might end up with is the old post-Jobs Apple, which launched a plethora of new product lines while letting the software stagnate to the point where Microsoft almost killed them.
Forstall has a track record, and the iOS is the best of the products out there compared to similar devices from other companies. So he did _SOMETHING_ right. As a developer, I love the developer environment as well - compare to say BlackBerry, Android and its eclipse and etc.
Indeed, this has been expected since Jony Ive was observed standing immediately to Tim Cook's right at the last Red Square May Day parade.
It is useful because it places the article within a larger historical context. It extends the content, and on HN, that is appropriate.
I strongly disagree with your description of the objectionable comment:
* First, saying that it is "non-offensive" to compare someone to Stalin's regime (or more generally to the Soviet regimes) is so blatantly inaccurate that it's difficult to believe that you seriously advanced that claim. Let's set aside "offensive" and say merely that comparing someone to Stalin is in virtually all contexts likely to be inflammatory, perceived as aggressive and hostile, and very likely to derail the discussion. It is not innocuous. So the original claim, with its comparison to Stalin, is immediately suspect because the author has chosen a way to express their disagreement that leads the conversation away from substance.
* When you say it "draws an analogy between two organizations which used propaganda effectively" you elide important points of information. For one, the nature of any comparison to Stalin. For another, the comment did not, I would say, "draw an analogy," it proposed one - and then took it for granted that the analogy was sound and useful. It presented no evidence for this point, it just stated its view as a _fait accompli._ That is not a good way to make an argument. When you advance a position, you're also obliged to advance evidence for it if you want it to be taken seriously. Humor is no defense here: the commenter was using sarcastic humor to advance an argument, and is not excused from the requirement of presenting evidence for the argument.
* On your own part, when you say "Comparing Mr. Gruber's writings to those of fellow travelers..." you too are assuming facts not in evidence. Do you mean that Mr. Gruber is a Stalinist? Then please advance the evidence in favor of that, or abandon your argument. You are obliged to present your arguments and their evidence forthrightly, not to wink knowingly and wave in the general direction of something faintly evidence-like.
* That the comment "places the article within a larger historical context" is so low a standard as to be useless. Any comment here that referred to events outside of 2012 could be said to do as much. Even if the above critiques did not hold, saying that the comment added "historical context" would be too glib, would not be a substantial point in its favor. If the comment were presenting evidence for its views, that would be one thing, but to say that the comment as it stands adds "historical context" is to say nothing, because by that standard you could defend the legions of facile "Apple would never have done X while Steve Jobs was alive" comments.
* The comment advanced, more or less, the argument "Apple's press releases are a form of propaganda; their terseness requires us all to make inferences and guesses about goings-on inside the company that do not serve our understanding well." This is a mere argument - which is a good thing! It is something that we can have a discussion about, reason about, and it is capable of being falsified. For that matter, if the comment had had what I just said appended to its original content, then all would have been forgiven. But instead we got only the version of the comment that flatters the prejudices of people who are already convinced that Apple is a bunch of no-goodniks and which has nothing useful to say to people who are not already convinced of its argument.
In summary, I objected to the comment because it advanced its argument by a method that was obviously likely to drag the discussion in unproductive directions, because it advanced its argument without presenting any evidence, and because it was advancing by insult an argument that could have been advanced without the insult just as productively. I disagree with your defense of it because you are neither holding it to a high standard of argument nor addressing any of its flaws - flaws which are obvious enough that my listing them is barely necessary.
Now, since you spoke up to defend it, you have heard its measure. It didn't add anything to the discussion, and the comparison it made was not helpful to anyone's understanding of the situation. I'm willing to put effort into explaining exactly why I think that because I think that a high standard for discussions here is important and necessary, and that letting comments like the one I object to slide by without expressing that they do not meet those standards, is part of maintaining that standard of discussion. Silence on community standards serves no one well. When objectionable comments are met with vigorous resistance, it not only shows the people making them "no, that kind of comment is not welcome," it affirms the community standards by setting them out explicitly and bringing them to everyone's mind. This is why I'm willing to write this much telling you and the author of the objectionable comment why I object. It is not about my disagreeing. Disagreement is a normal part of discourse - but there is no productive disagreement to be had unless people make their arguments plainly, make them falsifiable, and make them by going from evidence to conclusion.
> Comparing two things is different from equating them.
> It's not offensive to compare Stalin to anything,
> including those things you hold sacred. It doesn't
> imply they are equal in all respects, and any inference
> to that effect on your part is in error.
For the record, I find comparisons to the DPRK much richer for satire.
> "Kremlinology is the study and analysis of Soviet (and today, Russian) politics and policies based on efforts to understand the inner workings of an opaque central government"
[...]
> "During the Cold War, lack of reliable information about the country forced Western analysts to "read between the lines" and to use the tiniest tidbits, such as the removal of portraits, the rearranging of chairs, positions at the reviewing stand for parades in Red Square, the choice of capital or small initial letters in phrases such as "First Secretary", the arrangement of articles on the pages of the party newspaper "Pravda" and other indirect signs to try to understand what was happening in internal Soviet politics. In the German language, such attempts acquired the somewhat derisive name "Kreml-Astrologie" (Kremlin Astrology), hinting at the fact that its results were often vague and inconclusive, if not outright wrong."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kremlinology
----
If you read it this way too, and responded how you have making the same assumptions I did... then I suppose you are just a more civil-minded person than I am. I thought it was a worthwhile contribution, and as much as I love to keep HN's signal:noise high, I have a soft spot for this kind of sardonicism. And I think it was an important reminder amidst this highly speculative discussion, that I don't see any other comment making as tersely.
I read it as a satirical joke. A little "on the nose", perhaps. But just a joke.
(Edit: cleaned up repetition.)
Good leaders know when to change their mind. I actually have more respect for Cook being able to recognize that John Browett was not a good fit after personally hiring him.
The timing of his stock sale in May, is more consistent with the idea the Forstall foresaw the writing on the wall when he was made responsible for Maps. Selling 95% of his shares was clearly a sign that his long term commitment was in doubt.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-57425920-37/apple-exec-sco...
If I were looking only at the impact of the iOS decision, I would have a hard time believing that Google didn't tell Apple to piss off, but I think even that reading is far too simplistic.
The decision to adopt not invented here as corporate policy backfired. Forestall was probably prescient enough to see where it was headed.
Apple and Google have become serious competitors. Apple realized that and started working on its mapping solution, but recognized it wasn't ready in time for iOS 6. Unfortunately, the license was going to run out before iOS 7, so a new contract would have to be negotiated[1].
Google came back and said "piss off" (or "pay $50/phone" or whatever "evil" terms you want). Apple couldn't make the terms work within their constraints, so quickly made a deal with Tom Tom and tried to integrate their data into the nascent mapping system[2].
The iOS 6 beta comes along and the data is nowhere near where it needs to be. Apple has a decision to make here and, with a choice of "go for it" or "pull a major feature in iOS 6.x"[3], they decide to cross their fingers and go for it.
Now, iOS 6 release hits. They know the maps aren't ready, but the bridges have been burned. Their choices now are "put some lipstick on a pig" or "pull a major feature from iOS 6.0". They decide on lipstick. Sometimes you get away with it; sometimes you don't. They didn't.
I'm not saying this is what happened!
My point is that when major companies are in "coopetition"[4], nothing is simple and obvious. Maybe Apple thought they could shroud everybody in a reality distorition field. It is possible, even plausible. I just don't think it is the most possible scenario, and it is tiring to hear it expressed as the "only" possible solution.[5]
1. http://daringfireball.net/2012/09/timing_of_apples_map_switc... (that's the best I've got to "source" the end of the Apple/Google deal happening before iOS 7 would release)
2. http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/article/427347/apple_signs_glo...
3. iOS releases seem to have stabilized on an October time-frame. Based on my experience, it is unlikely that you could pull up the release of an OS by 6 months, so maps would have to change in a "dot" release.
4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coopetition
5. Regardless of what really happened, I would have loved to be a fly on the wall in those meetings. Those would have been awesome bizdev meetings...unless Apple really did say "piss off". :)
If the new Maps had even been good enough they'd still be saying it. Instead they're now trying to backpedal, just like before Maps was widely believed to be a bit shoddy it was claimed to be an Apple "homegrown", from scratch data set, when clearly they mostly just bought in data, but still managed to screw that up by putting some pretty crappy business info on top of solid map data. Now the emphasis (and blame) shifts onto all the data suppliers whereas before they'd all have remain faceless (just like Gorilla Glass wasn't allowed to name Apple as a customer, and Samsung has to screenprint Apple logos onto their chips).
http://www.theverge.com/2012/6/11/3078987/apple-tomtom-opens...
To place responsibility fully on either company is silly. No company of that size is simply going to say "no". There's always a price, and Apple decided it wasn't worthwhile.
This is all about unity.
Unifying iOS and OS X under one person.
Unifying human interface, both hardware and software, under one person.
Unifying underlying technologies under one person.
And fundamentally, unifying the team at the top, and removing discord.
No one can deny Forstall's legacy. But from what we've read in recent years I think there's real truth in this comment from Gruber:
"Thinking about it some more, though, and considering what I know about Forstall’s reputation within the company, I think that headline, euphemistic though it is, tells the plain truth: Forstall was an obstacle to collaboration within the company."
For the future? Integrating the hardware and the software was always Apple's core strength, that this just makes sense. It's an open question whether Ive has the technical knowledge for this role, but he certainly has the taste. He certainly wouldn't have let that new iPod nano UI be seen by the outside world.
Modern-day Apple has always shied away from manufacturing directly, and for good reason, but it may just be that they're too big not to anymore. That no one manufacturer can meet their demands, whether due to lack of capacity or politics. Making chips is difficult, and usually best left to the experts, but Apple now has the cash to hire the best and is in the perfect place to benefit from the competitive advantage it'd give. It'll be interesting to see how this new Technologies group turns out.
One of the things I admire about Apple is their plainspokenness, both in advertising and in press releases. ... Thinking about it some more, though, and considering what I know about Forstall’s reputation within the company, I think that headline, euphemistic though it is, tells the plain truth:
This, to me, reads as "Apple is plainspoken. Ok, so they're not, but let me convince you that even when they're not, they really are, it's just in disguise!"
Why go to such lengths? Why even bring that up? It's hardly a critical part of the article.
I'm genuinely curious, by the way - please, someone show me how I'm wrong.
Ive is Apple's new Product Chief (heads hardware and software design across whole company).
Federighi (Mac OS and iOS), Mansfield (Tech), Cue (Services & Content), Williams (Supply Chain), Schiller (Marketing) - all in support roles to Ive.
Under Steve Jobs, product and design was consolidated under himself. He had the ultimate say as to what shipped and he was the toughest curator. Now it appears that Apple is returning to that model, except now it's Jony Ive with that role.
I also wonder what this means for the future of hardware design at Apple. If Ive must now look after both the hardware and the software, he must be less hands-on in the day-to-day work on individual designs. Does this imply that Apple are not expecting to iterate on the hardware design on a high level from now on and have identified the software as the area with most potential for aesthetic improvement?
What this means is that, Ive now gets to chose people and those who do that in turn report to him.
Steve being gone meant the didn't have to keep him around, and the maps debacle was likely the straw big enough to break the camel's back.
However the work that he's done is all about Industrial Design, which operates under many different constraints from the software world.
From the Apple folk that I know Ive and his team currently seem to run a bit like an in-house agency rather than being 'part of Apple'. I wonder if they'll try and continue that way - or become more integrated with general product development.
As has been seen, mistakes aren't really tolerated when Apple's name is on the line -- someone almost always pays for it with their job. Apple has started to show cracks in the armor, and I imagine we're going to see a few more events of non-perfectness in the future. (Entirely reasonable, but nonetheless those that contribute to an image.)
If things don't go Apple-esque perfect in the future, I wonder who starts pointing fingers?
What?
Sure! I'd be happy to.
The way Hacker News works is, people submit content.
If people like the content, they vote it up. Sufficiently high-voted content reaches the front page. 55 people have voted this up at the time of this comment, feeling the content was worth their attention. Given the recency of the content relative to the votes it has received, it occupies the position you see on the front page.
Is there anything else I can help with?
you: Explaining how votes are tallied.
Technically correct but totally useless.
That's pretty much the only thing you can do to improve the situation.