Hey, here’s a fun exercise. Pay $1.99 for Simplenote, an iPhone note-taking app that came heartily recommended by John Gruber as a be-all, end-all replacement for Apple’s native Notes app, largely because it features syncing.
Write a few notes. Remark that the UI is sparse but easy to use.
Now register a Simplenote account for syncing. And while you’re typing in your password, mistype a few keystrokes because — let’s be honest — typing on the iPhone isn’t always a perfect science. Since there’s no “confirm password” field (where you would normally type your password a second time for just this purpose), click Done.
Now try to login to the web app. Discover your password isn’t working. Click the “Forgot your password?” prompt, and once you receive it, realize you typed it in wrong. Whoops, but it happens. Now try to change the password using the iPhone app.
Oh wait, you can’t.
Hmm, okay. Well, you can change it on the web app, so do so.
Now go back to enjoying Simplenote. Ride the Muni, wait in long lines, and use Simplenote to record brilliant diatribes, award-winning blog entries, and first-draft formats for your fabulously well-received Keynote presos. Giggle to yourself as you marvel that every last character is (presumably) syncing to the web effortlessly.
Wait a few days and log in to the web app, and notice that all your diatribes, blog entries, preso notes, etc., aren’t there. Hunh.
So go back to the iPhone app, go into settings and force sync. Notice the tiny little “sync error” message that appears in the lower right, with no popup dialog telling you that a major, bullet-point feature of this paid app is failing for some unexplained reason.
Now remember that password kerfuffle from a few days back, and use your Holmesian logic to deduce that the iPhone app doesn’t know the new password — just the old mistyped one.
So go into the app’s settings to “Change Login Details.” Get a big scary confirmation prompt warning you that changing those details will erase all non-synced notes. As in, all the notes that haven’t been syncing because the passwords didn’t match. As in, the exact opposite of what you want to have happen.
Spew rage about this whole ridiculous process on Twitter, take a deep breath, and e-mail yourself all your notes one-by-one. Then change account details to the new password. Now copy and paste the emailed notes into the web app. Hit “Force sync” just to make sure they copy over.
Plan your diatribe against Simplenote. But do it in TextEdit just to be safe.
2 replies on “Simplenote User Experience FAIL”
Hi Scott, I’m a Simplenote developer. You’re right, this is unacceptable. I’ve sent you a more detailed response by email. Thanks for bringing this to our attention.
Thanks for identifying the problem and giving a work-around solution. I’ve been burnt by this ‘Sync Error’. I did it by changing my password after initial syncing success and now have to track back to see where it started and what’s where. Not happy with Simplenote nor Mr Gruber but thank you for the help.