> But then you start trying to get actual work done, and the Fisher Priced interface is too simplified.
That's exactly my thinking as well. To give another example:
This week I tried to use an iPad and an Apple Pencil for day-to-day note taking. If you handwrite 100% plain English prose like, The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog, it instantly converts it to text and corrects any typos. For simple stuff, it seems perfect.
But it's insufferable once you start on real work. It doesn't understand a lot of punctuation, tries to correct foreign words (likes names and locations) I mix in with English, tries to spell correct serial numbers (N07 becomes NOT). Having to go back and correct each conversion error turned out to be much slower -- and frustrating. I went back to a keyboard.
The most notorious example I remember was an update to data entry software in the medical field. The old one ran on some Unix iirc, had a text mode interface, and was entirely controlled by keyboard. Staff could use it in their sleep, enter text, tab, enter more text, tab tab, and so on.
The new version ran on Windows, had a lot more features for sure, but suddenly staff was entering data into a field, grabbed the mouse to move to the next field, entered data, and so on. The process became way slower. So I asked why they don't just ignore the mouse and keep using tab. They were surprised this even works, because it was never mentioned by the folks who trained them on the new software. It was all about how modern and slick it looks and how it has so many more features.
So then staff tried to use the tab key again, but got frustrated very quickly since the software was smart enough so enable and disable controls in the entry form depending on selections you made in earlier fields. So tabbing through the form would require different number of key presses all the time, making it hard to build muscle memory. I think they raised their complaints to management but whether that feedback ever reached the software vendor I have no idea. I guess they did get faster again over time because any new system takes time to get used to, but I'd be very surprised if it ever matched the ancient, simple system again.
I would add to that what I call "fractioning" of data (on multiple screens).
We used for years (decades) a DOS based tool, where in a "conventional" 80x25 mask there was enough space for all the data we had to input (navigating with TAB/Enter, etc.) before passing to the next (with F8).
On the new software the same data (in windows, on a modern screen) goes inside a teeny-tiny window that has not enough fields, so it is spread on three tabs and this breaks the flow.
The same happens a lot on forms on the web, fill one or two fields, click next, repeat.
This explains a tendency I've long had which I always assumed was just a look and feel thing. So back in 2021 I got myself a (relatively new) Blackberry. I loved it. Hardware buttons. Lots of them. I've had to upgrade to a newer Android for work reasons, and it has so many default settings I've had to turn off because they are infuriating. Pixel 7. Gestures. No standard bottom bar with the three buttons. Power button does something else. Why???? Even with all these turned off, the three button bar disappears if an app is full screen, and you have to do a gesture to get it back. Seems mad to me.
This was very jarring at first, but over time I've actually gotten used to the gestures and they feel more consistent than various makers of phones having the software buttons in different positions. It's almost like muscle memory at this point.
If you don't like gestures, however, you should be able to go to the system settings and enable the old style navigation. If they had removed it entirely, then I'd probably be more critical (a la Windows 11 vertical taskbar).
That's my experience with doing basically anything that's vaguely complex on mobile devices.
The iPhone camera is usually excellent, but there are some situations (for me it's autumn forests and funnily enough Disneyland at night) in which the auto white balance fails miserably. On my DSLM it's a simple question of just using manual white balance, but on the iPhone the only way to do it with the stock camera app is to do in post.
On that note, the Photos Mac app has a neat feature where you can fix white balance by calibrating on a neutral grey area, but that feature is missing on the mobile apps which just have a color temperature slider which does not give as good results.
That's exactly my thinking as well. To give another example:
This week I tried to use an iPad and an Apple Pencil for day-to-day note taking. If you handwrite 100% plain English prose like, The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog, it instantly converts it to text and corrects any typos. For simple stuff, it seems perfect.
But it's insufferable once you start on real work. It doesn't understand a lot of punctuation, tries to correct foreign words (likes names and locations) I mix in with English, tries to spell correct serial numbers (N07 becomes NOT). Having to go back and correct each conversion error turned out to be much slower -- and frustrating. I went back to a keyboard.