Action button labels: poll

[_wb_]

How are triangles taught in other countries (i.e. not Switzerland and Germany)? Here around practically everyone should know Alpha, Beta and Gamma as the variables used for the angles in triangles.

Same here in Belgium. We use Greek letters for all angles.

 

[Exophase]

Is anyone else looking forward to ED picking something, just so at least one person is sure to be outraged?

 

[bzar]

If we have Pi, I want Tau in there

 

[_wb_]

If we have Pi, I want Tau in there

You just have to press Pi twice for that

 

[levi]

I learned alpha, beta, pi, sigma and delta in maths, gamma, mu and omega in physics, and lambda at university, but in all those cases (except for sigma and omega) it was the lower case version.  I didn't know many of the upper-case versions until people started using them here, but they weren't that hard to learn from there.

 

[Tenka]

I imagine that people are just as likely to accidentally press the original four buttons while trying to press one of the new ones with this layout

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as people are to accidentally press one of the new buttons while trying to press one of the original four buttons in this layout.

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Now that I'm looking at it again I take that back.  Because our thumbs come from the south east, isn't there a largely smaller chance of accidentally pressing both buttons at once if they are side by side from the point of our thumbs rather than one after another?

And if the new buttons are going to be made smaller, won't those small hills on the opposite side of the large hills be even more difficult to press without pressing the large button between it and our thumbs?  Or maybe EvilDragon meant that all six of the buttons will be smaller than the original four.

Two smaller buttons closer to the center of the pad sound rather anti-action, more like absolute pause or menu buttons.  Sort of like the easily forgettable black and white buttons on an Xbox controller.

Maybe I'm just not grasping the big picture yet due to having not seen many pictures of this idea.

 

[levi]

The extra buttons can't be that close to your palm as the S pad black and white buttons where, as that's where the keyboard will be.


None of us know exactly what's planned, though if I had to bet I'd say it's likely to be the two extra buttons to the right of B and Y (using Pandora notation) or maybe slightly above also, so that X, B and new button 1 form an arc, as do A, Y and new button 2. It makes the buttons no harder to access than the existing buttons (you don't need to stretch any further) and wouldn't take up any extra vertical space.


I don't think it matters whether the buttons have space left and right of them or up and down - the limiting factor is the size of the pad of your thumb. You generally want them closer so you can chord them (so you can run and jump in Mario, for example) but far enough apart that you can easily press one alone when you want to.

 

[_wb_]

I think we have to add small-print "PgUp/PgDn/Home/End/Ins/Del" labels to the action buttons, whatever option is picked.

If something that differs from the Pandora layout is chosen, I would also add small-print labels that show the Pandora layout, for backwards compatibility (and so that people who really want to refer to the key using Latin letters can do that). Like this:

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/6ac1562c59c89ba7ba7c7fa7dd938701

 

[Rockthesmurf]

Delta (Δ) is widely used to denote differences.


Pi (Π) is a mathematical constant everyone should know (ok, that's lowercase π but that looks almost the same as uppercase Π, depending on the font)


Omega (Ω) is the symbol for Ohm, the SI unit for electrical resistance. Christians may also be familiar with the letter for other reasons.


Chi (Χ) is quite well-known from the statistical Chi-squared test. It looks a lot like an X, so if you don't know it, it's not hard to describe it.


Lambda (λ) is known among computer scientists for lambda calculus / functional programming. Among gamers it's probably best known as the Half-Life logo.


Gamma (γ) is maybe not that widely known. It's the third letter of the Greek alphabet though, so people may have heard "alpha beta gamma" at some point (e.g. radiation).

There is obviously an issue here between where people live, the circles they move in, and so on. Things like 'should know' and 'quite well-known' don't seem to correlate with the people I know/country I am in. I am sitting with a guy right now who is into games and computing in general (university degree in computing related subject), but the only symbol out of the 6 above he knew was pi, with a bit of thinking of prompting he also remembered delta. He said the lambda symbol was something he was sure he had seen, but wasn't sure where.

There was a post somewhere on here that suggested a Pandora was shown to a parent, and then the parent was asked to press the X key, and they pressed the keyboard key instead of the button. Well I asked my mother about these Greek symbols and she honestly couldn't recognize any of them. Well; she recognized two things as 'triangle' and the letter 'x'. I then asked he to guess which key was 'Delta', which was 'Pi' and so on, to try and give her a chance of having some association what they *might* be, and this still didn't help. She thought the Omega symbol could be Pi because she thought it looked a little like a pie, and thought maybe Gamma was Chi, because she had heard of gamma radiation and thinks radiation is bad, and knows that X can be a symbol for bad/danger.

For me personally, I recognize Delta, Pi and Lambda by name. I have seen Omega but have only known it as 'Ohm'. Chi is not something I recall and Gamma is not something I recognize (although I have a feeling this would have been mentioned to me sometime during GCSE/AS Level physics). I have degree level education (I got a first class degree, graduated top of my class, in a computing related discipline). If these symbols were something I needed to know then I would them, but they either haven't come up, or if they did, I have since long forgotten them due to not using them for a long time.

@T4b: we were only taught about feta for triangles, so for right angle triangles it was 'feta', the 'right angle' and the 'other angle'. 

 

[Neelix]

@T4b: we were only taught about feta for triangles, so for right angle triangles it was 'feta', the 'right angle' and the 'other angle'. 

I think you mean Theta.   Feta is a kind of cheese.    (and yeah theta is the only greek letter I remember from my trig classes too)

- Neelix

 

[WizardStan]

New idea: the feta, brie, swiss, gruyere, pepperjack, and chedder buttons.

 

[Caine]

I think we have to add small-print "PgUp/PgDn/Home/End/Ins/Del" labels to the action buttons, whatever option is picked.

If something that differs from the Pandora layout is chosen, I would also add small-print labels that show the Pandora layout, for backwards compatibility (and so that people who really want to refer to the key using Latin letters can do that). Like this:

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/6ac1562c59c89ba7ba7c7fa7dd938701

I agree that these should be added. That said, if we add PgUp/PgDn/Home/End/Ins/Del then isn't the basic premise of this entire discussion moot?
The PgUp/PgDn/Home/End/Ins and Del labels effectively become the unique identifiers for the key then.

Even if (for the sense of gaming handheld compatibility) other keys such as e.g. ABXYUV are chosen, then you can simple state "hit A (home)".

 

[Rockthesmurf]

@Neelix, thanks, I couldn't work out the spelling, knew it seemed wrong, but then googled it and saw hits (about trig) where others had misspelled it. Ha @

 

[Neelix]

Personally, If they are going to be labelled with their keyboard functions then I'm happy for them to be otherwise unmarked. 

If they have to have gaming labels though, then I still think alphanumeric combinations are the best way to go.  They are consistent with the shoulder button naming,  there's no learning curve involved,  and  it's easy to ensure that they do not conflict with anything else on the keyboard.

- Neelix

 

[levi]

Hmm, the Pandora is missing screen text to let you know that A/B and home and end and X/Y is pg down/up. I only learned that after using it for a while, but now I use them all the time. But I still think even if they are labelled on the keyboard, a game saying 'press pgup to select' is more than a bit naff. We need game-specific labelling on them, and having text-editing appropriate functions on them too would be a usability improvement over the Pandora.

 

[milkshake]

Yes we need commonly associated gaming buttons ;-) which are easy for any gaming veteran or newbie to pick up hmm why not use Latin letters (pure genius)

 

[Kiga]

Yes we need commonly associated gaming buttons ;-) which are easy for any gaming veteran or newbie to pick up hmm why not use Latin letters (pure genius)

Pyra isn't a device for people who are in search "commonly" and "easy" and just pick up iphone or galaxy. Pyra is a console for people who are in search of logic (so no button with the same label) and for a lot of them who love sciences (so Greek letters).

And "genius" isn't about following foolishly common practice.

 

[Caine]

Pyra isn't a device for people who are in search "commonly" and "easy" and just pick up iphone or galaxy. Pyra is a console for people who are in search of logic (so no button with the same label) and for a lot of them who love sciences (so Greek letters).

Interesting statement. From which observations did you derive this proposition and what makes you believe it holds so universally that you state it as fact.

 

[Kiga]

Just compare how many people buy an iphone and how many will buy a Pyra while Pyra will be able to do a lot more than a iphone  being cheaper that's not logic,  also Pyra hasn't  the same advertising.

That's why people who chose Pyra are in search, in search of logic and not commonly used or easy to know and use.

Plus I don't know how many people like science in the community but there is no doubt more than in the majority of others device community (if they have a community). And the core love science.

 

[Caine]

Just compare how many people buy an iphone and how many will buy a Pyra while Pyra will be able to do a lot more than a iphone  being cheaper that's not logic,  also Pyra hasn't  the same advertising.

That's why people who chose Pyra are in search, in search of logic and not commonly used or easy to know.

Plus I don't know how many people like science in the community but there is no doubt more than in the majority of others device community (if they have a community). And the core love science.

You judge the logic of a purchase on the basis of capability while you ignore metrics such as status, build quality, usability and many others.
That said, I love science and I still think that greek letters are a bad idea.