Consider Changing "Ascending / Descending" to "Smallest first / Largest first"?

tl;dr

If we want to make it a tiny amount easier / more intuitive / save a button click, “Largest first” and “Smallest first” would save a bit of cognition [when sorting].


I’ve noticed that every time I set a sort I have to think for half a second before remembering whether I want Ascending or Descending. I’ve also seen this with my doc users.

Obviously, it’s not hard to just click and see, but I always wondered why it felt weird.

I think the issue is that when you click Ascending, you’re saying:
give me a list where as the numbers descend the page they ascend in value
whereas when you click Descending you’re saying:
give me a list where as the numbers descend the page they descend in value.” (or also “as they ascend the page they ascend in value”)

It’s really fine how it is. But if we wanted to make it a tiny amount easier / more intuitive / save a button click, “Largest first” and “Smallest first” would save a bit of cognition. It’s obvious what they mean.


Exception: Sorting by letter. This just requires you to know that lexicographical sorts treat z as bigger than a, which means if you don’t know this you’ll have to play around. If people want a list sorted alphabetically from a->z and “Smallest first” is not what they tend to pick, then I’m wrong and the current terminology is better.

Trying to think of ways to make this better for new users and for my users, even if it’s only 1% better. :slight_smile:

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I agree. Plain English is better UX.

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It could be something ala A>Z, 1>9. The Coda Icon pack has some great ones I use for my page icons: Screen Shot 2020-06-17 at 3.40.36 PM
I agree this would be more intuitive, especially for novices.

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