iTunes 10
 

Hey all

iTunes 10 sounds like it's not going to be that good. All I've heard is they're going to add a music-based social network. Why don't they do some work on Carbon/Cocoa instead?

What's your opinion?

I like Ping so far, but the UI has taken a weird turn for the worse... And yeah, they need to move to Cocoa...

PS -- If you don't like the new color scheme, we're telling Apple all about it right here.

The search bar on the devices is gone. Now when trying to sync apps with my iPad and iPhone, instead of typing the first few letters, I have to manually scroll through the list and find the app I want. That alone makes me want to downgrade to iTunes 9.

Blargh, I just hate that new icon. Trying to change it doesn't work either.

(BTW, my Ping profile if anyone's on it too: http://c.itunes.apple.com/WebObjects...erId=143477364)

I'm hatin' it. Let me use iTunes 9 in peace, please.

I'm pretty sure the reason it's not fully Cocoa yet has to do with the Windows compatibility. QuickTime X may need to be ported as a prerequisite.

Thumbs down on many of the UI changes, but thumbs up on the performance; especially the sync seems to be faster. I'll give Ping a try with the invite-only safeguards in place and see if it's fun.

Hints are starting to come in about changing some of the UI settings back; I imagine we'll see more of those.

Yep. The traffic lights and grey-outs are totally against the HIGs!

Totally against the HIGs, but I like the look anyway.

This is not directed at Renault or chabig because similar sentiments have abounded in the few hours since iTunes 10 was released, but I don't believe the Human Interface Guidelines say anything about the Close, Minimize and Maximize buttons always being oriented horizontally. In fact, the HIG has specific suggestions for instances when recommended practices are not being used, and nothing about those buttons contradicts the guidelines for such exceptions.

And while some might question the efficacy of the buttons being vertically oriented for a smaller Toolbar, Apple has made a change that A) is not new since it has long been present in the iTunes mini player, and B) uses visual elements which enable the user to recognize and immediately understand how to interact with the new default layout.

Every button-criticizing comment I have seen fails to recognize this last point. There is no problem with a developer choosing non-standard approaches to an interface, as long as users can easily comprehend how to utilize the divergent elements. Put another way, there's a reason they are called Human Interface Guidelines, not Human Interface Requirements.

While some may not like the vertical layout of the buttons, nothing about their visual design or orientation inhibits usability. Did anyone who has used a Mac for more than 10 minutes open iTunes 10 for the first time and say, "What do those buttons do?"

On a certain level, I typically appreciate how Apple users can obsess about what others might call minutiae. The new icon for iTunes would be an example of this, whether or not I agree with the take of most people. The outcry over these buttons, though, is nothing more than a tempest in a teapot.

Still, it looks so unfamiliar to me. Whatever happened to Aqua? No, no, we had to make it oh-so-different. Sorry if you're on the other team, but I despise the new list view and the grayed-out icons. Still, at least we can straighten out the traffic lights using a Unix hack, perhaps for Montréal people. :)

Most of the complaints about the look of iTunes 10 of little or nothing to do with the orientation of the buttons. It mostly has to do with the lack of color in the icons now. They're hard to look at, and hard to distinguish.

Does Apple have to do things a certain way. Certainly not, they are, after all, guidelines. But I also don't have to like it. And especially when it's a readability issue, I don't mind raising a complaint.

That being said, there are several viable solutions that have been offered on the thread I mentioned earlier. So... that's a good thing.

I am SO using that defaults hack. My brother decided to install i10, despite what I told him. Now I'm officially mad.

I don't have a credit card, so I can't use iTunes' Ping. Grrrrr………

Note I made no comment about the color change, just the toolbar buttons which many have also complained about. While my initial reaction to the lack of colors is not positive, I have noted the icon-focused workarounds which have been proffered and saved the necessary files should I wish to revert to the previous look.

Generally, however, the comments here and elsewhere have shown thoughtlessness — by saying things defy the HIG as if they're immutable rules — and have demonstrated an attitude that change is simply bad. Personally, I prefer to give changes of this sort an adjustment period before rendering a judgment. Maybe in a week or two I'll see strengths in the new design, or maybe I'll see shortcomings worthy of UI reversion.

For now, though, I think it's a bit hasty for anyone to render much judgment. UI changes after years of a certain look are likely to initially seem jarring, and we have had less than 24 hours to familiarize ourselves with this new approach.

That said, I think many folks are either hasty in needing to judge immediately or are simply disingenuous in their criticisms. For example, the commenter in the linked Apple Discussions thread who claimed the new orientation of the "buttons [is] really confusing" doesn't seem to be serious. Did that person not know where to put the mouse? Was s/he unable to determine what clicking any of those buttons would do? Is there something else?

There is a frequent rush to judge things without ample time for observation, inspection and acclimation. This extends well beyond technology, but I find it a generally unwise and inherently crippling behavior. And while that's more of a sociological issue than anything else, there are times I choose to point out the shortcomings of people publicly averring their gut reactions as if they are factually based truths.

People saying things like Renault said — again, that's only using his words as an example and not a personal criticism of him — that the buttons "are totally against the HIGs," are simply conjuring reasons that the buttons are bad design. Opinions, however hastily reached, are one thing. Made-up facts are another, and I don't see any pitfalls to pointing them out as such. As far as I'm concerned, it's basically the same as informing someone who thinks the first troubleshooting step should always be to repair permissions. That's fine as an opinion, but it's factually baseless.

I understand where you stand on this. The HIG are guidelines, but following them closely makes it better.

I'd like to join Ping, but I don't have a credit card.

To be honest, I can't stand the grayscale. Not saying it's Mac-like, but it just scares me. "The Death of Aqua" -- muddying the waters?

Something has been around a bit longer. The modal problems of the pref and info boxes really are an annoying issue.

Hey, what if the Dock icon changed to reflect the current track's artwork?

This would actually be further afield of the HIG. Apple's recommendations for using the Dock for any type of information notifications are to 1) use a small badge, like is done with unread Mail messages, or 2) bounce an application's Dock icon (invoke the Notification Manager) "to convey more serious information, such as error conditions."

As general rules for notifications, Apple suggests consistency within an application ("Do icons mean the same thing every time they are used?"), consistency within past versions of an application, and consistency with user expectations ("Does it meet the needs of the user without extraneous features? Does it conform to the user’s mental model?").

That said, at least one third-party application offers th feature of the iTunes Dock icon indicating the currently playing album, CoverSutra. There may be others.

Well, I like the look and ping to follow my favourite music and star.

True, true. I'd just kind of like it, with the iTunes icon in the corner of the dock tile.

Oddly enough, it's missing the one thing I really expected to see: the ability to browse, view and purchase books from the iBookstore.

I wonder if there is a new iLife application in the works for that...

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Sounds like I’ll be sticking with iTunes 9 for a while.
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Despite the questionable UI decisions, the performance of iTunes is markedly improved in my experience. I have a large music library stored on an external drive and run 10.6 on 4-year-old hardware, and I've definitely noticed better performance. iPhone backups, which are not that important to me since I do them so infrequently, are also significantly faster.

If the performance enhancements are something you'd benefit from having, I'd say it's worth considering the upgrade. Personally, for all the time I have iTunes running, I actually look at it very little, so the gains in application behavior outweigh the questionable UI changes.

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Now that’s interesting!
Does anyone have information on how iTunes 10 is with Flac? I prefer this lossless format over Apple’s own, and use Fluke for importing into iTunes. (Flac is not natively supported in iTunes.)

For me the dealmaker or dealbreaker is Flac performance.
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I haven't noticed any performance biz, honestly. I got 1.9 days of music and it feels the same. Hey, we should have a music contest… whoever has the longest music wins. :)

Is this the longest song title ever?

"The Black Hawk War, or, How to Demolish an Entire Civilization and Still Feel Good About Yourself in the Morning, or, We Apologize for the Inconvenience but You're Going to Have to Leave Now, or, 'I Have Fought the Big Knives and Will Continue to Fight Them Until They Are Off Our Lands!'"

From Sufjan Stevens "Illinoise".

I made the mistake of using the "Auto Size all columns" option in iTunes.

The longest title must be "Mother in Law" or "Eternity" :D

I've kept iTunes 9 on the iMac (despite the protests of software-update); not much difference. UI is more tolerable and colourful; it's only a little bit slower than iTunes 10 on the MBP. Mind you, the MBP is a faster machine anyway.

I took the plunge and installed v10. Performance wise on my iMac I haven't noticed much difference. I've pretty much adjusted to the new icons. The only change I don't like is I'm pretty sure I used to be able to right-click an image in cover flow and select "Get Album Artwork" from a pop up menu. Now I have to select the tracks in the list view below the covers and select the option from there or from the advanced menu which is even more painful because my iTunes is on a second monitor.

At least you can get artwork from iTunes directly. I had to install some third-party freeware to get my artwork and lyrics.

Yeah it's great when it works, frustrating when it doesn't. Like when it pulls the wrong artwork, or you have to rename an album to get it to match up. I wish there was a search or browse option for the artwork for those occasions when things don't go to plan.

iTunes Artwork Assistant searches Google Images for artwork, presents you with choice so you can install it. More flexibility

I just upgraded to iTunes 9 about two months ago, and was very happy with it. Apple forced me to get iTunes 10 in order to sync my new iPod Shuffle, and I'm really not happy about that. They should have made a downloadable module to support new iPods in iTunes 9. Anyway, here are some of my first impressions of 10 after one evening of use.

iTunes 10 feels faster on my PowerBook. I like that.

New grey icons: I love them.

New iTunes icon: Inevitable and smart move away from the CD image. I would have preferred green, or orange, but I like it better than the previous / original icon.

New look for the list field (font, anti-aliasing, checkboxes): Don't like it.

New treatment of the column headers: Very nice, I dig it.

"Plays" and "Skips" instead of "Play Count" and "Skip Count": Please revert back.

Ping and Genius: Never use them. Not sure if I ever will.

My biggest complaint, thus far, is that I can no longer drag to re-size the album artwork in the list field. That was probably my favorite feature in 9, and now it's gone! The three selectable sizes just don't work for me. Also, I liked pressing Command+G to show or hide artwork. That feature didn't need an additional button added next to the HUD.

Second biggest complaint: It requires 10.5, or later, which means that Tiger users must update their OS if they plan to buy and use a new iPod. That includes the 4th generation Shuffle. That requirement bothers me… a lot.

Why don't you want to update your OS? Leopard was released almost 4 1/2 years ago. Tiger is 6 1/2 years old!

Tiger runs faster on older hardware… like those ancient G4s.

I still keep a fully maintained Tiger partition on my PowerBook because its G4 processor can't handle certain apps when in Leopard.

I'll also say that being forced to find, then download, and then install a new version of iTunes, and trying to get used to its massive UI overhaul, all while trying to learn how to use a new iPod, is just too much to handle all at once.

Most people, as I understand it, just want to buy it, plug it in, sync some songs, and go. I'm pretty good with Macs, applications, and the like, and it took me longer than it should have to get a few songs onto my Shuffle, mostly because I had to mess around with installing and then exploring iTunes 10.

I don't like the modality of iTunes. You're locked into preferences and info. That's maybe the worst.