Thoughts about the app's UI - feel free to give your opinion!

[laxu]

So there's several UI elements in the BetterDisplay icon dropdown that are unintuitive.

For example you click Display Mode, the list you get has a header that makes it seem you collapse the item, but it basically just backs out of the menu.

To me it should look more like "< Display Mode", because you can't scroll the list to show collapsed items like the UI element would suggest.

Similarly the three dots at the bottom that just shrinks the Tools makes no sense because "..." is often used to represent "More".

Finally the monitor names in the top level menu don't look like something you can click. Those should have the downward caret icon to mark if they are expanded or collapsed. Remove the little carets at the bottom of the list because they perform the same function.

It's a great app, but please follow UI design conventions.

[waydabber]

Hi @laxu

I get your points (mostly). :)

• The "Display Mode" menu by default can be expanded/collapsed and the content can be scrolled (except if you only have only a few resolution options - but with flexible scaling enabled you can have a dozens or even hundreds - so I think a good share of users think of this as a menu item with scrollable content - I certainly do so). You can however alter how menu items work in various ways under Settings/Menu (if you disable the expanding menu option, a submenu will be shown in a separate window for example - I recommend you to explore various options, you can make the app look much more "vanilla" by changing some settings). The rightward/downward pointing chevron combo is now used by Apple in Control Center menubar extras for expandable content (see for example the AirPods expandable area, WIFI "other networks" etc), so the way this works should be understandable to most users. The fact that opening the menu hides other menu unopened items under the display block by default is indeed a twist (but: this behavior can also be disabled under Settings/Menu/Additional.../Hide other unexpanded menu items), this is done in order to make the menu more compact/usable.
• The three dots originally denoted "More", it was later renamed to "Tools" but the "..." remained for continuity. I might change this in the future (there were versions when a more classic screwdriver+hammer icon was used but it looked somewhat... not nice imho).
• In earlier versions the Monitor Name headers did have an open/close chevron (in v1.x versions) but this became confusing later due to the by default expandable style submenu items (which use similar chevrons) and also looked bad next to the power on/off switch. Most users don't close the display menus, but I still left the option to do so in the app as some users want it.

Generally the current look of the app is a result of some evolution which might make sense to long time users but might not make sense for new users (but should be learnable quickly). There are myriads of customization options on look&feel, all based on various feedbacks and aesthetic preferences asked by picky users - the default look is what distilled to be a generally fine appearance. This is I think a good compromise and if somebody does not like something, the number of look&feel customization options far exceed what's available in most macOS apps. :)

Honestly, I don't think there are UI conventions to follow anymore. Apple's own first party apps are all around the place, Control Center and Control Center menus break most of Apple's own previous UI conventions (look at how icons, toggles etc work) and Apple has no unified Menubar Extra UI (except for plain old, super limited NSMenu based approach which Apple itself does not use now). I try to give the app a generally macOS like look&feel and I think I succeed mostly but for sure take certain liberties. Tried to follow more faithfully some of Apple's directions in Settings though (except for those foldable small caps sections and some other details).

[laxu]

The Display Mode etc menus are certainly scrollable, but I should have been clearer that I meant you can't scroll it down to e.g Refresh rate etc options when Display Mode is open. That's what makes the chevron not make sense as an UI element, and I think an arrow pointing to the left would be more intuitive to say "back out of this expanded item."

Explored the menu options a bit and I like it better after disabling the three dots and settings buttons.

Apple honestly is no longer following their own UI guidelines and regularly do some pretty awful choices.

[waydabber]

I see what you mean. Right, the Refresh Rate etc options are hidden by default, however you can turn off "Hide other unexpanded menu items" so they remain visible:

The same goes for entire display blocks, you can set all to be expanded at the same time.

I was thinking a lot what the default setting should be - I eventually opted to hide unexpanded items by default to preserve space - similar to how control center shows a rightward chevron for its controls which then open up to replace all controls when clicked:

So I basically utilized design choices already established by Apple here or there - I understand it might feel inconsistent to some older macOS standards but since Apple watered down its own formerly much more rigid design language, I feel this is now all allowed and fine. ;)

So even if you don't agree with some of the default settings, you might see that whatever I did is not actually random but a lot of thought went into it. :)