Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower than it was in 1983

Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by kgwxd on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:13AM (#15643948)

Just last week I discovered I could disable animations in Android through the hidden developer options. It's fabulous. The only initial quirk was no visual feedback when a picture is successfully taken, so it felt like i missed the button, but I've gotten used to it already.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by paulddraper on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:21AM (#15644046)

!!!!!

That is a amazing!!! I had no idea developer meant "interested user".

> Make sure developer options are enabled. If they're not, go to Settings > About phone, then tap on Build number several times to enable it

> Go to Settings > Developer options, and scroll down to Window animation scale, Transition animation scale, and Animator duration scale.

> Tap on each of the animation options and turn them off.

https://lifehacker.com/disable-animations-on-android-to-impr...

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by setzer22 on Thursday November 09, 2017 @01:09AM (#15660256)

There are also various visual feedback options, such as a CPU load indicator, or a debug renderer for screen touches which allows you to see if your touchscreen is misbehaving and how (happens to me when I plug my charger, for example).

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by sevensor on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @01:00PM (#15645763)

This is the best thing I've learned all day.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by jasonkostempski on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:57AM (#15644438)

On my first try I accidentally tapped "Android version" instead of "Build number" :)

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by gokhan on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @11:32AM (#15644760)

on 7.x, that leads to an easter egg.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by paulddraper on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @01:44PM (#15646230)

:( I am still on Android 6.

I thought the Google Nexus 5 phone would be getting updates often...but I guess not.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by nirv on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @04:17PM (#15647735)

If you you're comfortable with custom ROM, LineageOS[1][2] is very stable and snappy on Nexus 5.

[1] https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/hammerhead

[2] https://download.lineageos.org/hammerhead

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by jasonkostempski on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @01:04PM (#15645804)

8.0 too

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by jbb67 on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:52AM (#15644393)

Wow that makes an huge difference to usability. My phone feels like it's several times as fast now. Who knew that it felt slow and laggy on purpose!

It's really good!

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by Chaebixi on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @02:05PM (#15646417)

> Just last week I discovered I could disable animations in Android through the hidden developer options. It's fabulous. The only initial quirk was no visual feedback when a picture is successfully taken, so it felt like i missed the button, but I've gotten used to it already.

Are you talking about this: https://www.cnet.com/how-to/speed-up-your-android-by-adjusti... ?

I set mine to "0.5", and everything's much snappier, but they still play so I still get some feedback.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by xnzakg on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:17AM (#15644009)

You can also speed them up a bit. Makes the phone seem a lot snappier without breaking apps that seem to rely on animations for timing (I'm looking at you, messenger's "share" feature which doesn't have a send delay if you disable animations)

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by Declanomous on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:18AM (#15644021)

Another bonus is how much longer your battery lasts without animations. I'm pretty sure battery saver just turns off tactile response, and disables animations for the most part (in addition to changing the gps update speed if you are using location services)

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by sliverstorm on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @04:03PM (#15647613)

Try setting just "Animator duration scale" to 0.5x while leaving the others off. This will fix the camera problem, as well as makes things like closing apps in the "recent" list less janky, and you still get the rest of the benefit.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by zeveb on Wednesday November 08, 2017 @09:19AM (#15652586)

It's a real pity that there isn't a .25x setting, or even a .125 setting; the .5x setting feels nice, but still a bit slow-ish. I understand that the intent here is to simulate slow phones (try using the phone with the 10x setting — it's horrid!), but it'd be nice to simulate a fast phone instead!

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by sliverstorm on Wednesday November 08, 2017 @11:12AM (#15653819)

Even on the 0.5x setting things like the refresh pinwheel spin a little too fast, so 0.25x might be a bit much. It just controls too many different animations.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by tome on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @11:10AM (#15644542)

Does anyone know if you can do the same with iPhone?

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by kec on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @11:23AM (#15644677)

Settings -> General -> Acessibility -> Reduce Motion

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by tome on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @11:54AM (#15644995)

Oh nice, thanks! Unfortunately it seems that apps still animate.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by SilasX on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @05:01PM (#15648067)

Yeah and I still see a lag from opening apps.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by goldenkey on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @12:44PM (#15645605)

If you have root you can write a MobileSubstrate hook that calls UIView setAnimationsEnabled:NO in a hooked constructor of UIView (then call super.)

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by manmal on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @02:16PM (#15646530)

Completely disabling animations would break many apps, because a lot is going on in completion blocks of animations. Setting animation durations to a very low value would work though (that’s also what you have to do for UI tests).

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by loxs on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @11:18AM (#15644620)

Only if you jailbreak

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by ashleyn on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:16AM (#15643991)

I've done this as well. It reminds me of when I upgraded PalmOS devices in Ye Olde Days and home would appear instantly when you tapped it.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by sclangdon on Wednesday November 08, 2017 @03:34AM (#15650653)

There is a similar setting in Windows, in case anyone is interested.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\MenuShowDelay

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by bramjans on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:48AM (#15644349)

Wow! Didn't know this existed, thanks for the tip!

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by Macuyiko on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @02:04PM (#15646405)

This is simply amazing! Thanks for sharing!

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by mnm1 on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @02:22PM (#15646589)

A lot. Just take a look at the desktop switching animation in OS X that's been there now for years. I bring that up anytime anyone tries to suggest Apple has decent design sense. No sane UI designer would put something like that in without the possibility of disabling it (like their other shitty animations). To be clear, any UI designer who hasn't understood the absolute fact that after a hundred or a thousand times, any animation becomes despised by a large fraction of one's user base shouldn't be working in this field. A lot of these unqualified people also apparently make a lot of videogames with un-skippable cut scenes. Same idea. Same stupidity and lack of any forethought whatsoever about the user's experience. It's almost like they're making this software with only the manufacturer's goals of looking 'shiny', 'sleek', or whatever dumb adjective of the day people who don't understand tech use to describe it. Oh, wait a second ...

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by hawski on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @04:04PM (#15647627)

Few years back when I had to use OSX I tried to use native workspaces. The switch workspaces animation was already too long for me the first time. In Windows there are (were?) at least all those registry edits that one can do to do whatever one pleases. Also Windows has the adjust all visual effects for best performance setting. But I couldn't find anything for OSX.

An example of the way I use workspaces:

- one workspace for terminal, browser with documentation and some text editor

- second workspace for a full-blown IDE, another browser window with documentation and the developed application

It's funny that there are easy solutions to the cut scene problem. If user skips the cut scene there could be a little message that if you press some key the cut scene will replay. And/or give the list of all cut scenes to the point somewhere in the menu. But most of the time cut scenes are there to bring the cinematic experience and are easy and lazy thing to do...

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by Veen on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @03:05PM (#15647013)

You can cut down on those pointless MacOS animations if you turn on "Reduce Motion" in the accessibility settings.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by epistasis on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:12AM (#15643946)

That's a huge frustration with current web pages for me, and for iOS. Animations that stall interaction rather then enable it do exactly the opposite funtction. And if you're ever in a situation where interactions get chained from user requests, like the bug in the iOS calculator, you're gone way off the path on your UI

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by acdha on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @12:13PM (#15645230)

Settings -> General -> Accessibility -> Reduce Motion on iOS is a really nice way to improve the subjective interface speed.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by epistasis on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @12:54PM (#15645712)

That had zero effect on the interaction-halting animations for me.

I'm not opposed to animation, I'm opposed to animation that makes the phone unresponsive and not listen to input, or delays the display of information for more than 200-300ms. Unfortunately the "Reduce Motion" only seems to be for some very minor things.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by wnevets on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @12:56PM (#15645732)

>I wonder how much of this is a result of UI designers deliberately putting tiny delays/animations into their UIs to make them more "usable"?

I disable most if not all of the animations on my android phone and windows desktops for that very reason. The animations make for great tech demos but also makes everything feel so much slower when trying to get things done.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by tandav on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @03:08PM (#15647043)

Who knows how to completely disable all animations in macOS?

I've tried many from this list https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/14001/how-to-turn-...

but it seems that most of commands doesn't actually make any affect

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by yorwba on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @11:02AM (#15644475)

Maybe those animations could be sped up with continued use. Then new users get the visual connection between their actions and the response, while experienced users don't have to wait as long for the animation to play.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by vlasev on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @02:04PM (#15646407)

No other UI infuriates me more than the McDonalds ordering UI at their locations. Everything is all over the place and the animations make it 100x slower.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by jseliger on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @12:17PM (#15645282)

You inspired me to look up how to turn off animations in MacOS; this has some answers: https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/14001/how-to-turn-... although I can't vouch for their accuracy.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by tomc1985 on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @01:23PM (#15645995)

I think animations, as most program them, slow down the UI exactly as you say.

But when their timing is tight, and the whole thing happens in under, say, half a second, you get the benefits of that context association and it still feels really cool and high-tech. People jsut set their animations too slow. (Seriously, nothing should ever take longer than 500ms)

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by white-flame on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @01:33PM (#15646100)

I don't have a link, but in referencing interactivity tests for some remote software development I did some years back, the maximum time between pressing a button and perceiving its effect to be considered "instant" is around 200ms. You don't want to go slower than that if you want it to "feel" fast & responsive.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by bostik on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @02:36PM (#15646730)

You're talking about Nielsen thresholds, and the limit for "instantaneous" is actually ~100ms.[0] Anything slower is considered to have taken some time.

Now, if that wasn't depressing enough - the Nielsen research is from early 90's. In the intervening 25 years, the users have certainly not become any less impatient.

0: https://www.nngroup.com/articles/response-times-3-important-...

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by tomc1985 on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @01:42PM (#15646204)

Even better. Does that give the animation enough time to show though? At that speed I'd guess you might as well make something instant

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by Filligree on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @02:04PM (#15646406)

At 60 frames per second? Sure, that's enough for 12 frames.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by yason on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @02:53PM (#15646901)

People jsut set their animations too slow. (Seriously, nothing should ever take longer than 500ms)

They could start with 500ms and subtract 100ms from each UI activity after each time it is used until the delay is 0ms.

The user would learn the interactions on the screen first and then not be bothered by the animations later. As a bonus the user might actually thing the program "speeded up after a 'break-in' period".

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by zeveb on Wednesday November 08, 2017 @09:31AM (#15652706)

Now that's an awesome idea! It'd be fine to actually just store that setting in memory, and reset with every restart: I wouldn't mind a half-second delay on my first window zoom after restart if I knew that it'd drop down to zero four zooms later.

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Re:Almost everything on computers is perceptually slower tha... by catgirl666 on Tuesday November 07, 2017 @10:31AM (#15644163)

I think a lot of this true!

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