Why is Big Sur so ugly?

[nickdalzell1]

Since all major phone, tablet and desktop OSs these days use flat UI anyway, I don't see how having night shift/dark mode to compensate for the eye strain caused by flat UI design is a misnomer. Now, if one or more still did skeuomorphic UI, you would be correct.

During the skeuo era, a lot of menus, settings pages, etc were dark anyway. The depth of skeuo also didn't harm anyone's eyes as much. People might see it as ugly (then why buy Apple at that time lol) but that didn't mean their eyes got strained. I don't remember eye strain until after iOS7, Mac OS X Yosemite, or Android 5.x Lollipop. These days I keep dark mode on 24/7.

 

[darngooddesign]

Since all major phone, tablet and desktop OSs these days use flat UI anyway, I don't see how having night shift/dark mode to compensate for the eye strain caused by flat UI design is a misnomer. Now, if one or more still did skeuomorphic UI, you would be correct.

During the skeuo era, a lot of menus, settings pages, etc were dark anyway. The depth of skeuo also didn't harm anyone's eyes as much. People might see it as ugly (then why buy Apple at that time lol) but that didn't mean their eyes got strained. I don't remember eye strain until after iOS7, Mac OS X Yosemite, or Android 5.x Lollipop. These days I keep dark mode on 24/7.

I disagree.

I would always reduce the brightness of my displays at night to reduce eye-strain; dark mode lets me keep the display brighter without all the bright white light straining my eyes.

 

[nickdalzell1]

Still, there's far more whitespace that adds to the problem which dark mode fixes. Personally, I'd just rather go back to skeuo and depth. Staring too long at a 2-D cartoon can't be good for one's eyesight.

 

[nsklaus]

apple designs are mostly about being lean and functional minimalism. this is at every level: from the clean design of open spaces in apple stores, to the look of the hardware too .. laptops, phones, accessories and every things: few buttons, and sleek minimalist design. this also used to be true about the appearance of macos, that took care to look good while avoiding wasting space and also avoided filling ui elements with too much buttons or too big buttons or packing too much stuffs in a given spot. now, big sur new theme is the first step of a departure from that philosophy. wasting space with larger ui element is a shift away from what was a standard at apple, that used to be applied globaly with consistency.

if you look at it, from macos 7,8,9 to macos 10 series it was always the case. nice looking, minimalist ui, each ui element took care to reduce its 'foot print' and avoid space waste and intrusion.
now we see something different that depart from that trend we always had with apple.
my guess is that they lost the main individual responsible for UI direction. in other words: the person that used to decide what the OS was supposed to look like left. now apple might have tried to put a spin on it and have someone new try to fill the vacant position. but unfortunately that person doesn't seem to share the same philosophy principle that made apple products look like apple products. that person doesn't understand the minimalist 'zen' approach. and that person taste regarding colours choices is also not the best to say the least. the result is that apple lost some of its face. some of what made its identity.

it's kind of sad. the end of an era. it's like if suddenly japanese traditional gardens started to be about having lots of flashy colours and modern gizmos everywhere.. that would also be a departure from the usual. from natural and minimalist to flashy and wasteful of space.

it appears to me, the ones saying it's all for the better either didn't understood a thing about apple past designs or are just pretending it is in accordance to their will because they have no other options.
it's the classical case: when people can't have something they desire, often they pretend that it is not good enough anyway and even deny ever having had a desire for it. "in the refusal of admission they've been denied their wishes they pretend they never had such a desire anyway".

 

[fisherking]

apple designs are mostly about being lean and functional minimalism. this is at every level: from the clean design of open spaces in apple stores, to the look of the hardware too .. laptops, phones, accessories and every things: few buttons, and sleek minimalist design. this also used to be true about the appearance of macos, that took care to look good while avoiding wasting space and also avoided filling ui elements with too much buttons or too big buttons or packing too much stuffs in a given spot. now, big sur new theme is the first step of a departure from that philosophy. wasting space with larger ui element is a shift away from what was a standard at apple, that used to be applied globaly with consistency.

if you look at it, from macos 7,8,9 to macos 10 series it was always the case. nice looking, minimalist ui, each ui element took care to reduce its 'foot print' and avoid space waste and intrusion.
now we see something different that depart from that trend we always had with apple.
my guess is that they lost the main individual responsible for UI direction. in other words: the person that used to decide what the OS was supposed to look like left. now apple might have tried to put a spin on it and have someone new try to fill the vacant position. but unfortunately that person doesn't seem to share the same philosophy principle that made apple products look like apple products. that person doesn't understand the minimalist 'zen' approach. and that person taste regarding colours choices is also not the best to say the least. the result is that apple lost some of its face. some of what made its identity.

it's kind of sad. the end of an era. it's like if suddenly japanese traditional gardens started to be about having lots of flashy colours and modern gizmos everywhere.. that would also be a departure from the usual. from natural and minimalist to flashy and wasteful of space.

it appears to me, the ones saying it's all for the better either didn't understood a thing about apple past designs or are just pretending it is in accordance to their will because they have no other options.
it's the classical case: when people can't have something they desire, often they pretend that it is not good enough anyway and even deny ever having had a desire for it. "in the refusal of admission they've been denied their wishes they pretend they never had such a desire anyway".

haha. 'my guess is'... 'end of an era'. at least, your post isn't 'about lean and functional minimalism'.

 

[nsklaus]

haha. 'my guess is'... 'end of an era'. at least, your post isn't 'about lean and functional minimalism'.

"haha your right, see him how loks dum, hee wrotten a post with lots of wrods.
who do he sink hee is, shakspeer huh ?!"

is that what you're trying to say, in a nutshell ?

 

[fisherking]

"haha your right, see him how loks dum, hee wrotten a post with lots of wrods.
who do he sink hee is, shakspeer huh ?!"

is that what you're trying to say, in a nutshell ?

you're welcome to your opinions, and theories... and, if someone is adventurous, they might actually read that entire post. but this last post... i have no idea what that is, and am not going to try to translate it; are you attempting a joke?

is that what you're doing, in a nutshell?

 

[nsklaus]

you're welcome to your opinions, and theories... and, if someone is adventurous, they might actually read that entire post. but this last post... i have no idea what that is, and am not going to try to translate it; are you attempting a joke?

is that what you're doing, in a nutshell?

as i suspected from you, reading an entire post before commenting is already too much of an effort.
no wonder your replies are off target .. focusing on the size of the post rather than the content, failing to think in terms of "right or wrong". failing to expose constructed arguments and to top it off, mockery without knowing what the actual subject is about .. well, let's stop the interaction between you and me right there.

 

[fisherking]

as i suspected from you, reading an entire post before commenting is already too much of an effort.
no wonder your replies are off target .. focusing on the size of post rather than the content, failing to think in terms of "right or wrong". failing to expose constructed arguments and to top it off, mockery without knowing what the actual subject is about .. well, let's stop the interaction between you and me right there.

no, i read it. but statements like this negate anything else you're saying, as it's pure fantasy:

"my guess is that they lost the main individual responsible for UI direction. in other words: the person that used to decide what the OS was supposed to look like left."

you're suggesting that a corporation the size of apple has 'one person' responsible for the UI... but this is the saddest line of all:

"pretending it is in accordance to their will because they have no other options"

so, any of us who LIKE the new UI are delusional, wrong.

anyway, now back to the real world...

 

[TheGeneralist]

Well, honestly...I kind of expected to dislike it, but in fact I quite like it.

Did not update my 6-year-old iMac so far, not doing any experiments with early releases after the Catalina Meltdown I had on that machine (encountering several Blocker Bugs with the .5 Version of Catalina - even that late revision was not enough of waiting, should have skipped that Catastrophina entirely).

But yesterday my brandnew M1 MBP arrived, which of course brings Big Sur with it as a must. After removing the incredibly unsightly neon-colored landscape-ish background as a very first official act and using one of the nice photographic backgrounds instead, the new design quickly turned out to be quite a nice change.
After reading much about waste of space, I expected experiencing a very inefficient window layout on the 13" screen, but that's just not the case - things are working out quite well for my taste.
While setting up the new machine, I had my 27" 5K iMac right besides the 27" 5K LG Ultrafine Display I ordered with the MBP, the iMac still being on Catalina. By direct comparison, I sense no significant waste of space or other disadvantages on the Big Sur side. Instead I'm glad to look at a nicely designed new interface which offers some welcome variation to the more-or-less Yosemite Design I was looking at for the last 6 years.

So, from a design standpoint, nothing to be afraid of, as I perceive.

Even more important, Big Sur 11.1 already feels a lot more stable than Catalina 10.15.7. Of course this has to be taken with a grain of salt - as of now I'm only looking back to 1.5 days of experience with Big Sur, Apple Silicon Version.
But it already feels a lot better than Crapalina, curious to see if this will hold true in the weeks to come...

 

[hugodrax]

I actually like it quite a bit. nicest of all the NeXSTEP versions when it comes too looks.

 

[nsklaus]

it's simple logic really. i explain:
- is 2 bigger than 1, yes.
- are the toolbar on big sur bigger than on previous macos, yes.
- so does it waste more space, yes

the point i was making was not about stability of macos, or if there was more bugs than on previous releases. or wether if people like the new design or not.
the point was: that there was a shift in aesthetics philosophy and that it was a departure from the direction macos took since the beginning. simpy put, it's like if someone you knew wore military cargo pants for all the long years you knew him and suddenly he decided to use blue jeans. that's a shift. in appearance. now, about the logic, do bigger bar means less screen space for the actual content ? yes it does. wether some like it or not is a different subject.

 

[fisherking]

it's simple logic really. i explain:
- is 2 bigger than 1, yes.
- are the toolbar on big sur bigger than on previous macos, yes.
- so does it waste more space, yes

the point i was making was not about stability of macos, or if there was more bugs than on previous releases. or wether if people like the new design or not.
the point was: that there was a shift in aesthetics philosophy and that it was a departure from the direction macos took since the beginning. simpy put, it's like if someone you knew wore military cargo pants for all the long years you knew him and suddenly he decided to use blue jeans. that's a shift. in appearance. now, about the logic, do bigger bar means less screen space for the actual content ? yes it does. wether some like it or not is a different subject.

are the toolbars too big? some might say no. some might be busy working on something, and not care.

personally, working in big sur isn't really different from previous OSes; i can run my apps, write, email, surf... and am fine (all this on a 12" screen).

regardless of what you think (or i think, or what anyone thinks)... apple does what it chooses to do. maybe they'll change the 'toolbar', maybe they won't. either way, life goes on, and nothing is keeping us from doing our real work.

 

[nsklaus]

your reply is off target again. what i'm saying is: there was a shift in aesthetic philosophy. yes or no ? i'm trying to assess if folks can already acknowledge this point without talking at all about acceptation or endorsement. recognising that bars are actually, as a matter of fact: bigger. why am i doing this ? because i bet some might be tempted to say this isn't true. a.k.a: reality denial. once we can agree that big sur toolbar are indeed of a different size in comparison with previous macos iterations, then we'll have made a progress. because, recognising things for what they actually are (and not how we would like them to be ideologically) is the first step toward a meaningful discussion.

 

[fisherking]

your reply is off target again. what i'm saying is: there was a shift in aesthetic pholosophy. yes or no ? i'm trying to assess if folks can already acknowledge this point without talking at all about acceptation or endorsement. recognising that bars are actually, as a matter of fact: bigger. why am i doing this ? because i bet some might be tempted to say this isn't true. a.k.a: reality denial. once we can agree that big sur toolbar are indeed of a different size in comparison with previous macos iterations, then we'll have made a progress. because, recognising things for what they actually are (and not how we would like them to be ideologically) is the first step toward a meaningful discussion.

not off target, it just seems you don't like my responses. but this is a forum, for discussion, and it's ok for us to disagree. i stand by everything i've said.

am not arguing whether there's been an 'aesthetic shift'... of course there's been one. am saying that, for most macusers, it's not an issue. most of us just use our macs for our work, and our lives, and we don't stress tiny details. and/or we actually like the changes.

"recognising things for what they actually are (and not how we would like them to be ideologically) is the first step toward a meaningful discussion."

what? shouldn't that read: "accepting that my point-of-view as the only one that really matters"??

 

[nsklaus]

we're not discussing about the same subject. you fail to understand what is the point actually being debated. i tried to recenter you to it. but you just can't see it. as such, there little sense in talking with you when i'm talking about 'A' and you keep replying about 'B'. we're not on the same page. i'm probably loosing my time even by just trying to tell you this. you obviously miss the point. please refer back to my post here regarding our possibilities of interaction together.

 

[fisherking]

we're not discussing about the same subject. you fail to understand what is the point actually being debated. i tried to recenter you to it. but you just can't see it. i see little point in talking with you when i'm talking about 'A' and you keep replying about 'B'. we're not on the same page. i'm probably loosing my time even by just trying to tell you this. you obviously miss the point. please refer back to my post here regarding our possibilities of interaction together.

apologies, and will move forward. but i still stand by all of my comments.

 

[CasualFanboy]

Staring too long at a 2-D cartoon can't be good for one's eyesight.

It's also not good for one's sanity. And "cartoon" is the best description of this over-rounded void space disaster. It looks like a nurf toy.

 

[nickdalzell1]

What's funny is that in the cartoon space, 3-D animation has totally taken over and 2-D animation has kinda died. Although I do miss the era of Don Bluth animation, it was quite detailed and well-made.

Some UI designs from still-functioning devices that still cling to skeuo:

I wish Samsung still made magic like this. They actually succeeded in making a WORSE UI than Apple! One UI is really ugly and basic. Old TouchWiz Nature UX had a lot more attention to detail. I also don't update these devices, or their apps. Everything still works. Proof that an app does NOT need to be updated to continue to function.

 

[lupinglade]

I actually like it quite a bit. nicest of all the NeXSTEP versions when it comes too looks.

I'll take NeXTSTEP's clean, consistent UI any day over the bulky and random UI we have in Big Sur. It needs work, to say the least. Its not unfixable, but it needs someone to really focus on quality over quantity. And they do need *just* one very qualified person making the big UI decisions, for sure. There is too much disagreement in the UI otherwise -- feels like one big UI experiment.

Also, the giant toolbar in Safari is awful on the 13" MBP, that screen has inadequate working space as is.

 

[lupinglade]

are the toolbars too big? some might say no. some might be busy working on something, and not care.

personally, working in big sur isn't really different from previous OSes; i can run my apps, write, email, surf... and am fine (all this on a 12" screen).

regardless of what you think (or i think, or what anyone thinks)... apple does what it chooses to do. maybe they'll change the 'toolbar', maybe they won't. either way, life goes on, and nothing is keeping us from doing our real work.

So why do you bother to make these posts? Something that does not matter to you may still matter to someone else. Rhetorical question of course, but consider the thought.

 

[fisherking]

So why do you bother to make these posts? Something that does not matter to you may still matter to someone else. Rhetorical question of course, but consider the thought.

because a discussion allows for other points-of-view; if the thread is 'why is big sur so ugly', and i think it's fine, can i not present my thoughts? something also to consider.

 

[nsklaus]

@All,
was there any audacious endeavour undertaken with testing theme-engine so far ?
i'm myself not particularly good with theming in general and i was wondering what folks with longer experience than mine could accomplish, even if just being a work in progress currently.
any screenshots to share ?

the best thing that could happen is, if a simple tutorial on how to change ui elements could be put together. such as how to modify titlebar and toolbars background colours and size too. i was able to quickly put back some greyish colour instead of the new white introduced by apple with its "new design", but it would surely look better with a gradient for example. also, putting back the white background around the toolbar's buttons would be sweet. any artists or intrepid testers around ?

 

[cosmichobo]

This is all my option, but I've heard some hate on Big Sur here and there as well. My question is, why does Apple want to make Mac OS into IOS like seriously; I've always liked how good and "professional" OS X looked, but now it just looks so unprofessional...

And when Apple pushes this update, do you think it is safe for me to stay on Catalina?

Like I just got my new Mac, and I see this...

It's all been down hill since here:

Look at those nice tangible buttons and windows. You know what you were doing back then. Not like now.

 

[MacGizmo]

I think there are several areas that need some work, and some inconsistency issues to deal with... but overall I think BS looks fantastic. At the end of the day though, I don't really care because I live in the apps, not the Finder.