I have a fantasy where everyone who worked on recent USB standards must personally provide tech support when there's a problem.

Support guy: "M'am, can you tell me what is on the plug of your hub? Is it a sort of pitch fork with three numbers, or is it more like a pitch fork with a lightning bolt and two numbers?"

Customer: "Son, I'm 75, I don't see so well anymore!"

Support guy: "Well, unless we can find out if you have a USB 3.1 Gen 2b compliant with Power Delivery 20W hub or a USB 3.2 Gen 1 DP+ SuperSpeed 10GB hub, we won't know what alternate modes your cable must support in able to connect that mouse to your laptop m'am"

They probably do. It's an industry-driven standard; they added all that stuff exactly because they intended to sell it to consumers.

But the people who worked on the standard directly aren't doing the tech support

How is that different from any other technical standard or product design?

It behooves one to read the conversation before replying. The implication is this: perhaps if the people who wrote the spec personally had to offer tech support for the spec they wrote, they might have an incentive to write less insane specs.

I get that. But spec writers never have to do that, yet there are many other specs that are presumably less insane. So it's unlikely that not-requiring tech support is a causal factor in USB's supposed insanity.

Reading the thread would also explain that you're discussing somebody's 'fantasy', not expectation or belief of causality.

This is classic HN stuff, I find it actually valuable to see an explicit enumeration of all possible interpretations of some statement, also somewhat humorous.

To be honest, I wanted to essentially say that it's a thoroughly stupid fantasy. But in more polite terms.

“We could sell this feature to consumers even though it would confuse them”? That’s not what tech support would do.

I’d pay to watch them connect up a monitor, then try fix the issue when it mysteriously stops working. Then have the replacement also fail. Then find another that works but looks identical.

And display outputs too. What happens if the user plugs in multiple displays to the hub could be an important scenario to support...

(and for example, macOS doesn't support DisplayPort MST, requiring an encapsulation over Thunderbolt to support that scenario...)

tldr: it'd be possible to make such a hub, but it's so complexity fraught that a _lot_ of companies would avoid doing it, USB Type-C is just too complex.

This was the story moving from USB 1 to 2, and this is still the story for people trying to charge their laptop (USB-A to C cable) from a random phone charger or an underpowered USB-A hub.

Coupled with the nightmare of guessing which USB-C cable supports what, I have the feeling preventing us from further confusion has never been a decisive factor in product making.

But isn't that already the case with the ports directly on computers?

I have a laptop that can do USB 3.2 (or something). I can charge it through those ports, but it doesn't do Thunderbolt of any kind.

I have a small desktop in front of me that's power through an external adaptor, like a laptop. It has a USB-C port that doesn't do video output of any kind and which can't be used to power the computer. It has another USB-C port with a bolt on top of it. It does thunderbolt, it can output video (I've driven an Apple TB display with it), but still can't be powered through it. It also doesn't output video through the USB-C dock, which works on the laptop.

I have another laptop with a USB-C port with the bolt on it, and it can be powered through that port.

These are all ports directly on the computer, no hubs required.

Maybe! I know better and read the specs, but you're right, a lot of people might get confused that it isn't charging their 100W laptop.

We've trained people for decades that if it fits it should work. Now we've got a multitude of effectively different protocols all using the same connector shape.

I learnt "fits but won't work" running 5v(worked for the 486DX2) through a 3.3v CPU(DX4 100). The nymphs decided it was too hot and left.

Since then, building your own PC has gotten easier and easier. As you say, mostly if it fits it works. Which I think is great!

But how did plugging stuff in from the outside go the other way...

I think we're talking more about end user external connections. I'm sure I don't have to tell you that back in the day a bajillion things ran through a DB-9s and DB-25s in electrically incompatible ways and how much easier it got to tech support our families with USB 1 and 2.

I absolutely agree with you that USB 1 and 2 did great things for family IT support.

But now we're at the USB 3 (and seemingly 4) stage of things - hence my "plugging stuff in from the outside go the other way..." statement.

Between varying capabilities offered through USB 3 and cables/hubs/docks that support those varying capabilities it is a bit hit and miss whether plugging stuff in will work or not.

I now know (not yet personally verified, from other comments on this article) Lightning 4 branded cables should support all connectivity possibilities and power delivery. It doesn't solve patchy device support but at least it is one step better. Connect two USB3 devices with a Lightning 4 cable is a bit silly marketing wise but at least it is easy to support.

On the very plus side, with ATX, you can't plug in the motherboard power incorrectly, unlike AT.

Depends on how strong you are.

Or smart

Building a PC should be expected to require a certain level of RTFM that I don't you can responsibly expect from people just trying to charge their phone or plug in peripherals.