# Examples of bad design

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-bad-design/512109>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [September 30, 2009, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-bad-design/512109 "2009-09-30T15:28:02Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 9

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**Author:** ![Cardinal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cardinal/32/4000_2.png) [@Cardinal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardinal)\
**Post date:** [October 7, 2009, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-bad-design/512109/161 "2009-10-07T04:16:31Z")

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USB ports/plugs. There’s absolutely no reason they couldn’t have been made asymmetrical so you could spot the right way up to put the plug, but apparently they were designed by someone from the Microsoft Hero Worship House of Design, which values mechanical purity over actual ease of use, and wishes there were hexagonal flowers for the front garden because they could then be stored nicely together in keepsake volumes with no wasted space.

I mean, really. The level of Ignore the Customer and Just Draw Something Karl that design took makes me want to take away their drafting computer. “Ah, they can guess. How hard can it be? What, it might be behind the desk at night facing the wrong way with the stereo blocking it? Well, they should have planned ahead! We certainly do!”

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**Author:** ![rjk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ed655f/32.png) [@rjk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjk)\
**Post date:** [October 7, 2009, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-bad-design/512109/162 "2009-10-07T06:14:58Z")

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> [@CutterJohn](#):
>
> [QUOTE=rjk]  
> Second, the history is indexed on everything, not just on meaningful words. For example, when I want to go to xkcd, I type ‘x’ and FF shows me a list including URLs of pictures whose descriptions include the size (e.g. ‘640 **x** 480’). Now that’s useful!

It is, actually. If it didn’t search the middle of stuff, the search wouldn’t be nearly as useful. If you were searching for the dope, and typed in ‘straightdope’ nothing would come up, you would have to remember that the url started with ‘boards’.  
[/QUOTE]

Not at all. Those dots separate the words, so the index had the word ‘boards’ and the word ‘straightdope’ and so on, as I would expect. The ‘x’ in ‘640 **x** 480’ could, I suppose, be considered a word, but FF finds ‘x’ in the middle of words, like ‘inde **x** ing’ or the random strings you see in some urls. (See Google Books, for example.)

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**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\
**Post date:** [October 7, 2009, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-bad-design/512109/163 "2009-10-07T06:42:43Z")

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Sorry guys about that link. The website was a badly designed website about badly designed websites. Normally I wouldn’t link to a site buried that deep, but I couldn’t resist. I don’t appear to be infected, and Avira, which scored higher in recent antivirus tests, didn’t detect it.

Anyways, in consolation, I offer [http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/](http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/) No meta, though ☹

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