Recently Google is pushing the new themes all across the products for a unified look and feel. The new UI is more AJAX-ed and provides streamed flow of the content.
But with this there is a lot of UI real estate being wasted on my 15" wide-screen laptop, for controls which I would be using once in a lifetime during my use of the site (or web-app).
Consider the following screenshot of Google Groups new UI:
Only in the area marked by the red rectangle I have got a little scrollable space for the looking through discussions. A lot of space is is just wasted as:
1. The black navigation bar which could have been mouse hover only. This is present in all Google sites and I hardly use it anytime.
2. The Google logo, search text bar and Google+ buttons. While reading the discussions I wouldn't be using this all time. Why did they just made it fixed on the screen?
3. Group name, topics unread, my membership status and other buttons. Would I really be changing these with with every post I read?
And after passing so many hurdles I actually go the content I want to read.
Similar is the case with other Google products, see below for some screenshots:
Obviously with new features UI goes complex but with the UI which distracts from the actual content is just unacceptable. HTML / CSS / Javascript provide a lot of options for UI which can be employed to make the interface a lot cozier.
But with this there is a lot of UI real estate being wasted on my 15" wide-screen laptop, for controls which I would be using once in a lifetime during my use of the site (or web-app).
Consider the following screenshot of Google Groups new UI:
Only in the area marked by the red rectangle I have got a little scrollable space for the looking through discussions. A lot of space is is just wasted as:
1. The black navigation bar which could have been mouse hover only. This is present in all Google sites and I hardly use it anytime.
2. The Google logo, search text bar and Google+ buttons. While reading the discussions I wouldn't be using this all time. Why did they just made it fixed on the screen?
3. Group name, topics unread, my membership status and other buttons. Would I really be changing these with with every post I read?
And after passing so many hurdles I actually go the content I want to read.
Similar is the case with other Google products, see below for some screenshots:
 |
| Google Books |
 |
| Google Reader |
 | ||
| Google Plus (like anyone cares) |
 | ||
| Google Viewer |
 |
| Google Maps |
Obviously with new features UI goes complex but with the UI which distracts from the actual content is just unacceptable. HTML / CSS / Javascript provide a lot of options for UI which can be employed to make the interface a lot cozier.
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