
Really Good UX – A look inside your favorite products - mattleblank
https://www.reallygoodux.io
======
wruza
Okay, this one has to be really good UX. The floating bar at the bottom that
covered text “one mail each...” (before I could read it) contains a number 617
and few social buttons. Linkedin, that is blocked in my country, fb/tw/g+ that
I don’t have, and buffer that I’m unaware of. The same for 617. After first
stripe scrolled, there is ugly site name floating at the top that I can see in
my phone’s browser titlebar anyway. Two floating bars, nice. Menu(?) stripe
seems to have an inconsistency at “modal windows” item. Oh, and css is broken
between email input and stay inspired button.

I don’t want to read or tap anywhere on this site or stay inspired, but I
suspect how much time was spent to make it at least what it is (leading web-
based project right now). I think it is not good UX, nor a good platform to do
it.

My often used products are google and youtube, among others. Google can’t
remember my password when I’m switching accounts, i.e. my browser places wrong
remembered password into account switching form, because the domain is not
changing. This ruins the entire fast switching, and my browser made it really
faster than google, but now there is no way to do it, because login is
integrated with fast-switch and asks for login and password in separate
screens. Separate ... screens.

Youtube remembers the last button I pressed and leaves it focused. So, when
I’m clicking “next” in a playlist, two things happen: 1) I can’t control the
volume and time position with keys anymore, 2) pressing space does not pause
the video, it only shows focused “next” control. I don’t know what it does
pressed twice, but if it activates “next” again, then it is a double fail.
Hey, but you knew it was focused, can you ask. Yes, but not so after watching
content for half a hour. It is a surprise every time. Every ... time.

There was no desktop product such shitty, except for builtin IE and WMP, and
even those were better imo. Because no product could survive such
inconveniences, stupid design and the absense of real end-user usability
testing like today’s. Now that web has an ability to lock-in user via content,
not through good design, design went to the secondary plane and goes deeper
and deeper. And if you’ll try to make a good youtube viewer with human design,
UX and all, they’ll sue you to death.

Modern UX (web UX really) is a pile of trash. There may be something you can
learn from, but not much to do.

/rant

~~~
icebraining
FWIW, Firefox seems to be able to handle the "password in separate screen"
idiocy, the password manager still lets you choose the account despite the
domain not changing.

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yoz-y
Okay so I will be a bit cranky here but you can't just tear a product to bits
and pieces when it concerns UX.

On the site there was an example of Google Hangouts, I was curious because
this product has one of the worst UX as far as messaging services go.

Their first point is praising:

> ‍The first welcome message makes it very clear that users are in the right
> place: Hangouts. This can help orientate users, especially since Google has
> so many integrated products with similar-looking branding.

Well... nope, this first card is lying actually. When you open the hangouts
page and click on Video Call, you will be catapulted to Meet with no way of
actually calling anybody.

Second point:

> ‍The modal series provides a broad overview of the best features. The copy
> is short, and each window is image-heavy.

The copy is short but the images have absolutely no link to the content.

So my question would be, who writes these posts?

~~~
rypskar
Ah Google Hangouts... Doesn't work in Firefox, since they only was told about
changes to the extension API about a year before the change was made. No
logout button so have to go to google.com to logout after using it. Opening
Hangouts with an account with no access to Hangouts (test-account) and you get
an error page with option to use another account, but no place to logout...

~~~
nulagrithom
I have an account that _used_ to admin Google Apps. If that account is
available as a choice to log in -- doesn't matter if it's logged in or not,
only has to be on the account select -- then none of my accounts can log in to
Hangouts. Seems it's trying to redirect me to enable my Google Apps account
again, then complains that only an administrator can perform that action.

On the surface though, yeah, if you take some screenshots it looks like really
good UI. The follow through is generally garbage though. I think it's fair to
put it on the site.

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Sir_Cmpwn
Hah! Can we can lump all of these into a new "Business Experience" category?
None of the examples I looked at are good _user_ experiences, they're just
good ways of making more money off of users. Every design that takes more
money from you is a negative UX. Causing the user headache or inconvenience in
the hopes that they'll become a little less wealthy after the interaction and
calling it UX is fucking ridiculous. This is UX in the same way a carrot and
stick is to a donkey. And of course this site has a spam list^W^Wnewsletter,
fucking marketroids.

~~~
SirSavary
Not really sure who in their right mind considers "upsell prompts" part of a
great user experience.

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codemusings
So I randomly clicked on this:

[https://www.reallygoodux.io/blog/hellofresh-offboarding-
flow](https://www.reallygoodux.io/blog/hellofresh-offboarding-flow)

None of the points why this is __really good UX__ are valid in my opinion.

The practice of providing alternatives when unsubscribing is quite common
today. I get why it's there but it keeps me from achieving my goal.

Furthermore if I have to go through a two page survey to achieve my goal, then
no, that is not a good user experience. Doesn't matter if you get potential
valuable feedback out of this.

And finally the button "I've changed my mind" is also pretty common.

So all in all nothing special here. If that's the quality I can expect from
the newsletter then I can't say I would find this valuable.

~~~
unwind
I clicked too, and the site's introduction is pretty telling, in my opinion:

 _HelloFresh 's cancellation flow helps them mitigate churn and capture
valuable feedback to improve their product experience for the future._

That sounds _very_ much like it takes the business' side, and not the user.
"Mitigating churn" sounds like business speak for "making users stay since
quitting is hard". Very annoying.

I thought nobody but the actual user could have UX, talking about user
experiences based on the large-scale effects they have on your site/business
is ... cynical, at least to me. Bluergh.

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adrianoconnor
This site doesn't seem terribly useful -- looks like they're mostly looking
for shiny things; pretty buttons, nice on-boarding flows, fancy modals etc.

What I would like is a nice in-depth analysis of the UX in highly complex
applications -- does anybody know of a book or site that de-constructs web
apps (and/or mobile apps) that aim to replace desktop software? Thinking about
document management, hierarchical and context-aware menus, best-practices for
editing stuff on a canvas (including alternatives for right-click menus).

Too often we just replicate what we would have done on a desktop, in the
constraints of HTML, but usually that leads to poor UX (or at least sub-
optimal).

Any suggestions appreciated...

\--- After-thought: Does the 4th Edition of About Face go in to any of this?
Back in the early 00's, v2 of that book was an enlightening read, but I
haven't picked up the newer versions.

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johnday
Ironically, this seems like a good example of someone not knowing the
difference between UI and UX.

To recapitulate:

UI: User Interface. The design and aesthetics of the interactive and
informative parts of an application.

UX: User experience. The ways in which the UI enables users to navigate and
use the application with ease, understanding and minimal effort.

Many of the products (which others have mentioned) have a lovely UI, but the
UX leaves a lot to be desired. For example Google Hangouts might __look__
pretty but that's no use if it's making it harder to locate the relevant
actions.

My rule of thumb is this: If the average Joe would have more luck finding
their way around if it was just a HTML list of links to the right activity,
then your UX is crap.

~~~
Silhouette
_the difference between UI and UX._

This sort of criticism is neither helpful nor accurate. UI has always been
about more than just cosmetic details. We've been talking about usability,
accessibility, information architecture and so on for almost as long as we've
been making UIs. Certainly that means several decades before someone in need
of a new buzzword for their blog/presentation/resume first coined the term
"user experience".

~~~
dmitriid
> We've been talking about usability, accessibility, information architecture
> and so on for almost as long as we've been making UIs.

All of the above is UX, and should be integral part of design. Too often it
isn't.

> Certainly that means several decades before someone in need of a new
> buzzword for their blog/presentation/resume first coined the term "user
> experience".

\--- start quote ---

Early developments in User Experience can be traced back to the machine age
that includes the 19th and early 20th centuries.

The term user experience was brought to wider knowledge by Donald Norman in
the mid-1990s. He never intended the term "user experience" to be applied only
to the affective aspects of usage. A review of his earlier work suggests that
the term "user experience" was used to signal a shift to include affective
factors, along with the pre-requisite behavioral concerns, which had been
traditionally considered in the field. Many usability practitioners continue
to research and attend to affective factors associated with end-users, and
have been doing so for years, long before the term "user experience" was
introduced in the mid-1990s.

\--- end quote ---

What's that shiny new buzzword you are talking about?

~~~
Silhouette
_What 's that shiny new buzzword you are talking about?_

Just to be clear, it's not the term "user experience" itself that I object to,
so much as people making artificial distinctions between UI and UX. Using UX
instead of UI to try to sound more qualified or authoritative most certainly
does qualify as a buzzword, and it most certainly is a relatively recent and
IMNSHO undesirable trend. I have never seen an expert of the standing of Don
Norman claiming that UI is limited to no more than design or aesthetics, as
the comment I replied to claimed.

------
jitl
To me this site seems like it was slapped together at minimum cost pull
eyeballs and place ads.

This would be a cool idea if it was executed with passion and expertise.

~~~
RickS
Agreed. Less thorough and more informal, but you might like
[http://littlebigdetails.com/](http://littlebigdetails.com/)

------
hennsen
Really good UX is when i can still use a website even after activating all bad
content filters with firefox Klar. This site ain‘t one of those...

How much JS and whatever shit in background-loading do they need to tell me
whats good UX???

~~~
alexvoda
For those wondering, Firefox Klar is the name of Firefox Focus in German
speaking countries.

~~~
hennsen
Thanks, i wasn’t aware of the name being different in different markets (
which somehow sounds reasonable and then again makes international
communication complicated)

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mhd
So, 90% of those seem to be about making it easier for the web site to sell me
stuff. Didn't we talk about how the Mac menu has invisible triangles for
submenus, or pie menus or stuff like that instead of sales workflows?

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unabst
A good UX would be one where the UI is invisible. So the bullet points would
and should be about the elements that don't exist -- that are invisible. This
makes "Really Good UX" an oxymoron of sorts, because the focus is on what
doesn't exist.

Seems most of these are "Really Good Ways To X" where X is capture emails,
retain those who want to leave, gather information at the expense of user
attention, etc.

This, by definition, is bad UX, but good product design.

This dilemma is unavoidable. But it still should be made clear. Maybe not to
users, but between designers.

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jdhn
For a site that claims to laud "really good UX", their own UX leaves a bit to
be desired. If you go into a category page, there's no navbar or breadcrumb
that can help the user identify where they are in the site hierarchy.

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majewsky
Poe's law in action.

~~~
kmill
It's amazing: it is almost impossible to tell whether this is satire. I almost
thought [https://www.reallygoodux.io/about](https://www.reallygoodux.io/about)
clinched it, because the "Submit" button had scrollbars in Chrome, but, alas,
Firefox renders it without them.

In the final analysis, I find it hard to believe appcues.com would do such
subtle satire.

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hahamrfunnyguy
I like the idea, but the content is difficult to read. The photos are really
small and I can't see the elements being described.

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IlPeach
LOL this website should be featured on datkpatterns.org

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Bromskloss
> A look inside your favorite products

…which have been selected for you.

