Hidden interface controls that affect usability

First thing I do on new Pixel phones is enable 3 button navigation, but lately that's also falling out of favor in UI terms, with apps assuming bottom navigation bar and not accounting for the larger spacing of 3 button nav and putting content or text behind it.

Take a simple example: Open a read-only file in MS Word. There is no option to save? Where's it gone? Why can I edit but not save the file?

A much better user experience would be to enable and not hide the Save option. When the user tries to save, tell them "I cannot save this file because of blah" and then tell them what they can do to fix it.

Now that Pixel cameras outclass iPhone cameras, and even Samsung is on par, there is really no reason to ever switch to the Apple ecosystem anymore IMO.

Not having anything to do with Google is a pretty good reason I think.

And they aren't even consistent from app to app. That's perhaps the most frustrating thing.

You see this under macOS, too. A lot of Electron apps for instance replace the window manager’s standard titlebar with some custom thing that doesn’t implement chunks of the standard titlebar’s functionality. It’s frustrating.

However, I think they do a decent job at resisting it in general, and specifically I disagree that removing the home button constitutes hiding an UI element. I see it as a change in interaction, after which the gesture is no longer “press” but “swipe” and the UI element is not a button but edge of the screen itself. It is debatable whether it is intuitive or better in general, but I personally think it is rather similar to double-clicking an icon to launch an app, or right-clicking to invoke a context menu: neither have any visual cues, both are used all the time for some pretty key functions, but as soon as it becomes an intuition it does not add friction.

You may say Apple is way too liberal in forcing new intuitions like that, and I would agree in some cases (like address bar drag on Safari!), but would disagree in case of the home button (they went with it and they firmly stuck with it, and they kept around a model with the button for a few more years until 2025).

Regarding explaining the lack of home button: on iOS, there is an accessibility feature that puts on your screen a small draggable circle, which when pressed displays a configurable selection of shortcuts—with text labels—including the home button and a bunch of other pretty useful switches. Believe it or not, I know people who kept this circle around specifically when hardware home button was a thing, because they did not want to wear out the only thing they saw as a moving part!

As far as the Back button, on iOS the norm is for it to be present somewhere in the UI of the app in any context where there's a "back" to go to. For cross-app switching, there's an OS-supplied Back button in the status bar on top, again, showing only when it's relevant (admittedly it's very tiny and easy to miss). Having two might sound complicated but tbh I rather prefer it that way because in Android it can sometimes be confusing as to what the single global Back button will do in any given case (i.e. whether it'll navigate within the current app, or switch you back to the previous app).

Right, but while it's obvious to everyone that a button is a control, it's not obvious that an edge is a control. On top of that, swiping up from the bottom edge triggers two completely different actions depending on exactly when/where you lift your finger off the screen.

Why not move the physical home button to the back of the phone?

Forwhat it’s worth, back tap is a feature of iOS to which you can assign an action, though it only triggers on double or triple tap.

I couldn't disagree more.

A big physical button on the surface of the device that is both visible and touchable is completely unmissable. More importantly, it's unmistakably a control. There is simply no other explanation for its existence than being a control.

The edge of the screen on the other hand exists because the screen has to end somewhere. There is no hint whatsoever that it doubles as a control when touched in a certain way or that it doubles as multiple different controls when touched slightly differently.

That said, I'm not a dogmatic "UI physicalist" (if that's a thing). I hate the physical mute switch for instance and I'm not a huge fan of the physical double click to authorise purchases. And I don't want scrollbars constantly in my face.

I do believe that new ways of interacting with hardware can be introduced over time even if hidden. There's a legitimate trade-off beteween discoverability and productivity once you're familiar with the way a device works.

The problem is that some people really struggle with gestures even when they know they exist. I watched people fail to answer calls on Android because it required them to swipe up an on-screen icon.

The number of things you can do swiping or just touching somewhere near the bottom of the screen is staggering and constantly changing.

In Notes, to create a new Note, tap the pencil-in-a-square icon in the lower right corner.

In Calendar, to create a new appointment, tap the + icon in the upper right corner.

In Reminders, to create a new reminder, tap the + in a blue circle in the lower left corner. At least it offers a text label "New Reminder"

These are all Apple apps and they all do it differently. And that's not even getting into gestures and other actions that you just have to stumble upon to even know they exist.

The main one I end up missing most is the swipe to go back gesture within apps. It comes for “free” when using UIKit and SwiftUI navigation primitives (UINavigationController, UISplitViewController, and their SwiftUI counterparts) but it’s almost always missing from apps built with React Native and such.

You're welcome

Like there is no hint for double click, right-click context menu, pinch to zoom, force/long tap, swipe anywhere in any direction, etc. I do not want to repeat my comment. To each their own.