Tuesday 29 November 2005

Mile high : Mile deep menus

MACOS GUI sucks.

MAC fans think it looks nice, and thats a nice opinion but it doesn’t compare to windows for usability.

The only good thing I have heard said about the MAC GUI is the famed Mile High Menu. And thats a good thing if you don’t plan on learning to use a mouse well.

Does anybody seriously claim that all these MAC users can’t position a mouse in 16 pixels vertically but can position it in 16 pixels horizontally? How do they ever manage to click on buttons, or hyperlinks? How do they manage to drag their clipart about?

When you have one mile high menu, you gain something tiny for those who can’t use a mouse. What do you lose? You lose the mile-deep menu.

With GNOME or windows I can see the menu bars multiple windows at the same time, and even click directly on the menu bar of a non-focused window! MAC uses would have to first select the NOT-mile-high title bar and then move to the mile high menu bar. I get just one click.

Maybe MAC GUI has something to recommend it besides the dubiously and only slightly helpful mile high menu?

1 comment:

  1. I’m not sure that MAC GUI has any particular elements to recommend it over Gnome or Windows. As a regular user of both I can say that the MAC GUI is more “funky” (whatever that subjective assessment is worth or means). But I think whether one uses MAC or some other OS is more down to tradition, habit, or the industry you are in, rather than based on any usability test.
    A minus for the MAC GUI is that child menus which open from main menus tend to open only on hover, and if I click the parent label for the child menu, the whole menu closes - how daft is that? Menus also close if you accidentally click on a horizontal bar - they ought to stay open guessing you did a slightly innaccurate click, not simply close on you. Pah.

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