European crash tester says carmakers must bring back physical controls

boem@lemmy.world to Technology@lemmy.world – 1735 points –
European crash tester says carmakers must bring back physical controls
arstechnica.com
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I can as all the buttons are in a row. Same for the AC and heater controls. I pretty much know them by heart so it takes a fraction of a second to glance where to roughly put my finger, and then I can count them out by feel while looking at the road.

That image, while not as bad as a touchscreen, is still a pretty poor design. So many uniform buttons so close still require most people to look. Buttons should be clustered and/or have slighty different shape so you can tell by touch which one you're about to press....

When you remember where the buttons are they're fine to navigate. The average keyboard that meant people can type on without looking has less physical feedback (2 small bumps on f and h).

Yeah, once you get used to typing on a keyboard you don't really need anything else. I got blank caps for my keyboard because I thought it looked neater. Memorising a row of climate options isn't that bad. If you mix buttons and dials it's even easier. If the manufacturer thinks of accessibility they'll also add tactile bumps and such and make it accessible for people who don't have great vision too.

Lol as someone who touch types but sometimes has to look down for F-key locations and which symbols are attached to which numbers, this would drive me mad.

That's fair! Looking at my work computer's keyboard, I'd go nuts if that was the case too. This keyboard has it clustered in groups of four though, so it's not that challenging. Plus I rarely use more than two or three function keys on my personal computer.

F keys are in groups. It's easy to see which is which workout text.

Symbols are in the category of layout learning.

I had a blank keyboard once. This was so long ago that it was probably a manufacturing fluke but I really liked it. Though whatever the caps say didn't really affect the use in any way.

Compare it to a video game controller. Or a keyboard.All of my face buttons and keys have the same shape and size. I still know where they are, because I've used them each hundreds, thousands of times. You learn where they are, and if you don't immediately touch the right one, you can find it because they never move and you have feedback. A touch screen has zero feedback, and buttons are inconsistently placed, or 4 menus deep.