There were three prompts

This may be an indication of my short-attention span, but placeholder text used as the label has been bugging me for a while, and it seems to be getting more popular. I use it on the web version of this blog; the Search function in the top right uses a placeholder, though if you’re using Internet Explorer you won’t see anything unless it’s IE10. And if you’re using Firefox then older versions will result in the text clearing on focus, unlike Chrome (and presumably other WebKit browsers) where it only clears on user input.

Imagine however that all browsers implement HTML in a consistent manner and that there’s some placeholder text identifying the input that’s been designed to disappear on the text box receiving focus. Or imagine I’d used jQuery. For a single input field it’s a fair solution but for more than one it doesn’t work; I’ve found it niggling for something as simple as the usual three prompts (email, name and website) before adding a comment.

Proponents will point out the snapshot is unfair. In real life I’d be entering this information together; I’d know what I’d just clicked on. This might be true for some, it depends on the point at which your focus moves to the next field; is it before or after you click? For me it’s ‘after’, or would be if I used the mouse (or similar) to navigate the input. However, I use the keyboard and, I suspect like most who do, my focus doesn’t move until I tab away; hence my attention would only move to the next input field after it had already received focus, and lost its identifying label. Therefore if there is placeholder text it shouldn't clear until the input has content, though I'd question whether user content is an adequate identifier.

Materialistic wobbles

On Tuesday I caved. In the week in which the world updates their iPhone, I upgraded my Nokia... to another Nokia. This is my first smartphone and I chose not to follow the herd, or even the Android herd that copies follows it; at least that’s what I tell myself. From a distance I genuinely prefer Windows Phone to those two big hitters; so what if Microsoft supposedly makes more money from wielding its mighty patent sword at Android than it does from its own operating system - it has originality to commend it. But comparisons are unwise since the closest I’ve come to a Jesus phone is a three year old iPod Touch, though I did once hold a Samsung Galaxy Nexus.

Could this be a case of blissful ignorance? It matters not, as the main reason for my conversion was a £7.50/month tariff, cheaper than what I had been paying; this isn’t a materialistic wobble after all. It’s not an iPhone or top-of-the-range anything; it's more a bottom-of-the-range something that still manages to drag me into the modern world. I’m not sure whether this is a good or a bad thing. I suspect bad. I suspect I'll forgive myself. And reading of the misfortunes riddled in Apple Maps I confess to a certain schadenfreude since the pre-installed Nokia Maps on my Lumia knows exactly where I am - in my bedroom - useful that.

It’s broken because we designed it that way

Scott Hanselman’s recent post, on a week of annoyances caused by troublesome software, was entertaining because we’ve all been there. Thankfully it managed not to indulge (or at least I could stomach) the allusions to a lack of “passion” and “craft” and the comments were mostly sane, albeit I didn’t necessarily agree. I must confess to occasional astonishment at how much does work, not only in the world of IT but the world in general; yet we can do better, and if we didn’t think so then what’s the point?

It doesn’t have quite the same impact, but many of his gripes would be more accurately described as “less than perfect” rather than “broken” and it strikes me - in development, now more than ever - that “less than perfect” is not only allowed, it’s actively encouraged - I’m thinking of “release early, release often”. For example, I like Agile - since customer requirements will evolve it’s helpful to have an adaptive method that anticipates this - but it comes with an understanding that what’s initially released isn’t the finished article. Ironically the separation of concerns afforded by such patterns as MVC and MVVM not only enable this, but necessarily come with additional code you’d expect with any abstraction.

One can argue the difference between internal and external releases, and there is a balance, but if we don’t release early then any perceived advantage from user feedback becomes moot. The point here is that “less than perfect” is something we accept, as quicker and better is expected in the long term. The business challenge is to ensure as much effort is extended to the updates as the early release - which in turn requires challenging (or should that be refining?) an “if it ain’t broke” mentality.

A further confession: I’m not particularly understanding when “less than perfect” hits me; though yesterday’s example was a bug. In creating an online account to manage my Barclays mobile phone insurance I discovered the password format validation was different to that on logging in; the latter was strictly alphanumeric, the former allowed for what would have been more secure. Thus the telephone call I’d hoped to avoid by creating said account became inevitable; not that I could explain the problem to the person on the other end.

London in 2012, not London 2012

Think of this as a bump... with pictures.

Amazon’s square peg, round hole

This post is hardly cutting edge; a search shows people asking the same question as my mother, only three months ago. Not quite the same, my Mum’s phone call said she couldn’t find the option to switch off the radio on her Kindle; it wasn’t until after we’d hung up, having agreed to her stopping by after church because I had no idea, that I realised she meant wireless. And indeed this wasn’t a case of her forgetting how, or having lost the hand-written instructions she makes for every device, be it DVD player, iPod or this, her latest device. The wireless on/off option had disappeared. It wasn’t on the main menu, nor had it moved to the settings sub-menu.

Only of course it had. If I’d looked more closely at the blurb under ‘Airplane Mode’, which I’d briefly registered as not having seen before, or if I’d even given some thought as to what ‘Airplane Mode’ might be, I’d have realised this was the wireless option, relocated and renamed and with the on/off options therefore reversed. Presumably done with the noble intention of consistency with other products, the iPhone for example, that’s still a crap user experience.

An iPhone has several functions transmitting a signal and ironically, depending on the aircraft operator, since ‘Airplane Mode’ isn’t standard, it allows you to re-enable the Wi-Fi independently. So if Amazon is determined in its effort to be consistent, to a term that isn’t, it needs a specific option for switching the Wi-Fi on/off, in addition to its ‘Airplane Mode’ - which on my mother’s Kindle can only switch the Wi-Fi off/on. Or perhaps Amazon should concentrate on applying patterns where they fit.

Understood by all and with value to none

The closing ceremony of the London 2012 Olympics was what I’d feared of the opening ceremony. An antithesis of that glorious spectacle it was a mess of ideas, a shambles, a ‘history of British music’ degraded to a party or some such excuse. Early on we were treated to an extended montage of athletes crying, and with subtlety suitably bludgeoned it was on with the show.

And what a show; the stage imaginatively made up in the style of the union flag, the athletes were kettled within and encircled by several billboard trucks driven to the tune of David Bowie’s Fashion. From each truck emerged the fashion supermodel pictured who then, to prove his or her versatility, walked to the centre of the stage and posed fashionably. Some marvelled, some wondered. It was this sense of the unknown, this crazy sense of danger that kept me watching; here, some supermodels standing upright; there, a middle-aged pop group aboard a flatbed, none of whom wore seatbelts, one of whom, the saxophone player, dangled from a wire; it was madness.

Or was the highlight Liam Gallagher and his new band, whose ‘new arrangement’ of an old Oasis ‘classic’ amounted to singing out of tune? Not a problem with recorded slots, of which there were several including the aforementioned Bowie, and of course John Lennon whose challenging contribution - “Imagine there's no countries, it isn't hard to do” - caused the more enlightened athletes to vanish in a puff of logic.

Not to be outdone, George Michael - who was able to attend - in a paean to the great days of Top of The Pops, mimed to a recording of his new song. It’s an outrage, suggested various commentators afterwards, to use the occasion to plug your latest single, and who presumably thought the Spice Girls and The Who had appeared for philanthropic reasons. There were lights, there were fireworks, an emotional time was had by all. I’d liked Michael’s performance, preferable anyway to the adoration inexplicably given to five wannabe pop stars screeching “spice up your life”, which was my daughter’s favourite moment; my daughter is ten.

Medalling

The party is almost over and as befits two weeks of almost non-stop entertainment, I am due an almighty hangover. I’ve enjoyed the Olympics so much that a verbing medal no longer perturbs; though a podium probably would; small steps and all that. So good, I couldn’t manage the upset required at Aiden Burley’s asinine comments on multiculturalism during the opening ceremony, nor the daft notion that ‘super Saturday’ - a day on which Team GB won six gold medals - somehow proved the Conservative MP wrong. He was wrong, but the ‘proof’ was equally silly.

So many sports, some of which I was only barely aware, yet sensible to this: whilst it has been fun, I am no more motivated to get on my bike, take up running, dive back into the pool or punch or kick someone for sport; at least, no more inclined than I was before all this started. Many I know, will be; some of whom may medal in the future. You see, I am trying.