[JK47]

Its fairly apparent to me that the UI design of many Apple apps is changing. For one, Apple seems to be phasing out the brushed metal look for windows in favor of the new dark-grey-plastic look. Nearly all Apple products released since (and including) iTunes 6 have sported this new look. Others are the iLife '06 suite and Aperture. Furthermore, it also looks like Apple is phasing in this black-transparent look for toolbars. Examples of this are the Aperture menu that allows one to set the bounds for a smart folder, or the editing toolbar in iPhoto '06. Finally, it seems that Apple is trending towards using darker colors (esp. more blacks) in their designs. The new black iPod aside, many pages on the Apple website now have black backgrounds instead of the white backgrounds that were there for years.

Personally, I like this look very much. It is more professional than the brushed aluminum, and a far cry from the tacky Aqua UI's used in early stages of OSX. What do you think about the new look? Also, do you think this new look will become even more prevalent with the release of Leopard?

Note: This wasn't posted in Speculation/Rumors because the main focus of the thread is essentially talking about the existing UI. The Leopard UI is just an interesting connection...

[dfiler]

This could be considered a UI shift... but that term is perhaps a bit misleading. UI generally tends to refer to more than just the window dressing, skin, or theme.

But yeah, I think most will here agree. We've been discussing the disparity between pro-apps and aqua for a couple years now.

[dviant]

It's such a mish-mash of styling right now, any kind of coherant plan or consolidation of UI themes would be an improvement.

[dfiler]

I'm actually a fan of differing window dressings... as long as they are functionally equivalent.

Can you imagine trying to find you car in a parking lot if everyone had the exact same car? (Insert Expose analogy here). If every window was identical, they would be difficult to tell apart.

Extremely strict consistancy made sense in the early years when people dealt with far fewer on screen objects. There was little benefit to being distinct so being perfectly consistent was a logical goal. However, today's users deal with far more virtual "objects" than before. Now that finding a specific object has become more difficult, the optimal tradeoff between consistency and visual differentiation has shifted.

A consistant look isn't needed for predictable behavior. Interaction can be perfectly predictable even with distinct window dressings.

I think that people will eventually stop toting the old line of "consistency or die!" when they realize that visual distinctiveness is more valuable than it used to be.

[JK47]

Originally Posted by dfiler This could be considered a UI shift... but that term is perhaps a bit misleading. UI generally tends to refer to more than just the window dressing, skin, or theme.

I knew that, really I did. Maybe i should have made the thread after my nap instead of before it.

[dviant]

Well visual distinctiveness is one thing... aqua vs brushed metal vs black etc... and I don't disagree with you there. What I'm talking about is Apple's tendency to throw things in piecemeal where the difference is a slightly less corse brushed metal, varying degrees of rounded corners etc.

I guess maybe I'm just asking for visual consistency within the subsets.

[Mac Donald]

Originally Posted by JK47 Its fairly apparent to me that the UI design of many Apple apps is changing. For one, Apple seems to be phasing out the brushed metal look for windows in favor of the new dark-grey-plastic look. Nearly all Apple products released since (and including) iTunes 6 have sported this new look.

Actually, that would be since (and including) iTunes 5, buy hey who pays attention to that stuff anyway?

[BlueRabbit]

Originally Posted by Mac Donald Actually, that would be since (and including) iTunes 5, buy hey who pays attention to that stuff anyway?

It's pretty much the same thing - they came out a month apart from each other anyways.

[BarracksSi]

I don't mind the variety of themes at all. In fact, I like the sensation that I'm dealing with an entirely different object, like the differences between Finder, GarageBand, and iTunes.

I don't see a need for thematic uniformity when the apps are quite different themselves. If they did the same thing, then I could understand wanting them to look the same.

[Koodari]

Window dressing is wasted space. It should be minimized, not unified or diversified. As for the regular UI elements inside the window, they should share the same style so that the user immediately knows they work like the next element. Of course if they are custom elements that work differently, then they should definately *not* share the same style.

Most windows are distinguishable from the content inside. I understand a downscaled plaintext document or a Finder window looks a lot like another one, but that problem originates from Expose and should be fixed there instead of compromising every individual app's design.

[BarracksSi]

Originally Posted by Koodari Window dressing is wasted space. It should be minimized, not unified or diversified.

Agreed, to a degree.

When I was using Kaleidoscope back in OS9 and earlier, I occasionally switched to big, flashy themes just for fun, but then found that they were awkward and difficult to use with a lot of wasted space.

In Finder, the thick window borders on the top & bottom make it easy to "grab" a window and move it around. In an app like Mail, I don't need to drag the window around much, so it doesn't need a border at all.

I think that window edges are minimized where they can be, and retained where they should be.

[dfiler]

Originally Posted by Koodari Window dressing is wasted space. It should be minimized, not unified or diversified.

Sorry, but I completely disagree. Margins in printed material shouldn't be minimized either.