On Sun, Jul 15, 2012 at 4:31 AM, Dianne Hackborn <[email protected]> wrote: > Okay: Apple is famous for having great UIs. > > iOS does not have a hard menu button. > > I believe there is an implication that you can do a great UI here without > relying on a hard menu button.
Forget Apple - I've never been an Apple user, I've no idea how full-screen apps cope with Apple hardware. As I'm sure you understand only too well, the core of my argument is elsewhere. At this point, I just meant to emphasise the point that to users, things have a "feel" to them which means not all solutions that technically "work" are created equal. I remarked that Apple gets a lot of praise for understanding this and getting their UX mostly right. That doesn't mean they never screw up, that their stuff can't be improved upon or that it's equally well suited for any purpose. >> Saying "no Menu button should be enough for everyone" reminds a >> similar well-known statement that concerned 640kB of memory - >> supporting such claims you run an acute risk of getting on the wrong >> side of history. :-) > > > But this is what I was really here to reply to. > > Seriously? > > You are comparing whether there is a physical button for invoking a menu vs. > an affordance within the application to a statement that one will never need > more than the *amount* of a certain resource? Yep, exactly. What's your problem with that? Using memory is fundamental to software which is why the original statement was rather short-sighted - it didn't really take a clairvoyant to be able to imagine future software doing more stuff and eating more memory. Bringing up UI is equally fundamental to software (I don't remember if I ever saw an Android app that had no use for the menu button), especially on small screens, and that it would be very beneficial to have a standard way of doing so - in particular if there's no good reason not to have such a way. Also I believe I mentioned quite a few of more substantial arguments for off-screen controls, including a fairly realistic case study of an app that would be crippled by not having off-screen controls - why don't you choose to respond to some of that? In particular, what's the insurmountable problem with an off-screen menu button? Thanks. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Android Developers" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers?hl=en
