Anduril

Fixed the misspelled UI name.

Let’s play a game. Which of these are NOT actual modes for the current version of the Anduril UI:

1. Sunset Mode

2. Lightning Storm Mode

3. Candle Mode

4. Candle Timer Mode

5. Party Strobe Mode

6. Tactical Strobe Mode

7. Bike Flasher Mode

8. Muggle Mode

Ha! Its a trick question. ALL of these modes are hidden modes in Anduril UI. Because, you know, you need at least four different kinds of strobes (Candle Mode, Candle Timer Mode, Party Strobe Mode, Tactical Strobe Mode). God forbid you get the Party Strobe and Tactical Strobe mixed up and accidentally cause a flash mob at your next SWAT door breaching home entry.

Anduril UI is an abomination—a bit of flashlight programming flex/masturbation that deluded people think is a feature. Anduril UI is a bug, not a feature. It pains me to write that because I appreciate all of the work that ToyKeeper, its creator, has done to make the UI do everything, but Anduril UI is just too much. I also appreciate ToyKeeper’s collaborative philosophy. Finally, I like flashlights because they are technical. I consider myself a pretty hardcore flashlight enthusiast. But Anduril UI is nuts. It is both “impressive” nuts and “stupid” nuts.

Sure, it is great that someone developed this complex system and it is open source. I love that about the Internet and the enthusiast mindset. And yes, if you just use it without messing around, its pretty darn good in smooth ramp memory mode. But if you miss a click when it should be a hold or accidentally over count your 13 click input (yes, there is a 13 click input for a factory reset because, you know, two methods of reset aren’t enough, and actually, if you check ToyKeeper’s blog for the Anduril UI there is a THIRD method for resets for lights like the F3WA that can’t do a tailcap removal, because, remember the nubbin?), good luck.

EVERYTHING about the Anduril UI is too complicated. This isn’t a crotchety old man complaint. I can use the UI. I can get it to do what I want about 95% of the time. Instead this is a philosophical critique. The UI, given the input methods used on lights that run it, is too complex.

Why are there two different factory reset methods? And why are none of them as simple as: “Remove battery, wait some period of time longer than is needed to change batteries, and then re-insert battery?” Want a bit of the insanity “explained”? If your light has auxiliary LEDs, in my case, they are RGB micro LEDs, you first go to configure mode, then drop into aux LED configure mode, then you configure them with either 7 or 3 clicks (7 for off and 3 for lock out). I’d like to add that the normal “lockout” mode is achieved with 4 clicks, so if you think that carries over to the aux LEDs you are wrong. Its also true that 3 clicks from off does something entirely different when you are not in the aux LED configure mode. Why make it that way? Ready for this—there are 13 different inputs from off with a single button: 1-6 as a click, 1-6 as a hold, and 13 as hold. Also, many of those inputs have different outcomes if the light is on already. So 4 clicks when the light is off goes to lock out, while 4 clicks when the light is on goes to ramp configuration. That seems like a bad idea. And then there is the perennial question flashlight fans know too well—what the hell is the difference between a click and a hold? .5 seconds, 1 second, 2? I have no idea.

My favorite part of the Anduril UI is its apologists. When I said that I thought it was too complex multiple Andurilophiles said that I could just flash it. So I looked into to that. And, guess what, it is insanely complex. You need board connectors, monitoring devices, and a bunch of other stuff that no normal person owns. I am not even sure if NASA owns all of this stuff.

Complexity is not a goal. It should never be a design goal. Ever. If you have read DOET (“Design of Everyday Things” by Don Norman), you will remember the anecdote about the mini van that had the gas cap in the path to open its sliding door. To prevent the sliding door from ripping off the gas cap door and the gas cap itself, the van’s manufacturer rigged this system that locked out the sliding door when the gas cap door was open. It added hundreds of extra pieces and man hours to the process of building the vehicle, when all they had to do was switch the gas cap to the other side of the mini van. This is exactly what Anduril UI is. Instead of altering the input device (the flashlight’s on/off switch) Anduril creates this massively complex system to compensate for the lack of inputs.

When I look at Anduril lights and compare them to other lights like the HDS Rotary or the JetBeam RRT-01 v2, I see the Anduril UI as a workaround that is necessary because flashlight makers don’t want to invest in new or different input methods. A button on a body tube is cheap to make. A selector ring is not. The HDS Rotary also has a complex UI, but its main input, the selector ring/button combo, is so simple that you never have to use anything else AND (unlike Anduril) it is virtually impossible to fall into a hidden mode accidentally.

In the end, the Anduril UI is just too complicated, clunky, and nuanced to use. Norman also talks about mental modes DOET, ways in which we conceive how things work in our heads, usually before we use them or after we have become habituated to them. Anduril is too complex to allow for a mental model, hence the UI chart we have all seen that looks like the emergency system diagram from Three Mile Island.

Anduril has real potential. But until its design flaws are fixed or input methods change, it is a liability in a flashlight. If you walk away or aren’t incredibly attentive, you might render your light an inert paperweight or, more annoying, a flashing spastic mess. It makes a flashlight less useful and that no tool should be designed, from the outset, to be less useful.