Pick One.
September 7, 2005
The regrettable Unified1 user interface has struck again, in a modified, quasi-metal form, in the “streamlined” (Apple’s words) design for iTunes 5. I suppose the only possible bright spot in this is that the brushed metal interface might be phased out entirely.
As it stands, I’ve now got five different interfaces all competing for my attention and I’m beginning to have a hard time remembering that I’m using a Mac.
1 Someone pointed out to me that Tiger’s Mail interface is actually called “Unified,” while the Dashboard-style interface is called “Plastic,” so with Aqua, Brushed Metal, and now Smooth Metal I guess that makes five.
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yeah i am hoping for more consistency in leopard…
Would you still be upset if Apple released Leopard with only two window styles: the newly introduced Unified (ala Tiger Mail.app) and Smooth Metal (ala iTunes 5)? I wouldn’t. I like both new window styles, apart from the sharp corners in the Smooth Metal look… My problem is one of consistency, not of style (with the exception of brushed metal).
I predict that the next major version of Safari, the entire next iLife Suite, and the next QuickTime will all use Smooth Metal. I also predict that the entire next release of iWork will use the Unified window style. Thats a bright future!
It’s not that I mind “smooth metal” “brushed metal” or “plastic” or “unified” look. They’re all fine. But not all of them at once. I’m one of the few people that wasn’t terribly upset with the look of Mail in Tiger (once I got rid of those stupid blue button backgrounds) but we’re reaching a breaking point in how many interfaces we can simultaneously expect to see. If “smooth metal” or “unified” or whatever this qualifies as is what Apple wants to standardize on now, that’s great, as long as they standardize on something. But between all of these and that horrendo interface for GarageBand there is clearly a UI designer(s?) within Apple that has a serious speed habit.
But the radius on those rounded corners? No. fucking. excuse.
I am with you 100%. I think that the hiring of the designer of Delicious Library, Mike Matas, and a couple of other hires by Apple over the past year or so are great signs that they will be doing something big with the interface in Leopard. The sad fact is that we will be living with this inconsistency for at least another year or two before Leopard.
Well coming from a Windoze user (please don’t hurt me) I think the new “streamlined” look is quite nice. It is closest thing I have to nice looking on my XP box. I can see your points though about all the different looks melded together would get tedious to gander at all day.
I don’t disagree that it’s probably an improvement. I just fear that they’re not replacing anything, just adding to the clutter. I guess we’ll see over the next few months.