I just can't seem to find an alarm clock that just doesn't suck. The makers of these things all seem to think that everyone works the same hours five days a week, has perfect vision, and never mis-presses a control.
There are plenty of alarm clocks out there with large numerical displays. That isn't the only thing people need to see. Now days most have little icons on the face to tell you if the alarm in engaged, whether it will be the radio or a chime when it goes off, whether you are in standard or summer time (kind of useless), your time zone (more useless), AM/PM (I'd be just as happy with 24 hour time) and I'm sure some things that escape me right now.
I don't have much problem with the displays, but there is room for improvement. The icon that shows whether or not the alarm in engaged should be large enough for someone who wears glasses to see it without them. The rest can remain small or simply leave the indication to the position of the switch on the back.
Color could be used. Most are still segmented LED displays. With two primary color LEDs for each segment you would have the possibility for three colors them.
Red & green gives you the additional possibility of yellow.
Red & blue gives you the additional possibility of purple.
Green & blue gives you the additional possibility of cyan, but this is hard to distinguish by eye.
The color of the display could be used to show AM vs. PM. The color of the icon could be used to show whether alarm will be the chime or the radio. There are other options to be worked out through user testing.
Buttons are a huge issue. Almost every alarm clock I see has buttons of the same shape and size with the function labeling molded in or in small type adjacent to the button itself. Neither option is good for someone with poor vision in a poorly lit or dark room.
I know that the Genius Designers will hate this. They all seem to want to be in MOMA, but this is a fucking tool. Each button should have a distinctive shape and/or color indicating it's function and should, of course, be as large a practicable.
Mistakes should be back-outable. The one I have now (the RCA RP5430) has a Nap button which simply starts a countdown selectable in ten minute increments. This is a nice feature. The only problem is that you can't back out of it, or, if you can, the way to do so isn't apparent without reading the instruction sheet that I threw out ages ago. When I accidentally hit it I have to set it to its minimum time and wait for it to go off before I even think of going to sleep for real.
Lastly a word about functionality missing in every alarm clock I've looked at As I've mentioned, not everyone gets up at the same time every day of the week. I have four different times in an average week. Changing the alarm four times a week sucks. I'm sure that there are some with even more wake up times than me and I'm sure it sucks more for them. Sometimes people who share a bed have different schedules for getting up. This means that a non-sucky alarm clock would have one preset per person per day of the week, fourteen in all. Add another for unusual occasions for fifteen.
What sucks is that making an alarm clock with these features isn't hard or costly. Modern programmable processors are cheap especially in bulk.
I'm not sure about the usefulness of an alarm clock after the zombie apocalypse. Survivors should travel in groups to watch each others backs and to have someone to stand watch while the others sleep. An alarm clock would only serve to attract the undead.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Friday, November 19, 2010
Can Openers
About a year and a half ago I lost my can opener of 15 years. I probably dropped it in the trash and took it out to the Dumpster without noticing. One would think that this is a trivial replacement. This was not the case. I've gone through quite a few in the last 18ish months and finally found a good one.
First I'll talk about the bad ones.
The first one I bought was the butterfly type with the punch that pokes a triangular hole in the can at one end and a bottle opener at the other. It had a small blade that cuts the metal and a drive wheel that is rotated with the butterfly crank. This just didn't work well. The wheel didn't grip the edge of the can unless you held it at just the right angle and really squeezed the handles, hurting my hand. And, because of the need to really squeeze the handles it didn't last long. I bought it because it was all I could find at the grocery store and it was cheap. I went through several of these.
For a while after that I just used the can opener on my Leatherman multitool. This worked but it was slow going and it left very jagged edges on the top of the can making it difficult to remove.
The next one I bought was one of those side cutting types, this one from OXO. It was kind of expensive. It felt great in the hand. The handles and crank are large and have a slightly grippy surface. Most importantly it also opened the can easily.
Unfortunately there are a couple deal breaking downsides. The first is that it takes a lot of drawer space. It a small kitchen that is an issue. The large handles and padding pretty much made it impossible to throw it in the drawer, give the drawer a little shake and have it fit with all the other crap that is in there.
The second failing is something many people think is a plus. It's a side cutter. This is to reduce the risk of cutting yourself on the sharp edges that top cutters leave.
Come on people. You are in a room full of knives. Exercising the caution needed to avoid injury is part of being there. Our ancestors butchered game with obsidian knives. We should be able to open a can without hurting ourselves.
The real problem with side cutters appears when you open a can of tuna or meat packed in broth. With a top cutter you just hold the can over the sink and press the freshly cut top into the can to squeeze the fluid out through a gap that is just the right size. With side cutter the top won't fit inside the can and if you try to hold it on the edge and pour you will probably wind up spilling the contents and still find that a lot of fluid stays behind.
After all this I decided to find out the brand of my old one. That's right. I actually did pre-purchase research on a can opener.
After a little bit of googling I found that is was a Swing-a-Way 407xx (the 'X's representing a color code). I now knew what to look for in the stores. Target Ho!.
It turned out that Target had them … sort of. They didn't have the normal model 407 but some "special" one with a modified design by Michael Graves, that was kind of expensive. The plastic handles he replaced the metal ones with spun around and fell off. He added a grippy surface to the crank, which was nice, but I could tell would be a point failure in the future and a magnet to remove tops that fall in that just wasn't strong enough to do so. It was all marketing gimickry, trivial "improvements" and a "designer" label. Only a big shot celebrity designer could take a design that has been around since the thirties and make it worse. I promptly returned it, and I guess a lot of people have done so since it isn't on Targets web site.
The good news is that I finally found one in my local Ace hardware. I should just start going there first since they always seem to have what I'm looking for. The bad news is that they are now made in China. It looks and feels as I remember my old one did. Knowing the Chinese reputation for using cheap steel only time will tell if it is made as well.
This episode is more evidence of something I've been more and more convinced of over the years. It is a rare event when modifications of mature technology are a net improvement and frequently are just useless bells and whistles. The fat handles on the OXO were offset by the extra drawer space it took. The side cutter's reduction of the small risk of a minor injury was offset by the definite increase of spillage. The Michael Graves modifications made it look good in the store but reduced its actual usefulness.
Now that I have a good can opener they'll probably start putting pop tops on everything.
SECOND/ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS: While bemoaning my can opener woes some people have suggested an electric one. Besides the fact that they are just indolent (unless you are arthritic), they take up counter space, use electricity, which isn't free, they would be useless after a zombie apocalypse, by which time I would be using my Leatherman multitool anyway.
First I'll talk about the bad ones.
The first one I bought was the butterfly type with the punch that pokes a triangular hole in the can at one end and a bottle opener at the other. It had a small blade that cuts the metal and a drive wheel that is rotated with the butterfly crank. This just didn't work well. The wheel didn't grip the edge of the can unless you held it at just the right angle and really squeezed the handles, hurting my hand. And, because of the need to really squeeze the handles it didn't last long. I bought it because it was all I could find at the grocery store and it was cheap. I went through several of these.
For a while after that I just used the can opener on my Leatherman multitool. This worked but it was slow going and it left very jagged edges on the top of the can making it difficult to remove.
The next one I bought was one of those side cutting types, this one from OXO. It was kind of expensive. It felt great in the hand. The handles and crank are large and have a slightly grippy surface. Most importantly it also opened the can easily.
Unfortunately there are a couple deal breaking downsides. The first is that it takes a lot of drawer space. It a small kitchen that is an issue. The large handles and padding pretty much made it impossible to throw it in the drawer, give the drawer a little shake and have it fit with all the other crap that is in there.
The second failing is something many people think is a plus. It's a side cutter. This is to reduce the risk of cutting yourself on the sharp edges that top cutters leave.
Come on people. You are in a room full of knives. Exercising the caution needed to avoid injury is part of being there. Our ancestors butchered game with obsidian knives. We should be able to open a can without hurting ourselves.
The real problem with side cutters appears when you open a can of tuna or meat packed in broth. With a top cutter you just hold the can over the sink and press the freshly cut top into the can to squeeze the fluid out through a gap that is just the right size. With side cutter the top won't fit inside the can and if you try to hold it on the edge and pour you will probably wind up spilling the contents and still find that a lot of fluid stays behind.
After all this I decided to find out the brand of my old one. That's right. I actually did pre-purchase research on a can opener.
After a little bit of googling I found that is was a Swing-a-Way 407xx (the 'X's representing a color code). I now knew what to look for in the stores. Target Ho!.
It turned out that Target had them … sort of. They didn't have the normal model 407 but some "special" one with a modified design by Michael Graves, that was kind of expensive. The plastic handles he replaced the metal ones with spun around and fell off. He added a grippy surface to the crank, which was nice, but I could tell would be a point failure in the future and a magnet to remove tops that fall in that just wasn't strong enough to do so. It was all marketing gimickry, trivial "improvements" and a "designer" label. Only a big shot celebrity designer could take a design that has been around since the thirties and make it worse. I promptly returned it, and I guess a lot of people have done so since it isn't on Targets web site.
The good news is that I finally found one in my local Ace hardware. I should just start going there first since they always seem to have what I'm looking for. The bad news is that they are now made in China. It looks and feels as I remember my old one did. Knowing the Chinese reputation for using cheap steel only time will tell if it is made as well.
This episode is more evidence of something I've been more and more convinced of over the years. It is a rare event when modifications of mature technology are a net improvement and frequently are just useless bells and whistles. The fat handles on the OXO were offset by the extra drawer space it took. The side cutter's reduction of the small risk of a minor injury was offset by the definite increase of spillage. The Michael Graves modifications made it look good in the store but reduced its actual usefulness.
Now that I have a good can opener they'll probably start putting pop tops on everything.
SECOND/ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS: While bemoaning my can opener woes some people have suggested an electric one. Besides the fact that they are just indolent (unless you are arthritic), they take up counter space, use electricity, which isn't free, they would be useless after a zombie apocalypse, by which time I would be using my Leatherman multitool anyway.
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