Google has rolled out a major Google Maps update for Android smartphones and tablets, which is also “coming soon” to iPhone and iPad. It introduces a new design that finally boasts a dedicated user interface for tablets, as well as enhanced navigation and new features.
In late April, Yahoo released a gorgeously designed new Weather app for iOS. Pretty much everyone loved the new Yahoo! Weather app, except for one thing: the purple logo.
“Officially the ugliest icon ever,” said one Twitter user in response to the app’s announcement. “Its icon isn’t home page worthy,” said another. Some used their available Twitter character counts to criticize the icon with even more ruthless efficiency: “That icon is ass.”
The icon was such a bust that less than a month later, Yahoo made the extraordinary move of replacing the logo with one that was even uglier. Despite this, the new mark was widely hailed as an improvement. Yet just last week, Yahoo updated its official Weather app again, and surprise! The original logo is back, with not a whiff of controversy.
Here’s why everyone hated the Yahoo! Weather app icon… and why Jony Ive and iOS 7 might have helped the design eventually get accepted by iPhone users at large.
Every time you turn on your MacBook, iPhone or iPad, an invisible force field starts pulsing out from it, made up entirely of complex patterns of magnetic and electric fields.
These fields can be visualized. And as it turns out, they make really cool looking light paintings.
If you lean more toward the creative side, web design is for you! Don’t be intimidated by code, design is a fun hobby that can turn into a fruitful side gig or lucrative career. With an abundance of sharp themes and templates, just about anyone can create a clean-looking site.
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What we’ve got here is arguably the coolest and most functional iPad case design yet with the ExoShift. Most iPad cases only cover your iPad’s screen. This premium faux leather slip case not only covers your tablet in style, but serves as an adjustable stand.
And we’ve got it for only $32.99 during this limited time offer from Cult of Mac Deals.
As a designer, there is no such thing as too many resources. It’s simple – the more assets you have, the more combinations and unique designs you can deliver. With that in mind, the more designs you can deliver, the more dynamic of a designer you’ll be! If you are looking for a UI/UX bundle that has it all, look no further.
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One thing’s for sure: once you have iOS 7 installed, OS X Mavericks sticks out like a sore thumb. iOS 7 is where Apple’s software design is headed, and OS X Mavericks is what Apple’s software design aesthetic is fleeing from.
Clearly, OS X Mavericks was left alone this year because Apple couldn’t concentrate on two design overhauls at once. Instead, Ive & Co. simply satisfied themselves with stripping out some of OS X’s more Forstallian flourishes, like the Corinthian leather and gray linen textures.
But what about next year? What would OS X 10.10 look like if brought in line with the design of iOS 7? DeviantArt user Ohsneezeme‘s concept, while not perfect — he hasn’t touched the icons or the dock — is a strong guess.
I like it. What about you?
As the new Director of Human Interface, Jony Ive has gone from making beautifully beveled Macs, to redesigning iOS into a multi-layered Parallax operating system. By drawing from his deep well of hardware design brilliance, Jony brought a lot of his hardware philosophies to iOS, and the Messages app icon shows just how insanely detailed Jony can get.
As discovered by Brad Ellis, Jony made sure that the Messages icon’s corners have the same tapered edges which can be found on the iMac and other Apple products.
The difference is just a small number of pixels that most users would probably never notice, so Brad created his awesome comparison GIF so you can actually see the changes:
I’ve already written up my thoughts on iOS 7’s new look, and particularly its new icons. But I’m interested in how you feel about it. Am I the only one who thinks Apple took a step in the wrong direction when it was designed certain aspects of its next-generation mobile operating system?
Okay, so not everyone thinks Apple has ruined iOS with its newfound support of flat icons and whacky, eye-stinging colors. In fact, some iOS users love the new look. But many think it’s a gut-wrenching mess. In fact, some hate it so much that they’ve taken some time to fix it.
User interface designers have taken to Dribbble to showcase their own iOS 7 concepts, and I think you’ll agree that they’re a welcome improvement.
You know what I’m hearing a lot of today? “Whine whine whine. Don’t like the icons. This really is kind of a mess.” And this, from our very own chatroom: “It hurts the eyes,” and “The hideousness of this is blowing my mind.”
It seems that a lot of people don’t like the look of iOS 7. But you know what? I love it. Sure, some of those icons are a little garish, but in iOS 6, all of the native Apple icons were hideous. And whatever you want to say about the new look, you have to admit that it is now way more consistent.
It’s our own fault. We all asked Apple to dramatically change the look and feel of the iOS operating system, which, until yesterday, remained largely unchanged since the introduction of the original iPhone back in 2007. And we all complained when it didn’t do that with iOS 6 this time last year.
But I can’t help but feel the Cupertino company is now punishing us for all those requests, and all that complaining we did before about its skeuomorphic designs.
When it comes to design, iOS 7 is vastly different to its predecessors. It still functions in much the same way — though there are some new features you’ll need to get used to — but it looks completely different. As soon as you power it up for the first time the minimalistic feel is staring back at you, but it isn’t until you’ve completed the setup process and arrived at your home screen that you want to vomit in your own lap.
When Apple unveiled iOS 6’s new Maps icon, it became an emblem for everything that was wrong with Apple Maps, a service that — at launch — was widely criticized as being inferior to Google’s own maps data, which every previous version of iOS had shipped with.
Why the icon? Because it gave directions that would probably end up killing you if you followed them in real life. But that’s all changed in iOS 7.
Craig Ferenghi just gave us a demo of iOS 7. Here’s what is new about the look and design ethos of iOS 7.
The Apple online store went down for just over four hours earlier today, and it came back with Apple’s new Father’s Day promotion and a few noticeable design changes.
The Cupertino company is again heavily promoting the iPad and the iPad mini, but the iPhone 5 also gets a lot of room on the store’s homepage.
Ok, so if you’ve been paying attention to the gaming space today, you’ll know that Microsoft unveiled its new gaming console, the Xbox One. This next generation console is going to play video games, control your TV (sort of), and act as a DVD/Blue-Ray player. It’s got a Kinect motion sensor box on top, which can not be disconnected, and the console won’t play Xbox 360 discs.
This is all well and good, and represents a step forward in Microsoft’s quest to own the living room, even though a lot of us don’t have the time, space, or extra cash to spend on a huge entertainment hub these days, anyway. That’s really not what bothers me, though.
The Xbox One is just uglier than anything I could have imagined.
Heck, my ten year-old son, not a maven of design in any way, saw pictures of the new Xbox, and chuckled. “Why is it bigger than the Xbox 360?” he asked. “It looks the same, just more square.”
Which really made it all hit home for me: design matters. The case design of the Xbox One is firmly rooted in the past. Which makes a lot of sense if you consider the reveal today, full of the same games and the same brands with better graphics.
Apple is well-known for its love of the so-called golden ratio, an “extreme and mean” mathematical ratio that designers as far back as the third-century B.C. identified as most likely to lead to harmonious design. The iCloud logo, for example, is designed with the golden ratio in mind … and it’s widely believed that the iconic Apple logo is also designed using the golden ratio.
It’s a nice thought, isn’t it? That Apple’s logo is constructed out of mathematically perfect circles and partial circles? Unfortunately, not only is it not true, but Apple has different logos it uses even in its own official materials: the Apple icon etched into the back of your iPad is very different than, say, the official Unicode symbol.
If you work with WordPress and have fun building new sites for family, friends, or even yourself, then these 3 developer themes will only better your options. They’re sleek, clean, and have tons of sweet capabilities that will allow you to propel your imagination right onto the web. And right now Cult of Mac Deals has them available for only $49 – a savings of $398!
Of course, I have no way of knowing whether space aliens actually had a hand in designing the Booq Boa Squeeze. I ran into a couple of Booq bigwigs in an elevator at the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas once, and they seemed pretty cheery, completely normal, and not at all alien-like — too not-alien-like, considering Booq is based in Southern California (I consider myself a Southern Californian; we’re all weirdos). And Booq’s Sierra Madre HQ is suspiciously close to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratories…
Anyway, whether or not of alien origin, what’s clear is that Booq’s bags are unlike any others on this planet — and their new lightweight, zillion-pocketed Boa Squeeze laptop backpack is no different.
Briefs is a new Mac app that allows designers to create interactive mockups of iOS apps. Developed by MartianCraft, Briefs can build iPhone and iPad app mockups without a single line of code. It looks like the ultimate tool for prototyping app ideas to clients and developers.
Different elements of an app can be assembled on the desktop and sent to the Briefscase iOS client via a shared WiFi network. From there, the mockup can be used like a real app on an iOS device.
Six months after taking responsibility of software design, Jony Ive is hard at work overhauling Apple’s upcoming iOS 7 operating system. And according to sources for Bloomberg, the changes he is making are so significant that they run the risk of delaying the update’s release.
Personal social networking app, Path, just released a new icon set into its sticker shop today, called “Iconic Bites.” While the stickers are adorable little bite-sized, pixel-chic representations of food and such, what really makes them cool is that they were created by none other than Susan Kare, the designer of the original Macintosh system icons.
The Path blog posted an interesting interview with her, as well, in which she talks about how her long experience in the design industry has influenced her current designs.
After being fired from his post at Apple for the Apple Maps fiasco last year, Richard Williamson has found a new home at one of tech’s other superstars – Facebook.
Richard Williamson played a key role in the development of the iPhone’s software under Steve Jobs. After working at Apple for more than a decade, Williamson was put in charge of the Apple Maps team that replaced Google Maps in iOS 6.
Steam! That’s what Steve Jobs would have had rocket from his ears when he heard about Facebook Home. We’ll explain why on our newest CultCast, but also covet aloud the one feature we hope Apple borrows for iOS. Plus, inside Leander Kahney’s Jony Ive book; Ron Johnson father of the Apple Store takes a boot to the rear; and we wrap with an all new Faves ‘N Raves, the segment where we pitch our favorite tech and apps then vote on which one’s best!
Stream or download new and past episodes of The CultCast on your Mac or iDevice by subscribing now on iTunes, or hit play below and let the good times roll.
Click on through for the show notes.
Apple’s new spaceship headquarters look pretty amazing. Even though the mothership is still a year behind schedule, Apple loves the design of it so much, that they want the architectural firm who created the mothership to redesign some Apple Stores too.
Foster + Partners architecture firm has just signed a deal with Apple to work on new designs for some of its retail stores.
