The user interface uses a lot of flat design. Be careful!

I'm glad IOS 7 finally put the flashlight and the system function shortcut switch, but a lot of misuse of the flat design deeply stung me this fruit powder heart, I believe that old Joe at the moment grave vomiting blood. I am not a flat design of the opponents, nor are the proponents of physical and chemical design, just think, in different occasions, different needs of the situation, should use different design methods, such as user interface is not suitable for a large number of flat design .

　　From the perspective of the user experience

First of all, my daughter. When she was two years old, I played the IPad and Nexus 7. She would be very proactive in reaching out to the highlighted buttons on the IPad screen, and she was able to distinguish between what was clickable and which areas were not responsive; Nexus 7 She became unaware of what to do and pressed everywhere. Her cognitive level is still unclear. Some text + color block is actually a button, after many attempts to know which can click, which area click Invalid. Once another App is changed, her response to the flattened interface is being explored again and again.

Besides my father, 70 years old, Sudoku, can't play computer, can't surf the internet. I do not play Sudoku, do not know what Sudoku game is good, so on the IPad loaded with N Sudoku game, let him choose the elderly, not fun I deleted. We do not guess, the proposed materialization of the win, flattening has been deleted, because the elderly know which blocks can be moved, where the number can be filled in, pencils, wood, paper, Eraser, for him is also very cordial, quoting the words is "like playing really".

"Young people who know science and technology are the mainstream smartphone users, and the time for educating users is over, and people have accepted and used flat design interfaces," the retort said. "Then, please do an experiment, the same App design and flatten two sets of interfaces, so that young people familiar with technology products into two groups, so that they complete a series of specified operations to see which group to complete the operation of the response time faster?"

Man has the primal consciousness of seeking balance, and sees the concave surface and wants to fill it with something, see convex out of the surface want to put it flat, this is why let users fill out the form to make concave, and the button to submit the form to make a projection to allow users to click, there are psychological hints.

　　at present, many people agree with the understanding is : the physical and chemical design is the imitation of real things, the user's understanding of the interface from the real world experience and cognition, greatly reduce the user's psychological acceptance threshold and learning costs.

　　Another point is that I specifically focus on IOS: the IPhone, IPad product design is flat, with a cold metal frame, a smooth glass on the click of a not protruding button is very sense. How to put the real world feeling out, there is life, so that people will not be resistant to cold and cold technology? A kind, temperature-materialized design is the answer.

That's why Joe insists on using the proposed physical design on IOS.

　　From the perspective of design language

The flat design is 2D, only X axis, Y axis, color, shape, layout, the physical and chemical design is a depth, more than a Z axis, but also a texture and texture. Rich design language to give designers a wealth of expression, flat design is like talking when not allowed to use metaphor as boring, so some places to make people "tacit" is very difficult to express. For user interaction interface, rich expression ability is especially important.

Some people say that the simplified design of the language to express the ability of the problem, then ask how many of the world is a Design Master? If you can afford it, please use the flat design interface!

　　Less is more new solution : The front lazy, the more trouble behind.

Some people put the flat design to the artistic point of view, to ask "Is it like painting is good?" In the art world, even if no one knows that you are painting a tree, there is no problem; But in the user interface, users do not know that you are designing a tree, there is a big problem! User interface design needs a little more pragmatism, with the mentality of ordinary users to do the design, rather than with the attitude of the master to disdain mortals.

Sewing thread, leather texture, rivet, crack ... Remove the superfluous details of the fitting, iOS 6 of the proposed materialization is too cumbersome, and iOS 7 flat is aggressive, too much. The individual believes that MIUI has found a balance between the materialization and flattening.

　　From the perspective of marketing

The materialization of the application and the role of the game in the marketing have a similar place: to give a sense of reality and soul.

To tell you a real case. A friend is going to develop a game of chess and cards, so in the major application of the market to do a survey, studied hundreds of chess and card games, found a law: the game only a few of the application of chess card download, and the virtual characters, there is a dialogue with the number of downloads is often dozens of times times or even hundreds of times times the former. A friend concludes that there are roles and situational simulations that allow players to get involved.

Back to IOS 7, the System application icon design, previously exquisite details are not, after the abstraction of the geometric shape and bold collision color. This is not Ive's work, it is a fashion designer's work, on the runway by the model is very eye-pleasing, but your wife will not wear them on the street. (Ive is busy with the iphone 6 and big screen iphone, and he really doesn't have time to manage that much detail.) )

Designers to each application icon as a brand logo to design, they are more abstract, are more like logo, but at the same time the problem is: the user of the application of the icon and the function of the button is not clear, because both are composed of simple geometry. Why is there such a strange feeling? Because to the user, the application is a product rather than a brand .

Brand is intangible, logo is responsible for the transfer of brand value and concept, so logo design suitable for a high degree of abstraction and simplification; the product is tangible, the shape of the product needs to help the user to understand and use, the user from the icon to open an application to see the specific interface, this process is continuous, It's the same with you stretching out the fridge door and seeing the fruit and vegetable drinks inside. Plainly, the application of the icon is part of the product, is the shape and entrance of the product, in the application design, the application of the image of the icon has become a way to improve product recognition.

Users have the habit of classifying the application, imagine if the music folder is a bunch of different colors of notes, you can quickly distinguish between the QQ music and Spotify it? If the Camera folder is a bunch of different sizes of circles (the shot is flattened), you can quickly distinguish between Instagram and Og GL?

Besides Windows Phone's interface, it is the ultimate in flat design. Once the developer has followed the Microsoft design standard, you will find that no matter what application, the recognition from the portal (icon) to the specific interface is weakened. Take two WP application screenshots, occlusion application name, you can not directly distinguish from the visual two applications. To be Zen, no design is the best design, and content becomes part of the design.

To put it more dark, this is a Microsoft conspiracy, so that all third-party applications are weakened into a Windows system part of the user will have the features of Windows rich and powerful illusion. Third-party applications are unified on VI, without personality and soul, low recognition, very unfavorable to spread.

Today, it's a very dangerous signal to just remove the iOS7 icon and put it in the Android system.

Finally, make a bet, once a large number of third-party applications have followed the flat design, app Store sales will be negative growth.