Socket3

AFAIK, Windows 95 was the last UI design with a published design methodology that includes numerous laboratory test sessions. I'm not sure the original URL, but it was republished [1]. It's listed at ACM [2] as published April 1996, so they were sharing how they did it pretty soon after it was done.

I just don't think Microsoft continued to do lab testing of their design, at least they haven't told us that they did, but it feels like a lot of things have gotten harder to do rather than easier to do, which doesn't match their earlier design goals. Windows 95 wasn't the peak, but it was a huge step vs Windows 3.1. IMHO, Apple clearly doesn't care about desktop experience (and anyway, their keyboard shortcuts are wrong, so I'm not using their design), and I don't think any OSS desktop environment is funding user studies (but I'd be happy to see evidence otherwise). Given that situation, I'd rather use the UI that had design goals I like and a design process that allowed developing towards those goals.

[1] https://socket3.wordpress.com/2018/02/03/designing-windows-95s-user-interface/

[2] https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/238386.238611

why "directories" were renamed to "folders"

I was just reading about that today. Alan Kay is to blame it seems, as for so much. :-)

"The desktop metaphor was first introduced by Alan Kay at Xerox PARC in 1970 and elaborated in a series of innovative software applications developed by PARC scientists throughout the ensuing decade. The first computer to use an early version of the desktop metaphor was the experimental Xerox Alto"[0]

For the wider context about desktop/folders etc see [1][2]

I found this [3] story linked to a while ago on here fascinating, about all the user testing done for Windows 95. They did a lot of watching people use the file/folder system, change things around etc, repeat etc. It's kind of funny, the problems people had.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desktop_metaphor

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_graphical_user_interface

[3] https://socket3.wordpress.com/2018/02/03/designing-windows-95s-user-interface/

I've been designing a complex desktop application.. there's not that much info out there. I found these helpful:

Designing the Win95: https://socket3.wordpress.com/2018/02/03/designing-windows-95s-user-interface/

Also the final design guides: https://www.ics.uci.edu/~kobsa/courses/ICS104/course-notes/Microsoft_WindowsGuidelines.pdf

A (really old) book: https://www.amazon.com/About-Face-Essentials-Interaction-Design/dp/1118766571/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=about+face&qid=1616050002&sr=8-2

Another book: https://www.amazon.com/Designing-Interfaces-Patterns-Effective-Interaction/dp/1492051969/ref=pd_sbs_4?pd_rd_w=HQRML&pf_rd_p=527ea27c-adf6-4b67-9c5f-265eb29e0622&pf_rd_r=A8VA18BM21JAZ1KQJJMZ&pd_rd_r=2525d4f9-fe7a-479a-b945-a0d5054a93b3&pd_rd_wg=npsDd&pd_rd_i=1492051969&psc=1

Oddly enough these are all ancient. There hasn't been much innovation in that space though. (apart from High Dpi and Dark Mode)

Blender recently did a redesign of their UI, they have lot's of discussions about their rationale.

Windows NT 3.1 seems to have come with a CD, a complete installation set of 3.5" discs, and even boot discs for the CD on 5.25" discs (and a voucher for a 5.25" complete set). So Microsoft obviously thought 3.5" discs were often going to be needed back in 1993 (and there's a notable number of people that have a CD-ROM drive, but no 3.5" drive?). See https://socket3.wordpress.com/2016/12/24/ebay-purchase-5-microsoft-windows-nt-3-1/

Frankly, I'd count Windows 95 as really being in the CD era, floppy software was getting rare than (although apparently there's a even a 39 disc floppy version of Windows 98 if you're a real masochist), but a couple of years earlier CD-ROMs were still quite niche, although a high end workstation does seem a likely candidate to have one.

Thanks! Interestingly, Motif was based on Windows 3.x look, more precisely "Presentation Manager" look designed for OS/2 and Windows. You can see the similarities in how resize corners and close buttons etc are laid out on windows.

Windows 95 was a phenomenal success IMHO in terms of UI design, and it was partly based on Cairo which got a lot of inspiration from NextSTEP, but Win95 became so widespread that it became somewhat bland, so I agree in that sense. I strongly recommend the story about how Windows 95 team achieved excellence in the UI design, especially the "Start" button and Taskbar, the things that we take for granted today: https://socket3.wordpress.com/2018/02/03/designing-windows-95s-user-interface/

> There is a huge blindspot, I've noticed, where people mistake familiarity for ease of use (and other qualities too).

The "legacy" Windows design isn't just so beloved because of familiarity, but because it actually provides visual cues to users [1], and the backstory on how it was designed is also interesting [2].

I know that there was an even more detailed article floating around here on HN but I can't find it offhand.

[1] https://twitter.com/tuomassalo/status/978717292023500805

[2] https://socket3.wordpress.com/2018/02/03/designing-windows-95s-user-interface/