TouchWiz is precisely why I won't go near a Samsung, vanilla Android please Samsung then I'm interested.
One UI to end gropes: Samsung facelift crowns your thumb the king
Samsung has embarked on a tasteful overhaul of how its phones look and work. Only three years ago Samsung's UI looked like a gaudy car boot sale, which felt out of place as Samsung's own futuristic AMOLED curved panels were rolling into mass production. The redesign modernised the notorious TouchWiz skin, but this makeover may …
COMMENTS
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Friday 9th November 2018 16:30 GMT Charlie Clark
I don't mind TouchWiz that much. I do mind not being able to remove preinstalled crap and tardy updates. Fortunately, nearly all Samsung's are easy to root and well supported by LineageOS. :-)
OneUI looks to me mainly like adopting Material Design, which makes sense because it gets a lot of things right.
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Saturday 10th November 2018 12:01 GMT Charlie Clark
As hard as I try, I cannot make myself think of Material Design as "getting things right".
I suspect you're just being snarky. If you compare apps before and after Material I think you'll find more recent ones are more consistent. Material Design, of course, builds on classic UX patterns but also incorporates lessons learned fom IOS and, yes, Windows Phone. Which is one of the reasons why the various platforms are increasingly interchangeable.
To summarise: I think that Material Design provides a coherent metaphor for design elements that recognises the importance of visual effects but subordinates them to functionality. Eg., the darkening around a screen press: the effect reinforces the action and is thus meaningul. I don't think this is particularly revolutionary or magical, just well applied, well documented and it provided a useable toolbox for developers.
Right enough of the whalesong guff, I've off to shoot some kittens!
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Tuesday 13th November 2018 16:26 GMT JohnFen
"I suspect you're just being snarky"
I am not. I don't think Material Design is a good thing.
"If you compare apps before and after Material I think you'll find more recent ones are more consistent."
Well, sure, but I'm also bitten by the downside of that. If a design you find to be suboptimal becomes "standard", then sure, you get consistency -- but all that means is that most of the apps you want to use are irritating and hard to use.
In other words, UI consistency across applications is a serious downside if you find that UI to be objectionable.
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Friday 9th November 2018 18:20 GMT JimmyPage
Re: How about we acknowledge that big phones aren't as usable
The problem is as people get older, they'll find bigger screens easier - if not essential - to use.
My wife has MS, and fucked vision and tactile sense. She's pretty much what a Samsung user will be like in 10, 15 years.
So manufactures *either* ignore them, and wait for the revenues of mobile to drop as the monied pensioners are driven off, OR they start to think what is going to be needed for an older user base.
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Friday 9th November 2018 20:18 GMT Barry Rueger
Re: How about we acknowledge that big phones aren't as usable
The problem is as people get older, they'll find bigger screens easier - if not essential - to use.
It's less about screen size and more about the size of the type and the contrast. And of course some kind of half-ways intelligent layout that doesn't bury content under pointless pop-ups and subscription nags.
Too much tech is so in love with the newest, coolest thing that they lose sight of basic functionality. Less is more. With respect to every phone maker deciding that they need to customize Android, there's also a lot to be said for maintaining a consistent interface across devices. I dread hardware upgrades because I know that functions that I need will disappear or be hidden, and I'll have to waste time learning a whole new workflow.
I challenge phone makers to offer a choice on first boot: the manufacturer's customized interface or straight Android.
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Saturday 10th November 2018 08:28 GMT Piro
Re: How about we acknowledge that big phones aren't as usable
I couldn't agree more.
I thought I could get used to 5.2", but I've since discarded the two 5.2" phones I was using, and have purchased a 5" one (Xiaomi Redmi 4X), and put a custom ROM on my old Z3 Compact. (Yes, I carry two phones, yes, I'm aware the Redmi 4X has dual-sim, I use that too, so I carry 3 sims in total). It's so much nicer using the Z3 Compact than pretty much any other phone I own, because of the size.
Anyone who downvoted you just flat out hates choice - the market is absolutely saturated with enormous devices, but almost no reasonably sized ones with good specifications. No-one is saying larger phones can't also be sold, but it would be refreshing to have some reasonably sized ones from time to time.
I remember the reviews of the HTC Desire HD back in the day: Gizmodo praised it as "A 720p-Shooting Android Behemoth" though they felt that it was a little too big for comfort.
It seems so quaint now, (I have a Desire HD too), as that size of device today would qualify as very much miniature, but my hand hasn't changed size.
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Saturday 10th November 2018 05:44 GMT Kevin McMurtrie
Is this to boost replacement glass sales?
The Galaxy S9 series has a touchscreen that wraps around the edges. It's nearly impossible to operate them single handed because you'll bump the sensitive area of the screen edges. The only way to operate the phone with your thumb is to rest it in a flat open hand rather than grip it. That's not something you want to do often with one of the most expensive and fragile phones on the market.
The S9 series already allows you to swipe apps into and out of windows. If you're in a reclining chair and can risk dropping the phone frequently, you can put your app in a window near your thumb.