Avoiding the notch

Targets macOS
61

Okay. I’ll bite. I have one of the new 14" MacBook Pros and, when I first turned it on, I noticed the Notch and said to myself “Huh. That looks weird.” And, within a day of that I promptly forgot about it. I really don’t notice it unless an app has a lot of menus.

I’m not saying that others aren’t allowed to disagree with this. But, I am saying that I—myself—don’t understand the fuss. Even if the menus get split, I honestly don’t see an issue. (To be fair, I haven’t noticed the notch on my iPhone since I first got the iPhone X.)

I do agree that some of Apple’s UI choices have been…questionable. But, my biggest issues there have been with how things work, not how they look (i.e. hiding the proxy icons in Finder windows, the changes to the notification popups, etc.) I don’t mind things like rounded corners. I think they look nice (refined even). Heck, even Windows 11 is introducing rounded corners on a lot of that UI.

But, ultimately, it comes down to usability. Does it work and is it intuitive? If it is, what it looks like is more the icing on the cake rather than the cake itself.

3 Likes
62

I think the fuss was about the viral video showing menu items getting behind the notch (not visible or accessible in some cases).

If that was true about the Monterey release, then the developer needed to update their apps ASAP to handle the notch.

The good news is that Monterey 12.0.1 split the menu and nothing is behind the notch and old apps can run without updating.

1 Like
63

They’re back in Monterey, or at least the option to make them come back is, mind you in 4 years they’ll probable make it the default again.

System Preferences → Accessibility → Display → “Show window title icons”

Why it is an accessibility option is beyond me, but that seems to just be the place where Apple dumps options nowadays.

1 Like
64

I can agree. With the new MacBook 16" there is enough space, that even with a lot of iStats showing, they stay on the right side.

65

Things going behind the Notch was, most assuredly, a bug. And, as pointed out, Apple is fixing that bug. Still work to do though with the status items (menu bar apps) still going behind the Notch. But, I’m confident that will be fixed too.

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Apple does seem to have a thing for hiding UI of late (see my comments about usability and intuitiveness). And, yes, having this option hidden away in Accessibility makes no sense. But, at least the option is there for those that want it.

I do hope, though, that this phase of hiding everything away behind multiple clicks (if even that) goes away soon. Will it? Who knows.

1 Like
67

A big thanks, Sam! This change was driving me nuts! (I very often use proxy icons, between Path Finder/the Finder and open dialogs).

Each time I install a new OS, I spend time checking system preferences panes, but “Accessibility” is generally one I skip the most (always the same options that I rarely use). It looks like it’s becoming more and more interesting in recent releases (since at least Big Sur) and it regains my interest.
Going to browse it completely right now, hoping to discover more :wink:

1 Like