iPhones and action discoverability

Re:iPhones and action discoverability by layer8 on Saturday September 24, 2022 @04:47PM (#32966421)

> Have you actually read the manual for your phone?

I have, and it’s abysmal, because it doesn’t make any attempt at explaining anything on a conceptual level, or even explaining basic UI elements. It doesn’t teach you how to interpret what you see on the screen. It does the bare minimum of enumerating the steps to activate a given feature, presuming that you are able to match those descriptions to what you see on the screen (there are barely any screenshots) and that you know why you would want to use that feature in the first place. It also doesn’t address any failure modes, and doesn’t discuss relevant considerations regarding the use of the given feature.

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Re:iPhones and action discoverability by teddyh on Saturday September 24, 2022 @06:10PM (#32966991)

There was a book series called “The Missing Manual – The book that should have been in the box®”:

https://www.oreilly.com/search/?query=missing+manual&formats...

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Re:iPhones and action discoverability by thih9 on Saturday September 24, 2022 @05:27PM (#32966670)

I see your point better now, thanks for explaining. That makes sense.

Then again, today’s smartphone operating systems are as popular as home appliances in the 90s.

Maybe if we took something modern that is as niche as software in the 90s then it might come with a manual with a mental model too.

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Re:iPhones and action discoverability by layer8 on Saturday September 24, 2022 @05:41PM (#32966770)

Home appliances also used to come with detailed and easy-to-understand manuals, and mostly don’t anymore. It’s mainly that manufacturers stopped caring, due to accelerated product cycles and globalization, because the products sell regardless.

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Re:iPhones and action discoverability by thewebcount on Saturday September 24, 2022 @05:54PM (#32966872)

I recently bought a new washing machine. It has a mode with an odd name that turns out to be tied to a cleaning product from another company. The manual doesn’t have any information on what the mode does or why it exists. The manual is a generic manual for like 5 or 10 models, and seems to only include the functions common to them all. Any function on a higher-end model that’s not included on the lower-end model is just not documented. I guess if you want to use those, you’re on your own.

But of course, there’s a phone app you can download and give the company a bunch of personal information to connect your washer to your home network so you can get notification when it’s done with its cycle.

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Re:iPhones and action discoverability by autoexec on Sunday September 25, 2022 @06:42AM (#32970233)

Companies used to provide manuals that'd include part numbers and even schematics!

Now they're developing products for themselves. No customer ever asked for a TV that plastered the screen with ads every time they adjusted the volume, or a lightbulb you need some shitty app to turn on and off, but now it seems everything comes with some kind of hidden monkey paw style gotcha attached to it.

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Re:iPhones and action discoverability by thih9 on Monday September 26, 2022 @03:43AM (#32980505)

What I'm trying to point out is the shift in complexity and similarities between the areas of the same complexity. Check this out:

- 2020s appliances (throw away manuals) are like 90s hardware toolbox (throw away manuals)

- 2020s smartphones (easy to understand manuals) are like 90s appliances (easy to understand manuals)

- 2020s specialized tools (manuals with mental models) are like 90s computers (manuals with mental models)

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