> It seems to me that preference for UI styles is completely personal, probably being influenced by what OS we initially used.
My first GUI "OS" was Win3.1 and while i do have some bits of nostalgia for it, i do not think it is a particularly good UI. It is a bit better than Win95 in one element where they tried to introduce a consistency where every element that represented a command was supposed to have a 3D/bevel look while every element that was an input entry was supposed to have a 2D/flat look, but ultimately they didn't succeed completely (e.g. menus are flat even though they invoke commands) - and was ultimately abandoned once the "3d controls" were introduced (and later became the default style in Win95).
However i do think that Win95 is among the best styles not because it has the most pleasing looks, but because it is the most visually neutral while at the same time being among the most functional. During the 90s there were even games that used regular desktop controls and it felt fine because Win95's style didn't really clash with them (well, unless the user customized it, but that was up to the user's choice).
I was always annoyed by the apparent lack of consistency between flat and beveled elements in Win3.1, and liked 95 better for its relative homogeneity across the UI. Now I get why they did 3.1 that way! Thanks for explaining this.
My first GUI "OS" was Win3.1 and while i do have some bits of nostalgia for it, i do not think it is a particularly good UI. It is a bit better than Win95 in one element where they tried to introduce a consistency where every element that represented a command was supposed to have a 3D/bevel look while every element that was an input entry was supposed to have a 2D/flat look, but ultimately they didn't succeed completely (e.g. menus are flat even though they invoke commands) - and was ultimately abandoned once the "3d controls" were introduced (and later became the default style in Win95).
However i do think that Win95 is among the best styles not because it has the most pleasing looks, but because it is the most visually neutral while at the same time being among the most functional. During the 90s there were even games that used regular desktop controls and it felt fine because Win95's style didn't really clash with them (well, unless the user customized it, but that was up to the user's choice).