Spatial Thinking and GUI Design | Hacker News Reader

Spatial Thinking and GUI Design

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16 pointstobtoh14 comments

Hmm,

Nautilus is my primary file browser only because I'm using Linux and KDE has all this horrible "transparent" stuff...

Gnome and Nautilus is nicer looking but Nautilus horribly unfunctional - a swear at it at least once per use (which is as little possible, I try to use Gnome-Do for most things). I don't know where it's more spatial than Microsoft's file explorer.

I think Gnome wins over KDE only by virtue of doing a few less awful things but

The idea of the articles are intriguing. I just can't with the details...

The file explorer on windows vista is a mess. You can customize the icon layout or what details are shown, but it has a persistent habit of switching back to exactly the view you didn't want (list vs icons or vice versa). Don't know if they fixed that in 7 or not.

Agreed,

I should have made it clear I was referring to 97/2000/xp file explorer.

They finally reverted the spatial Nautilus bullshit in the just-released Gnome 2.30 -- there was an intentionally-confusing preference to turn it off before, but now it'll be off by default, and replaced by a newly-improved browsing interface.

They originally implemented it after being inspired by some mactard ravings against all the improvements made in OS X's Finder: http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2003/04/finder.ars/2

Also,

It occurs to me that the approach of having meaning be tied to a fixed position in space is rather limited.

As I recall, when the first actual human beings evolved, they invent this thing called language, in which the relative position of a symbol determined it's meaning rather it's fixed position. Using fixed position anyway is all well and good but it seems that when an app runs out of fixed screen space, it has to start using relative position in a variety of effective ways, taking some clues from the human facility for language.

I suspect that is why the author can't find that many recent examples for his theory - though it is an interesting theory.

Actually it's very powerful. The mammalian brain has fantastic mechanisms for identifying a location in a context, remembering it for later, returning to that location with modest use of conscious thought, and remembering what characteristics and activities were previously associated with that location.

Do a web search for "grid cell" and "conditioned place preference". Also "memory palace" will learn you about an ancient place-based technique for memorizing huge amounts of information.

spatial mapping is in fact a really useful way to memorize anything. It works because it engages multiple parts of the brain at the same time creating a stronger memory.

Whilst I agree that relative position is used in language, I don't think you can associate that with ease of use. If anything, your example of language is a good one to show how relative position makes things so much more difficult (although it gives you more options) to learn/use.

And I think empirical evidence lends credibility to the article - everyone gushes how easy the iphone is to use compared to all the other phones out there. One of the biggest reasons would appear to be the 'fixed' layout.

Can you give an example of relative meaning? I get that language is contextual based on relationship, not position. In other words, the connection between symbol and meaning is fixed in relation to other symbols but the descriptions change based on the perspective of the speaker. Think of it like a family tree. Position is fixed from birth and meaning is derived from position. the only thing that is relative is description.

I guess you could be talking about semantics, or the use of a small number of sounds to produce an infinite number of meanings, but that seems like a discussion of speech or typography.

this reminds me of an article I read about how we need to shift our vocabulary when we describe digital interfaces. That the analogies implied in words like "file" or "folder" no longer accurately describe the functions and we need to ditch them and create new words that don't have the baggage of previous meanings. It also reminds me of a product design article I once read that talked about how most times when you pull on a push door or vice versa that it was most likely the door's fault for not being design properly for it's intended use.

I agree. I think there's a legacy of UI design over the past decades that many software houses still cling to. File/folder, menu bars and so on. I'm not really an iPhone/iPad fan, but I think they have and will continue to contribute a lot towards getting people to rethink UI design.

Also, the article you're thinking of is probably either this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Design-Everyday-Things-Donald-Norman/d...

Or an article about it. (The push/pull door things is a classic example out of that book.)

Thanks for tracking down a link. I'm terrible at remembering references.

File is still somewhat reasonable, since one of the meanings is an ordered sequence of similar-sized things in a row. (As in "rank and file".)

the analogies implied in words like "file" or "folder" no longer accurately describe the functions

For someone like me who grew up with computers almost from day one, catching the tail end of the BBS era and nearly all of the Web, it's actually more difficult to think of physical file folders than digital storage when I hear the words "file" and "folder." The meanings of those two words are entirely digital in my mind, and the physical analogies are the anomaly that requires extra conscious effort to process.

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