[voqv]

I will probably soon add an old 3D Touch iphone to my small Human Machine Interface hall of fame along with the old click wheel iPod Classic.

They probably removed it because nobody was using it and they couldn't figure out how to teach people, while spending extra $ to add it into phones.

[empyrrhicist]

As if they put any effort whatsoever into teaching or UI discoverability these days. If there was a tutorial app I would have used it, but I have repeatedly had to use Google to find unrelated blog sites describing how to accomplish things in the iOS interface.

Cynically, it feels like they think everyone should already "just know" how the various gestures work, which is obnoxious and user hostile.

[everyone]

As someone who only occasionally has to use macOS and iOS for work. The gestures and key combos required to do even the most basic things are insane.. and there is (almost) zero discoverability or affordances for them. On iOS gestures with multiple fingers, on macOS keyboard shortcuts with 3 or 4 keys.

I also dont often use Linux, but I could try some new distro with a completely different windows manager I have never seen before and I can figure it out and be happily computing in no time.

apple stuff always requiring searching on the internet to find out how how to do even most basic functions.

Also, not relevant, but I gotta mention as it grinds my gears so bad.. The only reason I have to use macOS is that it's required to build to iOS, which is just uniquely egregious. That sort of business should actually be illegal. Hopefully it will be in EU soon.

[gwright]

> there is zero discoverability

The shortcuts associated with menu items are shown in the menu item. I realize that there other discovery problems with keyboard shortcuts (on all platforms) but there is non-zero discoverability for "the most basic things" on Mac OS.

Gesture discoverability is much closer to zero, IMHO.

[egypturnash]

what you mean most people don't go explore every single page of the System Preferences when they get a new computer and look at all the helpful animations in the Gestures pane, I'm shocked

(yeah this is the computing equivalent of a locked file cabinet in a disused toilet stall in a dark basement with a sign on the door that says "Beware The Leopard")

[9935c101ab17a66]

macOS help menus are incredibly useful, system preferences is helpful, and support.apple.com actually has some useful guides. Apple also provides free training sessions at Apple Stores, and free remote support 24/7 AFAIK through AppleCare.

What do you expect? Unskippable videos when you first set up a mac followed by a mandatory test that you have to pass before you can use the computer?

[kergonath]

> yeah this is the computing equivalent of a locked file cabinet in a disused toilet stall in a dark basement with a sign on the door that says "Beware The Leopard"

OTOH it makes complete sense to have a look at the Trackpad pane to see how it works. It’s not like it’s hidden behind a defaults command line, and it even has movies. It’s much worse on phones.

[jjoonathan]

Mac OS Help menu search is spectacular for discoverability. Start typing what you want and it pops up the menu with an arrow and it shows you the shortcut.

Everyone else does it worse, except maybe the VSCode command palette.

[yourad_io]

This is the only thing I miss about macos. Last Mac used was snow leopard and I _still_ sometimes find myself wishing for menu search on Linux

[everyone]

Yeah fair enough, I was being hyperbolic, edited my comment to be more accurate.

[robertoandred]

How do you discover key combos in Linux?

[OJFord]

You read the man page/documentation for the software you installed that they're for, or else you defined them yourself and don't need to discover them.

[awad]

Apple also provides ample documentation

[OJFord]

Sure, but the complaint was discoverability, my point is that on Linux you start with something you don't need to discover: you either defined the shortcut yourself, or you installed something that defines it by default. There are no 'system shortcuts'.

[everyone]

Generally speaking, you dont actually need them in Linux, you can do everything with mouse.. however you can't actually use macOS without them.

[simonh]

>if there was a tutorial app I would have used it..

Isn't that the Tips App? I'm pretty sure it gets recommended every time you set up a new phone. Mine has a tip on using Haptic Touch with the keyboard to move the insertion point.

[nnoremap]

I just looked at that for the first time, there's some neat stuff. Didn't know you can define actions for tapping on the back of the phone, even works with my case.

[Elidrake42]

Not only is there a tutorial app ("Tips") but you receive a notification pointing you towards it shortly after setting up a new iOS device. Also after major iOS updates. So... Yeah I suppose you're making their point for them, to an extent.

[empyrrhicist]

Does this apply to iPads? I had mine set up by my employer and don't think I've seen a prompt. I also don't recall seeing this on an iPhone SE I had, so maybe discover ability would be better than popups for a tips app.

[jhanschoo]

As I understand it 3D touch's functionality per app depended on the app author, so the discoverability problem is not that simple.

[llaolleh]

One way to do discoverability here is to make a suggestion if you notice the user hoping around between texts during typing.

[torstenvl]

Absolutely not. Machines and software that interrupt users are Kafkaesque torture devices. Hell is full of Clippies and microwaves that repeatedly beep for eternity.

[failTide]

There's got to be a tactful way to do this without interrupting users. If anyone's got some good examples I'd like to take a look.

[lostlogin]

The thing some email clients do where they say “did you mean to attach something” is the one I love.

I’d like a Mark II version which also says “there is no such thing as Sunday 8th of August this year” so that I can fix my errors before they cause problems.

[homonculus1]

It's just fundamentally a bad idea. Software should never, ever bother the user during use about how it's being used. That's what tutorials and documentation are for.

No matter how clever and subtle you think you're being, you're still just redirecting the user's attention from the task at hand toward the UI itself. No matter how ignorable, dismissable, or optional it is, it's an abysmal UI failure and it shouldn't even happen once. Make the feature right in the first place and you won't have to resort to nagging.

[failTide]

I wouldn't mind having a shortcut or "I'm stuck" button that would try to figure out what my issue was based on my last 5 minutes of activity.

[happyopossum]

> If there was a tutorial app I would have used it

There is/was - it's called Tips, and most people ignore or uninstall it.

[empyrrhicist]

Its an interesting refutation and confirmation of my point.

[bombcar]

These features really need games added, where the only real requirement to play is learn the new feature.

Some say it's why minesweeper et al were added to Windows, so people could learn how to use the mouse.

[duskwuff]

Way back in the day, Apple shipped several different "Mouse Practice" tutorials on their computers to teach new users how to use the mouse. Here's videos of two of them:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvcwFYPiKKA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nV-d5F-AdX8

[failTide]

That game really does build up mouse skills. I remember playing it when I was 5 and having no idea what the rules were - I just liked to click all the fun little boxes with the cool numbers and bombs.

[xsmasher]

That's a great idea. Steam deck comes with a short game - Aperture desk job - that tests all of the controls. I didn't know it had a gyro until I played that game.

[kaba0]

I believe it was removed in big part due to being a relatively big energy drain. With that in mind, I don’t believe it was a bad decision, even though I liked the feature as well. (Though probably with additional R&D on the topic, it could have been improved)

[duskwuff]

And, IIRC, 3D Touch was also technologically infeasible to implement on iPad. That sharply limited what they could do with it, since it would never be available on all iOS devices.

[psychomugs]

I’ve never met anyone who was aware of the feature. Its removal kept me from upgrading my 6S until just this year.

[rasz]

>Human Machine Interface hall of fame along with the old click wheel iPod Classic

Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BnLbv6QYcA

"just few hundred clicks away"

[cainxinth]

I read they removed it because it required space-consuming hardware to accomplish, and Haptic Touch approximates most of its features (most) with just software.

[gullevek]

3D touch failed because it wasn't on all iOS devices.

The end. (I didn't even know about it until I finally switched to an iPhone Xs after years and years of lowest tear iPhones).

[yreg]

In addition to what you mentioned they were unable to bring it to the iPad.

[itsthejb]

I suppose it’s indicative of why the feature was removed, that I wasn’t aware of most of the features mentioned in the article

[conradev]

Features like that not only add cost, but also take away from available volume for other features

[ghoulishly]

I’m curious to hear what else lives in that collection