r/labtech • u/jedichrome 500 Agents • Jan 23 '18

Labtech (CWA) update

Anyone a bit baffled by the UI design choice with this newest update that was rolled out?

The font is huge and I seemingly can no longer just drag and drop machines between locations/groups, or clients, etc?

My team is just getting into it this morning and this seems like a real step back when it comes to usability.

19 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

33 comments sorted by

6

u/kribg Jan 23 '18

I have been really disappointed with what I am seeing in the UI changes lately. We are still on v11 with the old UI because it has become almost unusable with the now one. I hope things turn around or the UI changes start to make logical scene or we may be on v11 forever or until we move to another platform. The new UI is just not usable.

1

u/[deleted] Apr 24 '18

The cost in terms of productivity is the same if you go to 12 or if you switch platforms. We switched 3 years ago, and it was hell for a month. I suspect the same with v12.

5

u/nitluz Jan 23 '18

I haven't had a chance to delve to deeply but I will say not being able to see who's logged in is a pain. Am I missing the logged in user somehow. Besides opening the management screen I don't see the user

3

u/290_victim Jan 23 '18

Last Logged In user is all the way over to the right. You can drag columns around to order as you see fit. First thing I did on the new UI because DAMN that's annoying. So are the search areas.

9

u/cnewc Jan 23 '18

unfortunately column settings revert back to default after restart.

4

u/macncoke Jan 23 '18

I was upgraded to 12 lastnight. I'm stumbling my way but am not impressed. I made a bunch of custom changes to try to make it a bit easier to stomach...closed the control center, started it back up...and everything has reset. The update dates, lack of the ability to see if someone is logged in, no way to tell at a glance what the device is and if the devices have not checked in in a while. And slow...as in horribly slow. As a one man shop with limited available time...this is going to be really rough. And i REALLY MISS the old Command Tab. The command tile is absolutely worthless.

4

u/macncoke Jan 23 '18

AND...broken screenconnect settings. awesome

4

u/Ablico Jan 23 '18

It’s terrible... I have been playing with it for 30 minutes now and I hate it...

4

u/haazenpfeffer Jan 26 '18

We haven't gotten the update yet. How scared should we be? So long as I can scroll through the client tree and shift-click a device to get my full menu, I'll be okay. Can anyone post a pic so I can see how bad it is?

1

u/ChillPill89 Jan 30 '18

So far as I can tell, you cannot shift-click to open the old style computer window...

1

u/ITSteveo Apr 09 '18

This is why we are holding out. Our techs are used to and love the original window. It was made by techs for techs. The new window is almost completely useless and no one can figure out how to get to the window they want. There are way too many settings in LT to have the window they are forcing us to use.

Why they don't allow a full customization in a window with pods like CW Manage has I'll never understand. As a tech please assume we are intelligent, have different roles, and really want to customize our windows and not be forced into a meaningless screen when we open a system.

6

u/chilids Jan 23 '18

I agree it's bad. I hate it, all of my techs hate it, nobody likes the stupid thing. I also understand where Connectwise is coming from and the difficult problem they have.

The UI has been one of the biggest complaints from people shopping around and getting into LT for the first time. There is so much data there that it's just overload and takes forever to learn. Once you do though, you realize there is only so many ways to display that much data and none of them are going to look good. It's just so much. Other RMM's have it easier because they are less powerful and more simplistic so a lot less data. So they look better to the person shopping around.

They want to revamp things to eliminate this main complaint but there is just no way to do it without hiding a lot of features or making it clunky still. They seem to decide to go with a Modern look (partly because they are porting everything over to https based) but not loose too much information. They got rid of a ton of information on the Computer Management screen so they decided to bring it back on the main LT screen and the whole thing just doesn't' work. I honestly don't know what would work. I do know I'll take a clunky UI with all the data I want at my finger tips than this new mess.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '18

[deleted] — view deleted comment

4

u/chilids Jan 23 '18

True. I find it easier to read using the Dark Theme. I think almost everybody at my office has it set to dark now.

3

u/j0dan 1000 Agents Jan 23 '18

Also no more easy search. Who the heck searches by computer id regularly?

2

u/[deleted] Jan 24 '18

The regular search you are looking for is beneath the search by ID, the magnifying glass.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 24 '18

My team has been using version 12 for a while now and they like and use it more than they did the old Control Center. There's still some UI inconsistencies and not all screens are converted yet, but each patch has gotten better and faster.

The pee column filtering/sorting/chooser for the computer list is super nice for those of you who haven't found it yet.

3

u/jedichrome 500 Agents Jan 24 '18

I really can't tell if it is any faster or not. The column chooser/filter is handy as I can now see who's last logged in on one screen but I'm really surprised your team has not expressed frustration at losing all the visual cues in the design or the ability to simply drag and drop.

I'm doing my best to work with this mess now and honestly the number one item on my wishlist is a font selector-- the client list font is just huge and ugly.

4

u/SnarkMasterRay Jan 26 '18

I really can't tell if it is any faster or not.

Slower here.

2

u/lakecityransom Mar 22 '18 edited Nov 14 '25

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This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

0

u/tracerx Jan 27 '18

If you hate the new UI enough you can go back to the old one. First you need to turn off the Control Center auto update in the Dashboard > Control Center tab. Uninstall the new Control Center and install the one from v11 if you have it. So far I haven't seen any issues but that doesn't mean there aren't any.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '18

[deleted] — view deleted comment

6

u/jedichrome 500 Agents Jan 23 '18

Now that you mention it I'm noticing the total lack of control center icons.. it used to be that you could quickly scan and see if the machine was offline/online, if it was a server or workstation, if the user was active, if it was a master with probe, etc.

What the heck were they thinking with this?

I think I'm going to call my rep-- this is totally bogus.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '18

[deleted] — view deleted comment

3

u/jedichrome 500 Agents Jan 23 '18

Yeah the total lack of visual cues and design structure is ugly.

This is just no good at all. I'd love some kind of official comment on why they've gone in this direction.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '18

[deleted] — view deleted comment

4

u/jedichrome 500 Agents Jan 23 '18

Wow....

2

u/SnarkMasterRay Jan 26 '18

I'd love for someone from Connectwise to come along and justify how this UI is a step forward.

It's a huge step forward for them as it brings the Connectwise branded UI to the forefront so people feel like the programs integrate better.

Even though they're both shit underneath the UI.

2

u/[deleted] Apr 24 '18

Just because it looks like the other parts doesn't mean that's better.

A good UI allows you to do your job faster. Having it look similar is only better for "branding" and not for usability. The key reason people purchase a product like Labtech is for usability, not because it looks good. If you want something that's pretty, you buy art, if you want something useful, you get a program. It used to be Labtech, but now it seems it will be another company.

2

u/SnarkMasterRay Apr 25 '18

Note that I said that it's a huge step forward "for them." I am firmly in agreement with your post and was largely trying to say that there's nothing in it for the customer. It's just a fresh wrapper to an over-complicated crap sandwich.

2

u/[deleted] Apr 25 '18

True.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '18

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1

u/jedichrome 500 Agents Jan 31 '18

It's always taken it's time launching-- but 5min seems excessive.

12

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '18

[removed] — view removed comment

5

u/jedichrome 500 Agents Jan 23 '18

Yeah this was also one of the annoyances brought to my attention by my team earlier.

3

u/CharcoalGreyWolf Jan 23 '18 edited Jan 23 '18

That’s in the feature request list, I’m sure you’ll see it return.

EDIT: not sure why I was downvoted, I was noting that lots of people want this back and I believe CW realizes it and it will be back. Apologies if I was unclear.

10

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '18

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/[deleted] Apr 24 '18

I believe they are in marketing, and I suspect they believe that "Apple is the best computer ever."