Jony Ive shakes up Apple’s software design group | Hacker News Reader

Jony Ive shakes up Apple’s software design group

9to5mac.com

68 pointsantr71 comments

The problem I'm seeing with this whole unification of design across a whole system including hardware and software is that designing a proper UI for software is orders of magnitude more complex than designing UI for hardware. Not only is software far more complex than typical end-user hardware from a functionality standpoint, it's far more malleable, indefinitely extensible and has to work with third-party components over which it has little control. Also, because it takes far longer to learn how to use software, simply being good isn't enough - it has to work within the constraints of people's expectations, far more than a piece of hardware has to.

Now, there's certainly commonality between the two but if you were to exaggerate the difference, hardware UI design is like writing a sonnet. The medium is constraining but the compromises you have to make with other people are minimal - if you write a great sonnet, the chance is that people will like it. Software UI design is more like writing a constitution - it's about compromises. You have to weigh the needs of present users against those of future users, usability of old applications against new applications, properly balance the opinions and ideas of a whole bunch of people involved in design and implementation of various features, not to mention third-party developers. No matter what you do, there will be a huge number of inconsistencies, a lot of people will hate it and many others will worship and faithfully copy your mistakes, in a way that makes correcting your mistakes difficult.

Edit: Btw, when I say hardware UI, I actually mean the hardware as seen and directly manipulated by the user without software as the intermediary. If by hardware, we mean software interface to the hardware, the above points also apply to hardware, though hardware is still considerably simpler and the work is done almost entirely at the component level that has nothing to do with Jony Ive. At the whole system level, which is where Jony Ive comes in, hardware UI design is inherently simple. Simple doesn't mean easy - it just means you're judged by different standards.

I'd argue all your points regarding software are true for hardware but with the added difficulty of needing to get it right the first time.

Edit: Re your edit, I still think that designing the actual hardware that the user interacts with directly is equally difficult to design as the software at any level.

The fact that the iPhone has 4 buttons and a switch is a huge design decision. The size, shape, texture, reflectiveness, responsiveness, and tactile feedback are parts of the design that need to be considered and are not malleable once released.

There's a great lecture about the software UX design from Jeremy Lyon who used to work on webOS at Palm: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEwCRpTEgA0

The compromises you are talking about sound (to me) very much like the tradeoffs he's describing there.

This is starting to be a pattern. Although Jony is obviously talented, he sure has driven a lot of talent from the company.

At some point, that leaving talent points to a problem with Jony.

And then it will be Jony's turn.

What talent has Ive driven from the company apart from Scott Forstall and this guy?

Jon Rubenstein had plenty of conflict with him (via the Jobs and Ive biographies), and Tony Fadell as well [1].

[1] http://www.cultofmac.com/262334/feud-jony-ive-keep-tony-fade...

That’s enough.

He may not get on with Ive, but Apple Maps was Forstall's downfall.

I wonder how possible that would be given the quote in the Jobs biography:

"He told Isaacson that Ive had 'more operational power' at Apple than anyone else besides Jobs himself — that there's no one at the company who can tell Ive what to do," the report said. "That, says Jobs, is 'the way I set it up.'"

see Steve Ballmer

The only actual legal structure protecting Ive's position at Apple is one in which Cook voluntarily complies with Jobs' stated wishes. That is to say, there is nothing stopping Cook from firing Ive tomorrow, changing his job title or control inside the company. Jobs may have also secured the board's agreement to protect Ive, but that too would rest merely on their voluntary compliance with such. In the corporate world, there's no such thing as a truly untouchable employee. The CEO, the board, or shareholders, someone can always get rid of you.

How many people did Steve Jobs drive from the company on his return? (answer: the CEO, the whole board, and 1000's of employees)

At some point the Western intellectual canon of rhetorical tropes and logical fallacies will need to be expanded to add the "because Steve Jobs" fallacy which seems to justify anything on the basis of Steve Jobs having done it (without regard to context, or that the party in question is not Steve Jobs)

The point is that Jony pushing a few people out* as he takes control is hardly cause for concern.

What would be cause for concern is if the people obviously responsible for Apple, I.e. I've and Cook, were timidly playing corporate politics instead of decisively leading.

(* although it seems that the story of Christie leaving because of disagreement with Jony is actually a fabrication)

[edit: downvote away, but it would be interesting to know what you disagree with)

It's a bit hard to judge from the outside isn't it?

Jobs and Ive run Apple like a cult of personality. And it seems to have resulted in awesome products. Let's see if that can continue to happen.

Because in the last 2 years, Apple's design took a nosedive. I hate to say it but Google's interfaces are now way more pleasant than Apple's. And there is one reason for it:

FLAT INTERFACES

If it comes to the MacOS, I will probably abandon ship. I liked my iPhone and its familiar look and feel. Jobs got it, Ive didn't. It was all thrown out the window with the word "skeumorphism".

Let me be clear: iOS 7 was a leap forward DESPITE the interface, not because of it. It was all the other things, like the drawer on the bottom (whoopee) that made up for the horrible clown-like icons and complete lack of textures. My videos with white backgrounds now are indistinguishable from the controls. At least they fixed the neon-green color of the bar on top when you have a phonecall. The white text was almost impossible to read on it. How did it ever pass design QA at Apple? Probably while Jony Ive was desigining his much-touted icon grid.

Apple, your design was so good -- why'd you have to go copy Google and Microsoft after decades of leading design-wise? Why'd you have to break your browser only to fix it in 7.1? Argh.

> Jobs and Ive run Apple like a cult of personality

Hello? Earth speaking to whoever is out there.

I realize information takes time to reach the end of our solar system and beyond, but Steve Jobs died long ago. He also ceded control to Tim Cook months before doing so.

OK I omitted a word assuming most people would know what I meant.

Steve Jobs HAS run Apple like a cult of personality.

Steve Jobs appointed Ive head of everything hardware-design-related and made him untouchable on purpose. He groomed him to lead design at Apple, which is the major department.

Steve Jobs would have vehemently disagreed with Ive about skeumorphism and probably wouldn't let him create iOS 7 this way, or if it happened, would chew him out the way he did Forstall, even though he liked him.

That said, the reason Ive is now telling everyone it's his way or the highway is a direct extension of how Steve Jobs ran the company. Get it?

But that was not Steve Jobs..your over-simplifying things as there were times where standing up to Steve was not only encouraged but respected

Although I don't think that your point disproves mine, I'd love to learn about the times that standing up to Jobs was respected and rewarded. Genuinely want to have more examples of this.

Why not link to the source article? http://9to5mac.com/2014/04/09/jony-ive-shakes-up-apples-soft...

Thanks. I changed it.

The Financial Times got confirmation of this from Apple: http://blogs.ft.com/tech-blog/2014/04/apple-confirms-departu... (registration required)

Apple's statement: "Greg has been planning to retire later this year after nearly 20 years at Apple. He has made vital contributions to Apple products across the board, and built a world-class Human Interface team which has worked closely with Jony for many years."

Clearly downplaying a clash.

How is it clear that it's a clash? It's just as likely that the reporting of a clash is drama added by the media.

(Edit: see: http://daringfireball.net/linked/2014/04/09/christie-ive-wsj )

I didn't like those inconsistent style-over-substance design decisions in iOS7. Maybe Forstall and Christie just wanted to be a voice of reason and got sacked for it?

Are you kidding? iOS 7 strips down graphical elements so that the substance is the style.

iOS 6 and earlier was stuffed to the gills with stylization.

Outside of the valley bubble skeuomorphism is what people require in order to use the devices. A button needs to look like a button or people are confused. Im talking about customers. Not the people that designed it and live the technology and are bored with it after a few short years. 7 is a travesty, the beginning of the end.

I own mac, pc, android, ios. With each revision, ios has become harder to use because they keep adding new things without considering holistic experience.

Take a look at the Settings in ios7. It's nothing but a list of identical looking settings that go on for pages. Everything is nothing but text and thin lines.

A simple color-coded organization, categorization, and minor variation in fonts would've gone a long way.

Android's settings isn't much better, but at least things are better marked with text labels and clearer icons.

Apple has long crossed that line of less-is-more. They are firmly in the less-is-less territory. Both companies are leaving a lot on the table by being too boxed-in in their thinking, but Android is at least taking more humble approach.

"Take a look at the Settings in ios7. It's nothing but a list of identical looking settings that go on for pages. Everything is nothing but text and thin lines."

Err, it's pretty much always been like this.

The basic layout has stayed the same, but the left-side list has grown quite a bit over the years, as has the number of settings on the right side.

The original layout may have been serviceable years ago, but now it leaves a lot to be desired.

The current split-pane interface works fine if you go in there to change multiple items on a regular basis, but that's not exactly how most people use the settings.

> and minor variation in fonts would've gone a long way.

This would look awful, but you make a good point. Having little icons next to each one would be good as well.

Yes it 'could' look awful, but it could also look good too. That's where good designers earn their paychecks. As a designer, I sympathize with designers at Apple. Some of them must feel pretty frustrated.

But iOS 6 had functional styles. You could tell at a glance where the toggles, sliders, buttons, and non-interactive UI elements were at any time. Stripping these elements down to nothing doesn't make the device any easier to use.

iOS 7 strips down graphical elements so that the style is the substance.

iOS 6 and earlier were stuffed with obvious affordance. Certainly there was some ridiculous skeuomorphism but it was far more usable. The calendar is, for me, the best example of iOS 7 design gone wrong: A lot of motion, very little visual distinction between elements, and overall an loss of utility.

For me it would have to be the replacement of the universally-known signal strength bar with "5 balls".

Takes more space, conveys no more information, uses a design element that is already used for other purposes (such as breadcrumb nav)

It's much more legible than the tiny bars symbol. The bars icon is a bad fit for a wide and short space. The new signal strength icon looks like something that Ive wanted from the beginning:

http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/5011df3deab8ea5e1f0...

No I'm not kidding. The extreme minimalism in iOS7 is a style in and of itself.

Pre-iOS7, the GUI style provided utility and substance by always very clearly indicating state (which app is currently open was absolutely obvious to see even at the shortest glance because they all looked so very different), context (how screen elements relate to each other, how they are grouped together) and affordance (possible modes of interactions, what is a button, what can be manipulated how).

That substance is now gone, overridden by the style of extreme minimalism.

Why? I thought he was in charge of all UX to begin with. The fact that iOS7 came out with such inconsistent design, weird colors, and almost invisible fonts is his fault as much as anyone's, if not more so. He approved everything, and now he's taking it out on the designers because of the bad feedback from the market?

Ive approved it. This was a fiasco second only to the Maps fiasco. Jobs berated those guys.

SAD BUT THIS IS HOW THINGS HAPPEN:

1. Apple Maps is headed by Forstall, doesn't get enough resources, comes out sucking.

2. Scott Forstall is forced out the stall... I mean the door. And Steve Jobs passes away. The two biggest advocates of skeumorphism gone. http://www.businessinsider.com/tim-cook-why-i-fired-scott-fo...

3. Jony Ive, a hardware guy, takes over the UI. The microsoft-envy kills Apple's mojo. We just have to accept this new crap.

OR FOR EXAMPLE:

1. Some people in Florida can't vote properly on a poorly designed butterfly ballot

2. George W Bush comes to power

3. After 9-11, we go to war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and do nation building (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9SOVzMV2bc)

4. US economy falls, many countries start to resent the USA, meanwhile we get Patriot Act and a lot of domestic surveillance

5. All kinds of spy programs and warrantless searches and detaining of citizens is authorized because of "terrorism"

And it all started from a butterfly ballot...

While that is a wildly crazy comparison... and the conspiracy theorist in me likes it, it is completely naive to think that the war on terror was an emergent event after the butterfly ballot...

Cheney, Bush Sr, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz had been decades long been building up to their coup of the US.

But if they hadn't been elected, how would they have succeeded if Al Gore's admin was running the show?

I'm saying that the flutter of a butterfly's wing can ultimately cause a typhoon halfway around the world. Chaos theory :-P

Elected. I dont think that word means what you think it means.

What bad feedback from the market? Has there been any customer satisfaction survey done around iOS 6 vs 7?

They mean "falling out", right?

Funny looking word, but it's not wrong. Fallout is the noun: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fallout

No, "fallout" is not a noun form of "falling out." For one, "falling out" is already a noun phrase. Secondly, "fallout" refers to the lingering effects of some larger event. It doesn't apply here.

Not entirely true, as indicated by the link to Webster's Dictionary provided.

Read the definition again, it agrees with nardi's comment.

I did read it. The usage is correct and the dictionary entry shows that "fallout" is indeed a noun showing "a bad effect or result of something".

Sorry - I think you need to read it again because you've clearly downvoted my response in error.

"a secondary and often lingering effect"

The "falling out" described in the original comment is not a secondary effect - it is the primary driver of the action. The fallout from the falling out is that Christie left the organisation.

A falling out can be the fallout from another action, but that's not the context used here.

He probably sent him a link to one of those much better iOS flat GUI redesigns from independent artists.

The redesigns probably changed the color of the shift button.

Maybe it's just me, but I now have a hard time telling if the shift button is pressed or not now. I'm probably too used to the old colours.

It was a joke in reference to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7555012

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZp7BvQJnU8

Awesome video and complete validation of my theory that Ive is trying to eliminate design from user interfaces and make it so that anyone can do it even with MS Word.

Lowering the barrier to app creation is all this flat, modern crap is about. The end user's experience is of no consideration at all because they can be easily convinced _anything_ is cool. I can't wait for the backlash.

Everyone at apple with taste is either being forced out or quitting so when that backlash comes apple will be left holding an empty bag.

Jony, please stick to hardware.

It doesn't make any sense to have the hardware and software have opposing designs... that's why they put Jony in charge of both.

The box is the box. The box is supposed to be subtle. The software is the point. Design the software like the box and you have ios7.

Huh, how can hardware and software have "opposing designs"? I'm just an engineer who doesn't understand design so please explain.

Imagine a pink phone w/ a flowery case and a software ui styled to look like starcraft controls.

This my semi-outsider opinion.

Metal. Minimal. Futurism. Refined. Ive.

Kitchy. Cozy. Gaudy. Forstall and most things not iOS7 (and iOS7 has compromises) If this includes Christie now, yeah, him too.

So much of the UX has seemed to betray the industrial design. It's like Window's old "Hot Dog" color theme. I'm going to guess that Ive pushed to get people in line and the same old flat vs. skeumorphic arguments simmered since that is one specific instance of a larger aesthetic argument.

Certain aspects of the OSX are well done, but many parts are dated, klunky, and even garish.

Apple hardware looks beautiful sitting somewhere turned OFF or with someone else's app/lication loaded up. The native stuff feels like cheap plastic body kits on refined European sports cars (not the Italian ones).

Well, it seems to have made sense between 1984 and 2012...

Agree completely, I still can't believe ios7 made it to the market. I am embarrassed to ship software that conforms to their new look. The man makes beautiful boxes, but they are blowing it.

" "We saw Apple with Steve Jobs," Ellison purred, drawing the shape of an upwards graph with his finger.

"We saw Apple without Steve Jobs," the Oracle continued, pointing his finger down to the ground "

Funny, he was just on the stand in their patent trial last week.

Complete conjecture.

Ive will be the next CEO of Apple. Anyone who doesn't bow at the alter of Ive like they bow at the altar of Steve, will be gone.

Google should hire this dude, just to give Sir Jony the middle finger.

I wonder if he's still unemployed.

A quick google search indicates that Greg Christie came up with the "Slide to Unlock" idea: http://www.macrumors.com/2014/04/09/greg-christie-jony-ive-f...

Hopefully the person that invented the picker wheel control will be next. What a horrible interface.

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