"people always complain about UI changes at first and then they get used to it" i'm going to break into your house and put all your important stuff you use every day in random drawers and see how you like it. i'm gonna hide your phone in the towel cupboard. i'll put all your spoons in the fridge. all writing utensils are now stored under a floorboard that i've drawn a pencil on (in very light pencil so you can't actually see it)
if you want your software to be a part of users' everyday lives then it has to be reliable and predictable. you can't just change the entire shape of it on a whim no matter how much better you think it is. make small changes slowly or leave it the fuck alone. a UI overhaul is rarely a good idea because even if it really is "better" you are straining the fragile trust of your userbase by throwing them unexpectedly into HEY LEARN A NEW THING when it is fucking thursday or whatever and they are busy or maybe have an urgent message to send to someone. it's disrespectful. it's a breach of common decency. you shouldn't overhaul your entire UI on a whim any more than you should "deliver" a package by hucking it through an open window at the recipient's head. take the time to knock, or at least don't complain when they yell at you and throw stuff back.
or at least, outside of their areas of deep understanding
Like look, most people, the vast majority of people have absolutely abysmal computer skills. I'd wager that's not you, the person reading this, by virtue of a selection bias - but it is most people.
But I've seen this pattern over and over with people who aren't enthusiastic computer touchers - they don't internalize a computer/app as a generalized system with common UI conventions and frameworks and reusable elements that always behave predictably in different contexts, etc, etc. They interact with these things through a set of memorized steps that gets them to the thing they want to do.
And this is particularly disastrous because if you just constantly change the steps out from under them, not only do you break their set of memorized steps, but their understanding of the program is often limited in ways that make it harder to explore software as a collection of common, understandable systems and what you end up teaching them is learned helplessness.
It is a system of arbitrary changes inflicted on them for seemingly no discernible gain that constantly changes the thing they're trying really hard to memorize how to use. It's a random punishment scheme!
And it's kind of a delicate balance, because yeah, you know what? Your UI as it exists now is probably not ideal. You probably made some compromises or didn't anticipate ways that it would be used, or accessibility pitfalls only became evident after it shipped! Sometimes you've gotta do the hard thing and break routines to get better!
But gosh it sucks that all of our tools that we use every day keep changing unpredictably every few months.
as someone who works with Regular Folks at a computer repair shop, i will stress that if you are making software for the general public, and you move the UI around for what to you feels like a decent reason, your customers want you dead. they hate you. they would like to see you crucified for making their tool change shape while they're holding it
