Comments on: iTunes 9 is cram…

By: Deepak Nulu

Deepak Nulu — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 06:39:43 +0000

I love the way you wrote the blog titl…

By: John Blackburn

John Blackburn — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 04:23:54 +0000

Oz, I’m not saying there aren’t nice aspects to the new design, but I find your defense of the flawed aspects curious. The fact that notes are provided in some cases doesn’t help customers looking at the *other* cases. Being forced to drill down to find essential content is a classically flawed approach and is made worse when you’re unsure whether or not you’ll find that content once you’ve drilled down.

And ellipses are OK as long as you can work around the fact? What kind of design it that? How can you defend any design that would ignore copious empty space and instead ellipsize text everywhere? Even on a smaller screen those ellipses are bound to frustrate. Imagine you’re looking for an Indiana Jones movie and all you see is this:

Indiana Jones and the… [Template of Doom]
Indiana Jones and the… [Last Crusade]
Indiana Jones and the… [Crystal Skull]

There are more examples of this sort of thing than you might think. It’s particular a nuisance with classical music, where the multiple movements of symphonies and the like are generally given titles that all begin the same, like

Beethoven First Sym… [1st Movement]
Beethoven First Sym… [2nd Movement]
Beethoven First Sym… [3rd Movement]

Why should any iTunes user be forced to compensate for flawed design when HTML is specifically designed to reflow variable content without having to resort to layout tricks like ellipsizing? Blame the designer, not the user.

By: John Blackburn

John Blackburn — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 04:09:24 +0000

Colin and senacajack, there’s little reason for the new design to favor a particular layout size to an extreme, whether the rumored tablet, the Apple TV, or whatever. Small design decisions, sure, but nothing as dramatically limiting as the redesign shows now. HTML is designed to reflow to a variety of container sizes.

By: senacajack

senacajack — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 19:37:51 +0000

It’s probably, amazingly enough, just the right size for a tablet screen….

By: Oz

Oz — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 18:55:02 +0000

Your criticisms are not compelling. Notes are provided in some case, and presumably more notes will be made available by iTunes in the future. Also, when used on icons, “ellipsized” text is associated with a pathway to the complete text if desired. Click on the info button, and if you still find ellipses, click on the “album page” button. There always seems to be a way to “drill down” and find a complete view of the text that is initially “ellipsized.” For example, after arriving at the “album page,” letting the mouse hover above the text that is incomplete brings up a badge with the complete information. Furthermore, not everything is ellipsized as you claim. From my point of view, there seems to be a reasonable amount of information to aid the consumer. For me, the new set up makes it easier to browse rapidly and find what I want.
(Also, the scrollbar may be 8 pixels wide, but I still find that I can hit it easily with the mouse pointer. So it’s useable, and that’s really what is important. Not whether it’s only 8 or 10 or 12 pixels!)

By: Colin Ferrell

Colin Ferrell — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 17:15:25 +0000

The new content size is designed for the tablet.

By: Roger Mercer

Roger Mercer — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 15:07:37 +0000

I’m a designer with 40 years of experience in news page, and magazine design and 18 years of experience in Web design.

It looks much better, but is not more functional or easy to use.

By: Christian

Christian — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 08:31:42 +0000

Can only second that. Jobs sold it as an improvement. I think it looks horrible. No guidelines for the eye. It all dissolves into a big white. Plus the new-old candy iTunes UI this release really feels like a step back.