[div]

There are 2 things being discussed here:

1) people being confused by the back button because they don't realize it will always pop the current view of the navigationstack, which is systemwide.

2) the fact that the back, menu, search and home buttons are dedicated hardware buttons.

Explaining how 1) works does not mean that 2 is not broken. Personally I find 2 to be the interesting discussion.

Seeing how these hardware buttons are being changed to be a dedicated part of the Galaxy Nexus' touchscreen, and how not all vendors actually put all 3 buttons on there, it's not too hard to argue that something about the hardware buttons is at least flawed, if not broken.

[thebigshane]

Even though #2 isn't the topic of the original article, I also find it interesting. And looking over the comments it seems that most people prefer touch to hardware buttons.

I use my android mostly for calling, texting, music and instapaper (actually instafetch). I hate how I can't easily feel my phone and push a button for things like mute, or pause, or end call, or next song. Sometimes I actually have to unlock the phone with the top button, then swipe to really unlock, navigate to the right app/activity if it's not forefront, then look at the phone to see where the appropriate touch button is located.

Am I one of the few that wants more hardware buttons? And not the capacitive (fixed touch buttons) but the real buttons that maggit mentions elsewhere in these comments; buttons you can feel with your fingers.