Branding Crimes: 4. The Start-Button

You must be a Mac user

I personally think that if the taskbar was on the top, instead of the bottom, that it would distract from the program I am using.

I don’t spend all my time on the desktop, I spend it using a program. So by having it down away from where my eyes naturally look (the top left), it’s better. My eyes are left to focus on the program and its features, not the operating systems…

And technically, when I click the Start menu, it is towards the top left because of the size of the menu (there’s maybe 200 pixels from the top of the screen to the top of the menu).

This is all about familiarity, not about good design. Then again, I am free to move the taskbar to the top of the screen (or left or right) if I’m so inclined, and that’s the important thing to note here.

Agreed.

Microsoft also killed the function potential of pull down menus by originally defaulting to only 9 items (single digit count), which is still a limit in many resources.

And why can’t we resize on demand so we can read the entire contents?

Regardless, the information in a pull down menu also doesn’t print out. Repurposing the invisible list, and writing documentation for all the invisible options, is a nightmare.

But, it looks clean in a magazine snapshot review, where the reader is not actually using anything, so Microsoft gets good reviews and makes sales.

Consider professional chefs: do they have all their cooking tools hidden in drawers, or out on full-time display on hooks all around the stove?

Hey, I’m a tool guy. I think tools - well-designed tools - look great, and I like having them in view. I suppose some people like having options they are not using out of sight, “uncluttered”.

Perhaps someone could enhance the resources to offer a display setting option to permit scrolling and hiding choices from view for the “unclutter me” folks, versus always having all choices on screen at the same time for us “I want my tools right at hand” folk.

Well, I absolutely agree with you on the task bar/push-up issue. You do know you can move the task bar to where you want it, right? A couple of years ago I accidentally moved my task bar to the top; it has stayed there ever since.

On a Mac you also have to use a navigational element which is by default a the bottom of the screen — the Dock. Also the Dock by default doesn’t hide automatically, so it is just as annoying as the Windows start menu because both use valuable screen estate. On both Mac and Windows the user interface is in its default status not the best solution.

However, the Dock in Mac OS provides a better user experiece, as it allows you to easily select some apps you use on a regular basis. Windows in contrast seems to be guided by some UI principles I don’t get or — as you said — is simply guided by branding guidelines instead of UI wisdom.

My point is: Maybe we should rethink the GUI of a computer system entirely. Thinking about the position of GUI elements is only the first step…

I’ve had my Task Bar on Windows pegged to the top instead of the bottom for a long time now. I just like it better up there (and that’s before getting a TiBook to run OS X.)

As far as having the bar at the top be a distraction… that’s where using two monitors comes into play. I tend to put one monitor right in front of me, and the other (often a laptop) to the left, put the Task Bar on the left screen, and work primarily off the centered one.

You really think the dock provides a better user experience? I hate that it mixes the idea of an application kicker (to use a KDE term) and a taskbar, plus it consumes far more space than is strictly necessary when autohide is off.

If it does one thing right, it makes finding an application and opening it trivial, but that’s more icon design–silhouettes and colors of OS X icons are very diverse, making it easy to pick out individual applications–than the dock specifically.

I stick with the dock because the replacements for it suck more than it does.

yes. taskbar at the top of the screen. now i like that!

Another good post Oliver! I’m really looking forward to that book of yours. Interesting point about how Microsoft has been trapped into designing what people know (Start bottom left / clock bottom right) rather than what makes sense from a design POV. You can, as previous commenters point out, just move it - which I’m going to try to see if it makes an actual difference to me as a user.

Incidentally, I’ve been using the Start button less and less - there’s so much on my PC that it’s not really useful to have a hierachical tree showing it all. I’ve been using Launchy, which is basically like the Google search box but for the PC - hit a hotkey, up it comes, I type in what I want (Word, Excel, letter to dave.doc) and it’s loaded. I put a post up on my work blog about it, here: http://tinyurl.com/2gw7qb

I don’t spend all my time on the desktop, I spend it using a program. So by having it down away from where my eyes naturally look (the top left), it’s better. My eyes are left to focus on the program and its features, not the operating systems.

I think is probably why Apple has made the menubar transparent in the Leopard along with giving the active window a deeper drop-shadow.

I know, I know …too few people mess with default settings. Maybe I should get a banner for my blog saying ‘My task bar is on top; where is yours?’

The REAL crime in the “Start” button is that Microsoft insisted on LEAVING IT THERE IN WINDOWS MOBILE … OMG

Hum… humans actually look down instinctively, not up. It’s an avoiding predators/watching where you put your feet thing/perspective. Walk down the street — how many people do you see looking up, not down? Looking down is actually the normal state for a person, and looking up requires conscious effort. Just observe yourself, and you’ll almost certainly see it.

The same that is true for the whole visual field is also true for media that we’re looking at. Place objects of equal size at the top and bottom of a screen or piece of paper, and the one at the top will be perceived to be larger.

It’s important to make the distinction between instinct and habit. I’m guessing that all these countless studies mentioned above are actually testing people’s habits when put in front of a web page or similar — that’s a very different thing, and just because something has become a habit, doesn’t make it easier or better for a person than the alternatives.

As a people, we very easily get stuck in habits (top left!), and then believe those habits to be the ‘natural’ or ‘right’ thing. Often it takes just one brave individual or company (Apple and their great products re-branding, for example?) to show people how wrong they are. Of course, it’s not hard to see how the top left habit on the web developed (it’s what the software could support), but I imagine in a few years they’ll be laughing at us for it!

Having said all that, I’m not disagreeing that a pull up menu is a stupid idea. However, you can actually put the Windows taskbar wherever you want (at least in XP, not tired Vista). Just unlock it and drag it to whichever edge you want it on. Doh.

Nice to know that with Microsoft, you’re always starting over.

Start. Start. Start.

Hi Rob,

You have some interesting points. You’re correct about the instinctual reaction to look-down - you just have to spend some time on a Japanese train to realize that. What we mean is actually something more like a cultural instinct, specific to Westerners, and in certain situations (using Windows is very different to walking).

Present any English speaker (and a lot of other Europeans) with something they have to scan (a newspaper, a website, an operating system) and the natural starting point is the top left.

Of course this is a habit - something we form when we learn to read. Japanese and Chinese form a different habit (top right, read vertically), and Arabians different again (right to left).

The unique thing about this “habit” however is that it’s totally ingrained in the culture - so much so that people often don’t even know there are alternatives. It’s also extremely difficult to unlearn, with no motivation to do so.

Being able to move the task bar is also fine, but leaving it up to individuals to know what is best for them is not what a good software company should be doing, and if a user can make significant improvements to the interface by moving some stuff around then the defaults just aren’t good enough.

Years of forcefull training are making me look in the bottom left corner, that’s habit, should they change it now I would need re-training myself.

I completely agree that it’s a matter of branding were mac is top left pull down, and microsoft is now stuck with bottom left push up “start” button.

this might interest you: The New York Times open their archives: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/18/business/media/18times.html?ex=1347768000&en=880b1ab05717fa9d&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

As a percentage how often is the task bar/start menu used? A fairly small amount of the time I would think. So why would you put something that isn’t used that much in the top left corner?

Most of my time people are using an application (Web Browser, Email, etc), so wouldn’t they want to see the app’s menu and toolbar?

In MacOS X the bar at the top works fine because it also contains the menu options for the application I’m using.

But I think as screens get bigger that having the bar on the top of the screen is going to be a problem. On my 30″ screen I rarely have applications maximized, in Windows the menu is attached to the application, but in MacOS X it isn’t and when the apps aren’t maximized you have to think about which app the menu relates to.

On a 30″ screen I no longer start by looking at the top left of the screen, I instead look to the top left of the application window, and in Windows I find exactly what I want a menu and a toolbar, in MacOS X I have to go look in a different location for the menu.

As is normally the case there are multiple pros & cons to each design, and it is more about finding a good balance rather than perfecting one particular feature, especially when it isn’t used that often anyway. I believe as screen size grows that neither MacOS X nor Windows design in this area is great, but I think that Windows has some distinct advantages.

To be honest, a low level user will not even be bothered where is the Start button placed. A power user will NEVER click on start. There is a key on the keyboard (the magical Win key) that you quickly press with a pinky, and Start menu pops up with most used applications being on top of it - therefore, you put most used apps exactly where it is logical - top left, or on big screens, mid left.

Also, as i work on Mac and Windows (about 40/60 in favor for Windows), i must say that taskbar on the bottom makes much more sense, and it is far more usable, than one on the top.

Yes, i see you have some points in this article, but i think you missed the main point > who is using the software?

I tried putting the taskbar at the top of the screen (so that the start button was top left). Strange - I agree that the flow of information seemed more natural, but opening a program resulted in some visual confusion between the bar and the file menu and icons. My eye kept getting pulled upwards.

@Rob Chant - the behaviour is ‘instinctual’ because we read from top left, across then down. We learn to do this in early childhood.

The real crime is turning the machine off by pressing the start button.

I tried putting the taskbar at the top of the screen (so that the start button was top left). Strange - I agree that the flow of information seemed more natural, but opening a program resulted in some visual confusion between the bar and the file menu and icons. My eye kept getting pulled upwards. (http://img234.imageshack.us/my.php?image=tbartopyf9.png)

@Rob Chant - the behaviour is ‘instinctual’ because we read from top left, across then down. We learn to do this in early childhood.

The real crime is turning the machine off by pressing the start button.

START or not to START - for me, it’s a shame, because the freakin button only appears minutes after my start. I personally believe, start is a false methaphore. Maybe start is right for windows starter users, but to be honsest, our kids are learning at school about the alt-tab shortcut or even, just click on the icon and the neccesary allpication launches, so what the hell is the start button for?

Better it should be named: configurator, or something else. because I need it more or less just to configure something. I also see the alt-tab at colleagues using a mac - I would like to have a mac

And by the way, I also see people starting their machine in the morning, STARTing (launching) one application, for the whole day! So what do they need a START button for?

Consistency is valuable sometimes no? And yes I know Oscar Wilde said that “consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative”, but perhaps we should not be assuming that the user is imaginative and open to new ways of doing things.

I think the argument is a bit flawed and not really very interesting. Anyone who knows a bit about the Windows OS knows that you can place the taskbar wherever you like. On my new wide-screen laptop (with Windows Vista), I have placed my (widened) taskbar on the left side of the screen, which means the Start-button (or Vista logo-button if you like to call it that) is in the upper left corner. Problem solved. Right?

Am not really a big Microsoft fan and definitely not an Apple fan (if possible, I think Apple is even more evil than Microsoft!). But let us not create problems where there are none. Windows works and I am sure OS X does too. More or less.

It would be nice if the program menu would launch if you clicked anywhere on the desktop where there isn’t an icon.

I like having the Ubuntu taskbar on top. Our eyes tend to start top-left so it’s more convenient for me to open menu items from the top left. Thanks for the post.

A slightly computer illiterate person I know once asked me why you would use the ‘Start’ button when you’ve finished using your computer and want to shut it down. Fair point I think.