Why is Big Sur so ugly?

[Feyl]

I don't agree. iOS has a much larger user base than macOS and with all the technologies they have learnt from iOS, the future of macOS is to incorporate much of what they have learnt. The ability to run apps on all platforms, with little effort from developers will expand the app volume availability on macOS.

I was talking about the design.

 

[Madonepro]

I was talking about the design.

Yep, me too. The design of the UI is very much linked with what's under the hood.

 

[-BigMac-]

Yep, me too. The design of the UI is very much linked with what's under the hood.

Uhhhh is it though?
Flat design was on the mac 30 years ago, but under the hood it was a potato compared to current day.

 

[Feyl]

Yep, me too. The design of the UI is very much linked with what's under the hood.

That's very true. So they should unify iOS and MacOS even more so the creation of Catalyst apps could be easy. Which is not exactly the case and pretty much every Catalyst app is a piece of crap.

 

[nickdalzell1]

Uhhhh is it though?
Flat design was on the mac 30 years ago, but under the hood it was a potato compared to current day.

I thought I was the only one left who knew flat design was a thing 20-30 years back. Everyone today calls it 'Modern' while I just see it as being 'stuck in the past'.

I keep asking why we are treating modern gear (with the insane specs) as if it were 1984 gear. We have 4K displays on systems with 64GB RAM or more pulling a UI that seems more fitting to an Amiga.

 

[Feyl]

I thought I was the only one left who knew flat design was a thing 20-30 years back. Everyone today calls it 'Modern' while I just see it as being 'stuck in the past'.

I keep asking why we are treating modern gear (with the insane specs) as if it were 1984 gear. We have 4K displays on systems with 64GB RAM or more pulling a UI that seems more fitting to an Amiga.

I don't know man. Since System 1 and Windows 3.x the graphics were pretty skeuomorphic in my view. Let's not forget that at that time they had to do as little as possible in the UI to save performance. So the UI was basically buttons, windows, icons and menus. And every icon symbolised a different metaphor from the real life to make it easy to understand. And systems after that only kept adding things to the UI.

I'd say the real removal of design with the "flat" UI came with Windows 8. I'm just not sure if it was some grand intention or if the designers at Microsoft don't know how to design. Apple shortly afterwards followed with the iOS 7 and since that time they've been correcting their wrong decisions.

With Big Sur they gave us some sort of a hybrid between both of the worlds that I'm not sure if Apple knows what they're doing. On one hand they made like 4 icons with obcene ammount of shadows and depth and on the other hand they went with the iOS 7 route.

 

[nickdalzell1]

Big Sur seems more like a 'transitional period' in UI, combining both flat and 3D UI depth. Similar things happened only in the reverse with Android when going from 2.3 to 3.0 (and 4.0 on phones).

I wish there was at least a 'classic mode' during the whole iOS 7 update similar to the PowerPC "Classic 9" mode to help ease the transition and because a lot of apps either broke in iOS 7 or were inconsistent since a lot of 3rd party apps remained skeuo until updated later to work better with iOS 7's UI design.

I was surprised they even bothered at Apple given Microsoft essentially failing hard with Windows 8. But oh well, life goes on, I got my skeuo back via old Samsungs, and Big Sur is a hopeful sign of skeuo's return on my Mac. I have no real proper replacement for my Mac so I want to have a UI that doesn't hurt my eyes, so far, Big Sur is getting there. We will see next update, I suppose.

When iOS 7 came out, I didn't follow the news, so I expected not much to change as before, and when my devices updated, I thought they went into safe mode given the lack of color and flat icons. When doing searches online, and asking in iMore, the Apple-oriented variant of Android Forums, I was told both 'that's they way OS is going' and 'get used to it.' Sorry, but I cannot get used to something I hate. I have tried multiple times to use it, to give it a chance (and also give modern Android a chance) and every time it bothers me, as those device are no longer fun to use, and I merely tolerate, not enjoy, using them. Now more recently OEMs remove features but mark up the price a lot more than it's worth, and losing headphone jacks, IR blasters, and removable batteries, all once cited as strengths of Android over iOS, are just unforgivable. I tolerated the fact Apple didn't have removable batteries given they lasted a long time, but on Android it's unforgivable. Today's devices all look alike, the UI is pretty much alike as well where at first, you can't tell Android from iOS if a newbie, and everything is too dumbed down. Also there's no modern phone out there less than 5" in screen.

I don't even like modern Samsungs. I have given them and modern iOS devices such as the iPhone X and mom's 11 Pro, but they don't fit me at all, and I hate the UI. So it's not like I never tried. I tried, and kept going back to my old phones. Maybe one day something will push me to go forward but right now, I just don't see a reason to update, since nothing any modern devices do today have half the features I still use, are too big, and the UI is utter garbage. I am not sure if it's intended for younger folks to use since they never went through the first iteration of flat UI design, so to them skeuo is 'old' and 'designed for grandma' but I just can't stand flat design. I have to be 100% happy with what I use, I'm smart enough to not get hacked or install shady apps, so an outdated OS is not going to be unsafe for me. In fact, the last newer device I used, a Galaxy A01, running Android 10, leaked my phone number where I was getting a ton of spam texts from email addresses I couldn't block, so I pulled the SIM, waited a few weeks hoping they would stall at the server and the folks sending them would give up after, and popped the SIM into a Galaxy SIII and so far no more spam. So in fact I got hacked much faster and easier with the newer phone, although I did nothing to cause it.

 

[mj_]

@nickdalzell1 You sound like you're suffering from what I jokingly refer to as old white men syndrome. Symptoms include but are not limited to idealization of the past (aka: everything was better back in my days!), refusal to accept change for better or for worse (because clearly everything was better back in the days), and in some extreme cases refusal to acknowledge that one's personal opinion is not the one and only truth (aka: NO NO NO listen to me)

No offense, at almost 40 years old I'm in the same boat. I've seen the first symptoms of OWMS creep up in my life.

 

[Wowfunhappy]

Symptoms include but are not limited to idealization of the past (aka: everything was better back in my days!), refusal to accept change for better or for worse (because clearly everything was better back in the days), and in some extreme cases refusal to acknowledge that one's personal opinion is not the one and only truth (aka: NO NO NO listen to me)

See, I think these changes are largely neutral. I like Big Sur compared to Yosemite, but other people feel the opposite. So on net I guess nothing has been improved overall. And also, as @fisherking likes to keep pointing out in this thread, people like us care much more than the median Apple customer.

So... why bother with any of it? Apple did all of this work on Big Sur, and on some level that's going to be passed down to all of us as consumers. Developers will have to do even more work to update their apps to look correct. Some will do it in silence—for others, it will hasten the need to transition to subscription models, because they need a way to recoup all of these development costs. What's the point, if it's not clearly making everyone's experience better, or if it's just going to change again in seven years?

 

[fisherking]

And also, as @fisherking likes to keep pointing out in this thread, people like us care much more than the median Apple customer.

i DO like to keep pointing that out.... 😂

 

[nickdalzell1]

I admit I am probably starting to near a mid-life crisis, but when the older Samsung Nature UX interface fits me so well, and I mean for me, it's downright perfect, combining two things I love, nature and skeuomorphism. Also got features that only recently started being part of regular Android such as Multi-Window and dark mode (well it's not a mode, it's just dark by default) so personally compared to the overly bright, flat and boring UIs of today, it's far better the old way, at least for me. I have said it's probably me getting older being part of it.

It was worse in 1998-2008, I was using a Nokia 5185i then, as far as 2008, because I tried the RAZR and hated it (didn't help this was near the end of GPRS so data never worked), tried many other 'smartphones' (those old Samsung BlackBerry clones running Windows Mobile 6.1, I even had a Tandy Zoomer PDA with a cellular card that made it into one huge brick of a cell phone!) and kept going back to the Nokia as then, it did exactly what I needed a phone to do and I didn't feel like I missed anything. So eventually something comes along that I feel the need to upgrade to. Otherwise I'd have a heck of a time trying to login to MacRumors on MS-DOS or CP/M, right?

 

[ian87w]

Funny reading you kids arguing about how you don't want your old toys to look like newer toys.

Real computer users use command lines anyway. Only kids use GUI.

/s

 

[nickdalzell1]

If UI design tries to get any flatter, all that will remain is the CLI.

Kinda miss the rather creative UNIX error messages though:

#man overboard
#BUGS: No life raft

Error: Not enough data (%bytes) with which to do jack, ignored.

 

[ErikGrim]

I keep asking why we are treating modern gear (with the insane specs) as if it were 1984 gear. We have 4K displays on systems with 64GB RAM or more pulling a UI that seems more fitting to an Amiga.

This is a silly argument. Just because we have high res displays doesn't mean we should fill the pixels with 3d and texture. The UI should get out of the way of the content. Sharp flat design with emphasis on contrast and modes and easy to recognise shapes is the way to go.

Skeu came about because screens were low res. Anti-aliasing and textures hid the pixels.

 

[Wowfunhappy]

Skeu came about because screens were low res. Anti-aliasing and textures hid the pixels.

I'm not sure I understand? Flat designs don't preclude the use of antialiasing.

 

[ErikGrim]

I'm not sure I understand? Flat designs don't preclude the use of antialiasing.

High res monitors do.

 

[Wowfunhappy]

High res monitors do.

Well, they make antialiasing less necessary, which isn't quite the same thing, but, sure!

What I don't understand is how using depth/texture "hides" large pixels. I actually think they do the opposite if anything—those textures have more details, where you can see pixelation.

 

[nickdalzell1]

I don't know, when my iPhone 4 had iOS 6, it looked quite amazing on the retina display. Flat design just hurts my eyes and is boring and not fun to use at all. It just looks like a cartoon or a remnant from the 80s computing era.

 

[Feyl]

This is a silly argument. Just because we have high res displays doesn't mean we should fill the pixels with 3d and texture. The UI should get out of the way of the content. Sharp flat design with emphasis on contrast and modes and easy to recognise shapes is the way to go.

Skeu came about because screens were low res. Anti-aliasing and textures hid the pixels.

The problem is that there is not much contrast in flat design today (at least in macOS and Windows). I think I speak for many of us when I say that this is essentially the thing that bothers us. There's no clear distinction of what is a button or what is clickable (it's better now, but man that iOS 7 thing was bad) and the lack of contrast everywhere just makes everything look really bad, like a uniform area.

Is it a bad thing if I want Apple to make fun and rich design again? Honestly, I don't give a **** about making everything lifelike or 3D. But it's so boring to look at such cold and lifeless interface. Like a robot did it.

 

[nickdalzell1]

The best design that came close to flat UI design wasn't entirely flat, but mostly flat. Holo UX from Android 4.0 and 4.1. It was flatter than Gingerbread before it, but it still had button shapes and relevant cues to what was clickable and what was not, but maintained an overall flat aesthetic. It was also not a retina-searing white all the time.

Was also the only time there was a real tablet UI on Android.

Here's the same version but the Samsung Nature UX variant, flat but not too flat:

 

[ErikGrim]

The problem is that there is not much contrast in flat design today (at least in macOS and Windows). I think I speak for many of us when I say that this is essentially the thing that bothers us. There's no clear distinction of what is a button or what is clickable (it's better now, but man that iOS 7 thing was bad) and the lack of contrast everywhere just makes everything look really bad, like a uniform area.

I one hundred percent agree with this. Flat design tends to avoid contrast and distinctive UI elements, but it absolutely doesn't have to. We have come a long way from iOS 7s initial release thankfully.

 

[nickdalzell1]

Other than the signal 'dots' becoming bars again, and the battery icon going through a tiny change, I haven't seen any differences between iOS 7 and iOS 14. Now Big Sur, in contrast, has brought in some skeuo cues, but iOS remains largely unchanged. The only noticeable difference is the nicer Control Center, which is a lot nicer than iOS 7-9's barren grey background outline icon variant of it.

iOS is still flat though, those ugly icons are still there, and now they got flat widgets.

You'd think that after 7 years of flat, everyone would be as sick of it as they were with 6 years of skeuo. Unless, of course, flat was intended to be forever. I sure hope it's not forever. It's so boring.

 

[Feyl]

Other than the signal 'dots' becoming bars again, and the battery icon going through a tiny change, I haven't seen any differences between iOS 7 and iOS 14. Now Big Sur, in contrast, has brought in some skeuo cues, but iOS remains largely unchanged. The only noticeable difference is the nicer Control Center, which is a lot nicer than iOS 7-9's barren grey background outline icon variant of it.

iOS is still flat though, those ugly icons are still there, and now they got flat widgets.

You'd think that after 7 years of flat, everyone would be as sick of it as they were with 6 years of skeuo. Unless, of course, flat was intended to be forever. I sure hope it's not forever. It's so boring.

Sadly, I think flat is there forever. I think it's because it's easier to make it and much easier to scale it to different screen sizes and devices. Of course they could take the time and do something great but that would require too much effort and that's not Apple's style in the recent years.

 

[fisherking]

Sadly, I think flat is there forever. I think it's because it's easier to make it and much easier to scale it to different screen sizes and devices. Of course they could take the time and do something great but that would require too much effort and that's not Apple's style in the recent years.

'forever'? you think this, based on? apple's history? that they never change the GUI? and the choices they've made in big sur are because they're lazy? even though these changes are, in fact, changes... which required work...

theories are fun, but facts are better. opinions are great, because we all have one. facts are just much harder to assess... which never stops people from 'claiming' them anyway

 

[Feyl]

'forever'? you think this, based on? apple's history? that they never change the GUI? and the choices they've made in big sur are because they're lazy? even though these changes are, in fact, changes... which required work...

theories are fun, but facts are better. opinions are great, because we all have one. facts are just much harder to assess... which never stops people from 'claiming' them anyway

A, those changes they made are just transfers from iOS. No new work was done there. B, tell me what are the facts? At least according to you. We all discuss here our theories, that's why we're here. I stated why I think flat will stay for good. C, everyone here is civil and actually contributing to the topic and you always come here with your condescending tone to knock down someone who don't agree with you and ruins the conversation. Chill out man.