Thinkpads Forum

RealBlackStuff wrote:Is this what originally inspired David Hill to re-Think?
What took him/them so long?
Lenovo, Why Are You Designing ThinkPads No One Wants?

A small excerpt from the above article:
[In March 2013] Lenovo announced the ThinkPad T431s, the first ThinkPad based on its new industrial design, founded upon what the company called "extensive research" with ThinkPad loyalists and other users around the world.

Huh???

600X wrote:

They had an 18 month survey IIRC.

They chose both loyalists and people who had never used ThinkPads before.

600X wrote:

RealBlackStuff wrote:Is this what originally inspired David Hill to re-Think?
What took him/them so long?
Lenovo, Why Are You Designing ThinkPads No One Wants?

A small excerpt from the above article:
[In March 2013] Lenovo announced the ThinkPad T431s, the first ThinkPad based on its new industrial design, founded upon what the company called "extensive research" with ThinkPad loyalists and other users around the world.

Huh???

They had an 18 month survey IIRC. They chose both loyalists and people who had never used ThinkPads before. At least that's what I recall happened. I might be wrong since it has been quite some time, so just read up on the details here: http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/17/the- ... -redesign/

Sometimes an outpouring of anger can reveal itself as a kind of profound love. I know it sounds strange but that’s been my conclusion after moderating your comments across Lenovo’s Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and YouTube pages over the past couple months. The source of the angst (as many of you know) is the recent design change to Lenovo’s famous, award-winning, ergonomically-renowned ThinkPad laptop keyboard. Nearly every negative comment I’ve read has been delivered with a sense of ferocious loyalty, a sense of love. You’re mad because you care. I respect that.

Here are two samples of what we've heard from you guys:

“Lenovo, have you lost your minds? Why did you do this? Did you do any research or testing or was this a whim? Have you messed up the classic ThinkPad typing experience?”

“What I'd like to hear is some real arguments about why this has been done. Such a well-established keyboard should not be changed for no good reason or just to change something!”

But wait, isn't this the same keyboard that Notebook Review called “fantastic” and The Verge said “makes a world of difference, improving on a historically splendid design?” (Perhaps the most apt quote came from Slashgear: “ThinkPad fans, put away your scythes and pitchforks: the legendary key travel appears to be unblemished, and the signature trackpoint ‘nub’ is still present.”)

Is this the same keyboard that got this incredible endorsement from LAPTOP Magazine? “Putting a ThinkPad X1 at the fingers of a touch-typist is like placing a Stradivarius in the hands of a violinist. While all of Lenovo’s ThinkPads have strong keyboards, the ThinkPad X1 features the best laptop keyboard we’ve ever tested.”

In an effort to address the disconnect, we decided to put a few questions to Aaron Stewart, Senior Engineer for ThinkPad User Experience & Design. Aaron works closely with David Hill, the godfather of ThinkPad design, and basically spends every working hour thinking about how the slightest change might impact legions of ThinkPad users.

Q: Why do you think we are getting so much feedback about the new ThinkPad keyboard design—some of it quite negative—from so many devoted, longtime fans?

AARON: We do indeed have devoted fans with strong opinions about what makes a ThinkPad. Candidly, our long-time fans typically do not like change, particularly with our keyboard. We understand that completely. By design, the keyboard is central to the ThinkPad experience. So we don't take keyboard changes lightly. However, we constantly study ways to improve ThinkPad including our keyboard. We have done so since the first ThinkPad.

Q: You told me recently that the changes to the ThinkPad keyboard were several years in the making. How so?

A: There are two notable changes to the ThinkPad keyboard. One is the new key shape and the other is a more efficient layout. We have been studying and iteratively improving these particular attributes for more than four years. We decided to implement the changes throughout the 2012 ThinkPad line only when we knew they were, in fact, improvements.

Q: Some people have suggested that switching to a chiclet-style keyboard makes a ThinkPad less like a ThinkPad or more like everyone else. How do you respond to that and how are Lenovo’s chiclet keys any different from everyone else’s?

A: The debate between traditional and island or chiclet-style keys is an interesting one. Several years ago, all notebook computers had the traditional key shape. Use of island-style keys has increased across the industry as it simplifies and modernizes appearance. We were focused on how to merge the benefits of the traditional key shape with those of the island-style key shape. We dismissed flat, square island-style key shapes used by much of the industry. Fingers are neither square nor flat. The island-style key shape on the new ThinkPad keyboard enlarges the key top relative to traditional keys, which gives a larger sweet spot for key press. The new ThinkPad key shape also maintains a dished top and curved front edge for typing accuracy all while delivering a simpler, more modern appearance. The technology under the keys has not changed.

Q: The new keyboards have six rows of keys instead of seven. David Hill told me there’s a learning curve to adjusting but he said it doesn’t take long. Why did you make the change and what can you say to the programmers and coders who seem to be most put off by this?

A: The move from 7-row to 6-row only affects functions above the number row, which are generally for editing and navigation. Home, End, Insert and Delete are now positioned in order from left to right as they all address cursor position. Page Up/Down are positioned near the arrow keys so navigational controls are fully grouped. We have seen end-users comfortably adjust to these changes in less than an hour. Depending on personal use of these functions, other users may require a bit more time for the change to feel natural. However, this reset has occurred for every end-user in our extensive testing, typically with an ultimate preference for the new layout over the old. Legacy functions like Pause, Break and Scroll Lock are no longer overtly labelled on key tops, but remain accessible via key combinations using the Fn key (e.g., Fn+P = Pause).

Q: What kind of focus groups and/or testing did your team do before rolling out the design changes?

A: We often conduct different evaluations and user tests to maintain or improve the ThinkPad keyboard. However, to determine if and how we would make the changes to our keyboard in 2012, we embarked on one of the most in-depth keyboard studies ever conducted for ThinkPad. We did 350 hours of user testing with people in four countries. With each participant, we conducted 90- to 120-minute one-on-one interviews with hands-on use of different keyboard conditions to understand the latest about keyboard use and design preferences.

Q: The tech press—and our customers who have used the new keyboard—seem to be almost unanimous in their praise of it. The concerns seem to be coming from devoted ThinkPads fans who have not necessarily touched the new keyboard—do you think their concerns just demonstrate their love of the ThinkPad design and their desire to guard that legacy? How can you ever change something that is so beloved?

A: Yes, feeling is believing. I cannot expect all ThinkPad fans to welcome the news about the keyboard changes. But I urge them to try it before setting an opinion in stone. Use of a keyboard cannot be judged by looking at a picture. ThinkPad has evolved significantly over the years and will continue to do so. Our job is to deliver what we are known for while improving and remaining relevant. We will stay true to the elements that fundamentally make a ThinkPad a ThinkPad. All ThinkPads have an excellent keyboard—we have not changed that. The new keyboard is the best yet for ThinkPad.

Q: With all the excitement over the design changes, do you think anyone noticed that you added the backlight option? I’m convinced no one knows it’s there.

A: I hope so, it's a great feature. We designed Fn+Space as the trigger to enable and adjust the keyboard backlight. If there is a light icon on your space bar, you have the backlight option. I use mine all the time.

Q: Last question, and I deliver this one with a wink—are you getting rid of the TrackPoint?

A: No. We study how to keep improving TrackPoint, not how to remove it.



OK, everyone. We’ve made our case here—it’s in your hands now. (Or is it?) We would obviously love to hear from you in the comment field below. Many thanks for reading.

I thought it would be useful to follow up on the sneak peek blog I published earlier in the week with more information . Now that the product has officially announced, I can share a lot more of the research methodology and creative thinking that drove the changes to the keyboard. The video is just too short and a bit vague, by design, to share all the details. After all it was a bit of a teaser. Much of the footage ended up on the cutting room floor due to pre-announce concerns from legal and others. My team felt there was a great opportunity to take the ThinkPad keyboard design and user experience to the next level with the introduction of the T400s. It only made sense, this was to be the best T series ever made. Achieving such a goal was not easy, however, it required a lot of hard work, creative thinking , and most importantly information about how people used their exisiting keyboards. We thought that taking an updated look at key frequency of use would be a good place to start in order to uncover innovation opportunity. Things do change over the years. Who would ever have predicted the increased use of the @ and tab keys prior to the internet. To gather this kind of critical information we solicited agreement from several dozen internal users to install a special keyboard tracker on their ThinkPad. The request to install a keyboard tracker on peoples' laptops sounded a bit odd at first, but eventually volunteers lined up once they understood exactly what we were trying to accomplish. We really didn't want to peer into their lives, we just wanted frequency of use data. After an extended period of time the data was translated into what we call a "heat map". The more frequently used the key, the more red we used to color it. This visual mapping technique quickly revealed patterns that suggested design changes.

editing-cluster_heat-map
Portion of the heat map based on collected data

The QWERTY section of the keyboard is highly controlled for obvious touch typing reasons. Outside of the QWERTY section, some frequently used keys have larger than normal key tops. Enter, backspace, tab, caps lock, shift, control, and of course the space bar fall into this category. Surprisingly enough this idea has never made it past the 5th row. Frequency of use is not the only driver of increased key size. The style of gesture or stroke used for the function also comes into play. Enter falls into the category of a clear and deliberate action, a sort of salute to completion. There is a certain fervor of emotion connected to it's use. Sounds very similar to the delete key. Who doesn't enjoy hammering that one home when the boss sends you some ridiculous note that requires no action. When looking at frequency of use and gesture the delete key became an obvious candidate for increased size. The upward trajectory of movement towards the delete and escape keys also suggested making them taller rather than wider. For example, the enter key is wider for a similar reason, but with a more lateral trajectory. We didn't just rely on the frequency of use data collection technique. We also cross checked the data regarding frequency of key use against the occurance of letters in language. For instance e is the most frequently occuring letter in language and it is the most commonly used alphanumeric key. For those of you who are curious, space bar is the overall frequency of use winner by a wide margin. We also did visual inspections of numerous used ThinkPad keyboards to determine wear patterns. If you want to check your own system the glossier the key the more frequently it has been used. The tilde key on my system has no visible wear. Additionally we analyzed responses to a survey that I posted on this topic that allowed us to get even richer data, including respondant comments. Thanks to all who participated. In the end we decided to change the keyboard for what believe is the better. We increased the size of the delete and escape keys to make them more comfortable to use and mapped the shape to the vertical trajectory of the stroke. Okay we had to move the insert key to make way for a larger delete key, but our data indicated it was far less frequently used. We tested early hardware with real people and have used prototype machines with the keyboard modifications for over a year. As a side benefit we also think that we improved accidental striking of the F1 key by moving it to the right. Nice fix to a known reported issue. This has been quite a journey for my team, but I think it was worth it. I hope you've enjoyed reading about the detailed thinking that went into these changes, and more importantly, like the resulting experience we created.

David Hill

Puppy wrote:BTW I have heard rumors that IBM employees are currently receiving MacBooks as old ThinkPad upgrades.

lead_org wrote:From what I heard, the 6 rows keyboard change was Initiated by Microsoft as part of transition towards win 8.

Utwig wrote:I'm mainly using T540p for work almost a year now and I still press F1 instead of F2 and I have to look to hit insert or end.

If Lenovo would have to send user 10c for productivity (realistic price for 5 seconds for professionals who use Thinkpads) loss every time he/she pressed the wrong key due to layout change, I think they would have changed their mind very quickly.

Contrast Lenovo 6 rows change to IBM who hasn't budged to Windows key in 10 years.

lead_org wrote:From what I heard, the 6 rows keyboard change was Initiated by Microsoft as part of transition towards win 8.

Utwig wrote:Contrast Lenovo 6 rows change to IBM who hasn't budged to Windows key in 10 years.

MrMaguire wrote:Fair enough. But doesn't the Windows key (or rather the super key) also have its uses in Linux?

MrMaguire wrote:Where does this dislike of the Windows key come from? I find it to be quite useful for explorer shortcuts and what not.

lead_org wrote:From what I heard, the 6 rows keyboard change was Initiated by Microsoft as part of transition towards win 8.

lophiomys wrote: In general,
I consider those bloody newish keyboards - in their variations of bendy bases, chicklets, less-than-7-rows, keys-being-moved-around and poor tactile response - as blunt cost cutting measures and management failure.

jcvjcvjcvjcv wrote:Who gives a sh*t how it looks like? You're not supposed to look at it anyway. You're supposed to look at the screen and type 'blind'.

Only with 6-row keyboards is there a continuous need to look at the keyboard to (try) find some misplaced key.

As for shoving the keyboard back; you can do the same if you put the 9-cell battery in the body and use a taller screen. Overall footprint won't increase.

Also; huge touchpads are a nuisance anyway. Too much accidental swiping / clicking. Half the time my fingers are too dry to use a touchpad well anyway. Trackpoint is so much easier, especially in cramped places like train / bus / plane.

bhtooefr wrote: Most people, however, think the TrackPoint gets in the way - I see quite a few of my employer's laptops with the pointing stick cover removed by a user that doesn't want it, and a big trackpad that's properly tuned is helpful for most people (and my Mac's trackpad is completely intolerant of moisture, actually, my fingers need to be very dry for it to work well).

Utwig wrote:I'm mainly using T540p for work almost a year now and I still press F1 instead of F2 and I have to look to hit insert or end.

Puppy wrote:It is probably no longer issue because Windows 10 is going to be even bigger disaster than Windows 8 from I have seen yet.

MrMaguire wrote:Where does this dislike of the Windows key come from?

lophiomys wrote:IMO it might have, but it is just not necessary. This unfortunate Windows keys just reduce the size of CTRL and ALT keys, and make live more difficult.

bhtooefr wrote:15 mm more vertical space for the trackpad goes a very, very long way for trackpad users, and I think that's why they did it.

pianowizard wrote:

Puppy wrote:It is probably no longer issue because Windows 10 is going to be even bigger disaster than Windows 8 from I have seen yet.

A couple days ago I came across an article (on CNN?) saying that at least two thirds of all major companies have already indicated they are upgrading to 10.

Touchpad users needing huge touchpads remind me of older folks who think they need a huge desk to use a desktop mouse.