Apple Seeking Software Engineer for Future User Interfaces

[ezekielrage_99]

Hmmm... Cameras... for motion tracking? Controls that are remote...

Like this? (or this)

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/images/minority-report-ui.jpg

I was waiting for someone to post that...

 

[MacJoe]

Have you never heard of auto save?

Yep, but not every application (e.g. TeXShop) provides that functionality.

 

[MacJoe]

That part is VERY easy. The hard part is building an application smart enough to know that the reason you are quitting is because you just messed up and want to quit and NOT save the document so that it will revert to it's un edited state. Or maybe the number yo entered into the spread sheet was just to see "what if?" but you did not want to change the "real" value in the cell.

Time Machine kind of helps but we'd need a more fine grained version control system to allow for blindly auto-saving. With some kind of "undo" feature that work back across edit session then we'd have what you want

The app doesn't need to try to guess my intention, it only needs to know that whatever I type needs to be saved. Deleting the document is up to the user; preserving the content should be up to the operating system.

 

[tribulation]

to fill the hopefully recently fired UI designers

i hope these jobs are to look for some actually talented ui designers to fill the shoes of the so-hopefully-recently-departed apple ui idiots that did the leopard 'improvements'

just about every new leopard ui change from tiger that i can think of off the top of my head right now iSucks. bad
hopefully this is a call to some people that can come in and clean up the mess they call leopard user unfriendliness

 

[jettredmont]

The app doesn't need to try to guess my intention, it only needs to know that whatever I type needs to be saved. Deleting the document is up to the user; preserving the content should be up to the operating system.

The model may be advised by the OS, but it's not the OS's job to ensure that an application saves its data in a timely manner. It's the application's job.

Currently, there are two models which are prevalent: the "document" model, which hasn't changed much since the original Mac in 1984, and the "database" model, in which every action is immediately written to disk. Most apps choose one or the other; some apps (eg, DevonThink) choose to implement a little of both (in DevonThink, all "database" operations like organizing entries, etc, are in a database model; all "text" operations like adding something new to a note are in a document model).

A few "database model" apps you likely know and use:

• iTunes
• iPhoto
• iChat
• Address Book

A few "mixed model" apps you likely know and use:

• iMovie
• Mail

The "document" model is the one most users expect from a computer, especially when entering text, and so it is the one which is used by default in the vast majority of apps. Apps which use the "database" model have to explain this to their users, and field complaints about it, and mitigate confusion over the missing "save" actions et al. A user-level change in expectations could come about either by more of these database-model apps becoming prevalent or by the OS vendor with a respected HIG spec (aka, Apple) making such a model more advised. Of course, that's only if it really is a better model for most applications, and I'm still not convinced it is right for "most" text entry.

IMHO, things like TaskPaper should operate on a database model. As soon as I finish typing in a task, it should get written out to disk. However, longer-form text entry doesn't have a reasonable "break" point at which it should save. We end up there with timed auto-saves, which are the worst of both worlds (the save happens mid-sentence or at least mid-thought, and overwrites what had been on disk with what I might not have wanted to write out), or temporary-timed-auto-saves (which auto-save to a "recovery" area instead of just overwriting what is on disk).

In any case, it's not necessarily the OS's "job" to do this (and Palm doesn't do this either, although the combination of non-volatile memory and well-behaved apps gives that illusion; I've lost typed notes on a Palm before due to the application crashing). The OS vendor can make it a "best practice", but they can't force applications to write every state change out to disk the second it happens.

 

[jbcaro]

Well, while I'm not a Software Engineer by any stretch of the imagination, I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, so where do I sign up for this?

 

[John Musbach]

The camera bit is interesting indeed, it'd be very neat to see Apple release their version of a digital camera. I'm sure such a device would be very straightforward and easy to use as have all their devices. Keep it coming Apple!