The replacement for the UWP app doesn’t seem to support touch that well. For example:
Unable to seek when playing a video (the seeking bar jumps all over the place).
Unable to pause video using the pause/resume button when playing video (it thinks there’s a double click?).
On the video details page the add to playlist button invokes the virtual keyboard, but no model pops up.
On the video details page, the play button on the upper right or clicking the video thumbnail causes the player to flash, but not start the video.
On the dashboard, clicking the edit button causes the player to flash, but does not open the edit model.
On top of that, many elements are not touch friendly e.g.
The scroll bars are difficult to use.
The seeking bar is difficult to move.
The volume bar is near impossible to use.
These are all done with a Microsoft Surface Pro.
For this app to be a replacement for the UWP app, it really needs touch support. That’s the only reason I was using the UWP app, the web player had similar issues.
I second that. Plex Media Player and Plex both have issues with touch support. Using an HP Elite X2 G3 and Windows 10 Pro. I’m lost without the trackpad or an external mouse - which is pretty inconvenient when you’re in tablet mode…
PMP, Plex Web, and the new app are all bad when it comes to touch support. Try starting playback and then going to fullscreen. It requires multiple tap attempts unless you’re really, really quick and know exactly where to tap predictively. Usually you end up pausing, resuming, pausing again… The main issue is that the UIs rely heavily on mouseovers for functionality.
The button that zooms to fullscreen after you start playing - appears with pointer movement
Bringing up controls during playback - appears with pointer movement
Titles too long to fit beneath the poster/thumbnail - hover over to reveal*
Library menu to scan, edit, empty trash - hover over to reveal
The list goes on… These actions don’t exist with a touch interface. For many things, you have to touch the screen to bring up controls, which pauses playback. Sometimes I see the controls disappear as I’m about to tap on them, which then resumes playback, but now the controls are gone. Aaaaand I have to tap again.
*This one is especially aggravating in the new app, even with a mouse/touchpad. The full title appears for about half a second before disappearing again.
Okay, after giving this some more thought and using the Plex Web UI (with a touchpad) for the past hour or so, I have some ideas on how better touch input can be done. In an ideal scenario, there would be a checkbox in the player settings called “Enable Touch Features” or something like that. When that’s checked, behaviors and UI elements get updated…
Some things that needed mouseovers can be accomplished by touch & hold. Like bringing up the full title’s text (floating the text close, but far enough from the touch point to be readable).
Some things that needed mouse movements can be accomplished by traditional touch gestures. Like swiping up from the bottom, or down from the top, to display playback controls. Or maybe having the playback screen have a “safe touch zone” which could be the bottom 20% and doesn’t pause/resume, but only serves to display playback controls. Needless to say, the playback controls need to stay on screen long enough to digest what does what and be able to tap on buttons before they fade away.
Some elements hidden for the sake of cleaner aesthetics can just be shown by default. Like three-dot/hamburger menus.
Some buttons can be pseudo-duplicated to shortcut options that previously required tap, tap, taptaptaptap… Like having two play buttons, one to start playback in an existing, windowed state, one to start playback with an immediately zoomed, fullscreen state.
@Plan-B I would rather have the UX consider touch support while building out the UI. For example, YouTube doesn’t need to switch between touch and non-touch modes. The UI was designed for both types of input in mind. Although, YouTube’s accessibility design likely also helps (full keyboard control is amazing).
But like you said before, the UI should never rely on hover events, there should always be safe click zones, there should be a button for everything, every element should have a minimum click area.
@deactivated I can definitely see touch support being difficult to implement (requires a good amount of experience), I wouldn’t be surprised if touch devices aren’t a common thought in Plex testing or UX architecture/design. However, at this time, the app is basically broken for touch users. It would be nice to prioritize core functionality (e.g. video playback) . Or at the very least, don’t break the Plex API for the UWP until core functionality is restored.
Latest Plex version 1.2.x (08/27/2019): Still no chance to start playback with my finger on a touchscreen (HP Elite X2 G3). The Plex window is just flashing. No problems at all with mouse or trackpad…
Yeah Touch support is pretty rough currently still unusable on a touch screen device depending on your goals. I cannot download on my surface without connecting a mouse.
What I don’t get is: Almost every UI-element works like expected. The buttons “Play”, “Add To Playlist”, “Mark As Played” and “Download” do not - when you navigate to a specific episode in a tv show for instance.
Just wanted to make sure you all understand that we will improve in this regard although it won’t be right away. I’ll be certain to call it out in our release notes when available.
I think we understand this takes time. I would be happy to run beta versions if that means we can get support quicker. Would you say there’s a high chance of getting a basic MVP on the roadmap in the next year?
Just please don’t break the only client that supports touch under Windows (UWP) until basic support for touch is added to the player app (e.g. can play video and interact with video controls without a mouse).
For those like me who have been struggling to use Plex for Windows with a touch-screen device, I’ve found that the only way to resume a video is to press-and-hold in the center of the poster to trigger a right-click on the hover-activated play button. The “resume or start over” dialog will then display, and an option can be chosen by tapping on the screen.
The touch experience is simply atrocious in the new Windows app, not to mention the performance struggles.
. Or at the very least, don’t break the Plex API for the UWP until core functionality is restored.