

New drool-worthy WebOS screenshots emerge - transburgh
http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2009/04/29/new-drool-worthy-webos-screenshots-emerge/

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jemmons
Too many rounded corners! There's no law against right angles, and rounded
corners on top of rounded corners make for "soft" boundaries.

For example, look at the first screenshot. Large round buttons. Above that,
large round header (or something). Above that? Small round tab (title bar?).
Those elements are all so confusing that Palm is forced to use colors and
gradients to distinguish them (the awkward hard grey fill on the header and
the "fade into nothingness" alpha of the title bar).

Worse? Look at what happens when you scroll that form up a little in
screenshot #2. What is going on here? It turns out it's not the _header_ that
has the round corners. Those corners are some sort of _mask_ we're viewing the
form through. Not only is this effect completely divorced from any physical
metaphor we may be familiar with, but also ensures _anything_ that's just
below the title bar gets rounded. If it happens to be the rounded frameset
containing rounded buttons and round switches that we see a little lower in
the screenshot... well, that's going to be a tiring interface to mentally
parse.

They aped the glitz of the iPhone's design, but forgot to look for (or perhaps
discounted the existence of) any reason behind it. The result is a beautifully
shaded mess.

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alex_c
Looks pretty enough, but... why are some of the labels and fields the opposite
order from the convention (screenshot 2 - labels on the right, fields on the
left) and the other way around in other screenshots?

I don't take that as a good sign of the overall quality and polish of the end
product.

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intregus
So much of this UI looks like it was ripped right from the iPhone... I'm all
for innovation, and as they say "A rising tide floats all boats". Just PLEASE
don't brag about WebOS UI innovation when the WebOS developers have had 2+
years to study Apples interface designs.

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chrisbolt
Even the map is of Cupertino...

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jasongullickson
I noticed that too, interesting.

I agree with the initial post completely, but given Palm's position, if you
can't make something better, you could do worse than basing your design on the
best of class available.

I think a more accurate automotive analogy would be comparing a Hyundai to a
Honda.

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aristus
I wonder how much battery is chewed up rendering all those alpha-blends.

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wmf
Probably not much; hardware 3D is pretty efficient.

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tvon
Nice, but a bit derivative.

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omouse
What's the point?

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tvon
Someone needs a hug.

