To Use Stock UI, Or Not?
A Mac app should look and feel like a Mac app. A Windows app should look and feel like a Windows app.
Or should they?
Raymond Chen, The Old New Thing:
Sadly, almost nobody uses Win32 scroll bars any more. Everybody uses frameworks that provide their own custom scroll bars.
[...]
Great, so by the time I learn about a shortcut for scroll bars (Shift+click), the ecosystem has fragmented so much that I can’t even rely on it working.
Brent Simmons, Inessential:
What I found should be no surprise: many of the apps people think look good are not using stock UI.
[...]
I’ve long been a devoted proponent of using stock Mac UI for, I always thought, good reasons: users are already familiar with that UI and it’s less work to create and update every year.
I think those reasons (user familiarity and developer effort) may not stand up entirely. At least not these days.
~
Links:
- A Brief History of Windows Scroll Bar Shortcuts, by Raymond Chen, The Old New Thing
- That About Wraps It Up for Stock Mac UI, by Brent Simmons, Inessential