Two cranky, one nice

[sorcyress]

I have a cold or allergies or something and it is making me cranky.

(I don't normally have allergies, but because I did so much cleaning on Saturday, I did stir up a fair chunk of dust. So like...maybe that's some of the problem? I did take a covid test Sunmorn, I should probably take another one in a day or two. Wastewater data is pretty low right now, so I'd be surprised if it was covid (I am still masking everywhere as per usual))

But yeah, my nose is either congested or runny, which is very annoying. Probably one of the solutions is to drink more water, sigh. My current main water bottle is full of flowers from the brunch last weekend. Which is very nice, but probably I should've gotten a vase in the first place.

Sidebar: I have seen the writing on the wall and begun writing on the new/current version of 750words, as the old version becomes increasingly deprecated and buggy. I hate it, so much, because interacting with things that are different is Wrong And Bad and also I am unthrilled with how excited Buster is about the concept of using AI as a cool assistant who will give you lovely reports about your writing. Honestly gross, if I want to go through my writing and see how things are different, I am perfectly happy to just literally do that. I do not need robots to tell me how to feel about the changes that have happened or to find the patterns that are occurring. Anyways, there's a nonzero chance I might abandon the site entirely and just start tracking my writing in .txt files on my laptop, which would be annoying in different ways.

Anyways, all this most recent complaint is because apparently the new site does not respond to ctrl-z. What, I say as heartily as I possibly can, the fuck. Like I know some of my crankiness is just your classic neurospice "things are different [and that's bad]" but I'm going to legitimately flag this as a Poor UX Choice.

At least he did make it so that you could type in plaintext instead of horrible automatic markdown bullshit that thinks it knows what you mean when you type *emphasis* _like this_ and quite probably thinks those two things are the _same fucking thing_ which I assure you they are *not*. Also, both of them are different from italicising or bolding, those are additional *different* forms of emphasis. The fastest way to make me stop using a website is to assume you know how I wanted to say the things I said.

(It's a fun game to take a chunk of text that has auto-formatted, like in Discord, and to attempt to put back in the proper emphatic markers. The best part is that I am frequently --I'd say between two-thirds and seventy-five percent-- correct if I later go through and edit in a way that shows me the original. No one else can probably tell the way my voice is supposed to be, but I usually can, and I like that fact about myself.)

Everything in the world is cranky because it is the end of the school year and I am burnt out, and I'm not actually a fan of this way of being. So how about this: There are these flowers that grow in big weird purple balls and they're extremely keen. Aliums, I think? Anyways, I've been seeing those pretty frequently out and about in the world and I like them quite a bit.

(it is a well established fact that I like things that are round, known also as "the strongest I've ever been fuckored". I also like flowers and bright colours! So these are very good. I will try and take a picture sometime soon.)

Okay, I am in the library for extra math help (and I have a kiddo! even if it's not my kiddos who I was expecting but some strange lovely kiddo from another class, that's still quite good!) and while I'm not actively helping kids, I am either going to play Balatro or try and work on the Endless Email Project. Wish me luck, it's been a while!

~Sor
MOOP!

Comments

[squirrelitude]

Yeah! I think those are called "globe onions" or just "ornamental onions". They look like fireworks to me. :-)

[canyonwalker]

I understand your frustration when a website is "enhanced" with new features but they actually break elements of the UI/UX that many users depend on. I'm reminded of that every time Yahoo rolls out an update to a information tracking web page I've been using for 30 years. Many of the improvements, I've liked. But one thing the designers seem never to understand is that a critical thing for me is how many lines of the table (it's a tabular format) fit on one screen. Add fancy new widgets? Those almost invariably make each row taller, which means fewer rows fit on the screen, which means the table is that much less useful.

[sorcyress]

It is my most curmudgeonly opinion that "The Internet Was Better When I Was A Teenager" and I am constantly having to try and filter through my experiences to balance "okay, but is that just the rose-coloured glasses of nostalgia or was it actually better".

Your table example makes me wonder if it's meant to be viewed on increasingly big monitors, but that's probably giving them too much credit. There's a maximum size a laptop can be and still be usable, to say nothing about the prioritization of mobile/tablet web infrastructure.

~Sor

[canyonwalker]

I'm going beyond the curmudgeonly notion of "Everything was better 20-30 years ago" to identify the broad truth of why changes to software like a web portal or writing tool piss off us long-time users.

That portal I started using in 1995 was ground breaking at the time but was also totally bare-bones. I'd never want to turn back to the clock on it to 1995, or even 2005. It's gotten better in a lot of ways since then. But one aspect of its tabular format that appeals to me is its compact structure. Designers in their zeal to "Make it look prettier" and "Add more features and choices for customization" overlook this simple reason why customers like me have continued using this portal for 30 years even now that there are countless competitors out there.

That's my broader point-- that designers often lose sight of the simple reasons that a loyal base of long-time users has stuck with the product.

[jducoeur]

Anyways, all this most recent complaint is because apparently the new site does not respond to ctrl-z. What, I say as heartily as I possibly can, the fuck. Like I know some of my crankiness is just your classic neurospice "things are different [and that's bad]" but I'm going to legitimately flag this as a Poor UX Choice.

Wow, yeah -- that qualifies as a pure WTF. I mean, at this point that qualifies as failing to even fit the rest of the world's table stakes, since that feature is well-nigh universal. Any chance that the site is just immature and hasn't gotten around to implementing it yet?

It's a fun game to take a chunk of text that has auto-formatted, like in Discord, and to attempt to put back in the proper emphatic markers. The best part is that I am frequently --I'd say between two-thirds and seventy-five percent-- correct if I later go through and edit in a way that shows me the original.

Some years back, I actually coded up how to do this automatically for DW (maybe even LJ -- I forget how long ago it was), so that I could cross-post from here to Facebook. It's surprisingly tricky to do correctly, but was an interesting exercise.