Hacker News Reader

Comment by phr4ts | Hacker News Reader

Correction: iCloud Beta Incorporates windows (Metro) look and feel.

Except not at all. This has a very different look and feel.

Everything with a modern design is not a copy of Metro. Windows wasn't the first to do flat designs, and most designs (like this) that people say look like metro don't resemble it.

But it is Microsoft who made it trendy among web designers and even influenced Apple. Ironically this trend started by a company which was remarked as "tasteless" by Steve Jobs.

There really wasn't one company that made flat design trendy. Microsoft wanted to use web technologies as part of their main OS and flat design was already popular. Microsoft went with the flow like everyone else and they didn't set any trends.

There is a reason people say some designs look like metro: because they do. To the untrained eye, Helvetica Neue and Segoe look very similar; text-heavy flat designs using very similar fonts look very similar. Microsoft might not have been the first to bring this sort of concept to life (they weren't), but they certainly popularised it by virtue of their mainstream reach and their dramatic departure from previous design choices.

I'm not saying Apple hasn't improved the concept with gradients, shadows etc, but denying that Metro was a big influence on the iOS redesign is just unrealistic.

Sorry but nobody who has actually spent time with WM7 and iOS7 can possibly think they are related.

The iOS7 design is about layering, transparency and minimalism. WM7 is far more about its distinctive rectangular, high contrast design.

When people talk about Metro, they usually talk about Windows 8.

I'm not denying that there are differences; what I'm saying is that any Joe Average, asked whether iOS7 looks like Metro or iOS6 or any other OS before them, would say Metro.

There is nothing wrong in admitting influences in art, complete originality is a just a silly myth.

Not really. Windows (Metro) is completely flat, there is no depth and it is very difficult to distinguish controls. The direction Apple is taking adds a bit of depth to help distinguish most controls, similar to Android design guidelines.

Honest question: What depth ? All i see is flat all around.

There are subtle gradients. Take a look at the tabs in the contacts icon. Or the (subtle) shadow under each icon.

:) It is the one that you see when it is built by Apple. Says the guy who buys everything Apple produces :)

Well for one they use parallax (on the iPhone) which obviously communicates depth, plus background items out of focus, plus there is a very very light drop shadow on all the icons (oddly a png directly encoded directly into the html on beta.icloud.com) and a shadow around the text.

The icons themselves are mostly flat with some exceptions (Contacts has a very strong bevel and there is a slight bevel on the notes icon).

In iOS7, menu transparency that blur the content below it give a sense of depth in a similar way drop shadows do. UI elements are in the top layer, with content in the lower layer. Parallax in the home screen is also there to add depth, as well as a very subtle transparency in some app that allow you to see your (blurred) wallpaper while in app.

There are also some interesting use of solid color to indicate interactable elements (icons or links that are part of the UI are in the same solid color) that will be greyed out when there are layer above it (e.g. via action sheet).

Most of these are not in the iCloud website, however. And I'm still not sure I like the new visual style.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com