The latest rev of the redesign

 The latest rev of the redesign

The bizarre wide text tracking is gone, which is a relief, and the base text size has been reduced. Restoring avatars to the names in the popover when you hover the updates control is a welcome reversion (but that element still has the wide text tracking). The compose field on iOS now allows for overflow text scrolling, which is great. Formatting controls still don’t apply tags correctly when more than one word is selected though.

The avatar icons have been reduced in size a bit, which is good, but they keep the same large corner radius so the rounding is even more overbearing by comparison. Hanging the avatar to the left of the text greatly reduces the available space for nested comments on mobile. Third layer deep is cramped and fourth is reduced to a column of text with one word per line. Also you’ve kept the avatar-anchored profile overlay, which is now smaller since the avatar is smaller and the text is fitted awkwardly inside. Seriously, this whole pattern is amateurish, especially when compared to what it replaces.

The base font is still Robotic. Not replacing the original definition, but inserted on top as an override. I would love to hear the design justification for this decision. Previously, Mac/iOS users would get Helvetica Neue, Windows would get Arial, and Android would default to Robotic. Now, Android users (and developers/designers who have manually installed the font) get Robots and everyone else gets a sans serif fallback. It’s the visual presentation of the core of your product and you’re that much more leaving it to a roll of the dice. Why?

This isn’t getting into an assortment of other issues — clock icons attached to timestamps, omnipresent follow icons, popover inconsistency, etc. My impression of the first pass was that it looked like a third-party re-skinning that was done without Discus’ input. That hasn’t changed. I would not ship this product as it currently stands.