Does anyone else find Beersmith clunky?

The_Bishop · Jul 2, 2015

I gave a trial run a Beer Tools Pro, due to several people here giving it a thumbs-up. Holy crap, couldn't get *anything* done in it. It seemed to be the most counter-intuitive software I've ever used. Having to manually enter all the mash steps, the vessels, etc. The interface on BS may not be optimal, but once it's set up it's *all* there. No hunting through a bunch of menus to find things.

Bobby_M · Jul 2, 2015

Well, there is some setup required with BTP. I will give Beersmith the edge due to having several equipment setups preloaded. However, BTP wins on the user interface all day long. For one thing, you can drag and drop ingredients from the side bar browser to the recipe window. You can duplicate items on the recipe window quickly and edit the amounts and times directly on the recipe page without opening up extra dialog boxes. Don't underestimate how much more intuitive and quick that is.

In the mash scheduler, you absolutely have to disconnect any ingrained beersmith process out of your head. It doesn't work the same way. It's not a wizard so you have to intentionally add things to the process. Mash in, rest (additional infusions if you want), rest again if you want, sparge. All different steps. What I do like is that it's always telling you how much volume is available to drain out. Beersmith does not.

Brettomomyces · Jul 3, 2015

Bobby_M said:
The last straw for me was realizing that you can't copy/paste hops in the recipe designer and it really slows me down on a daily basis.

This^^^^^

I obviously don't use it nearly as much as you do...but I really wish this was a feature.

passedpawn · Jul 3, 2015

Bobby_M said:
The last straw for me was realizing that you can't copy/paste hops in the recipe designer and it really slows me down on a daily basis.

So many times I've selected a malt or hop in the recipe and hit the delete key on my keyboard. Why doesn't that work?

NervousDad · Jul 3, 2015

what would be ideal is if you could copy paste then in the "grid" use up and down selectors to adjust min/ibu/grams. When I get to the whirlpool and flameout it drives me nuts entering the hops.

kh54s10 · Jul 3, 2015

I used what is now Brewtoad. It was better, IMO, before they changed it. It was more plug and play and did not give nearly the same control that Beersmith does. I agree that it could be better (easier interface) but once you get used to it, it works great. It now only takes me about 10 - 15 minutes to work up a new recipe. Unless I mess around to see what different ingredients do to the beer. Then it can take days-months.

Brad has said that he is doing a new work up on Beersmith. I think that when he has finished it will be more what everyone is looking for.

Helloworld · Jul 6, 2015

Firewalker11 said:
No, no more so than Excel or Access. I guess if you want a kids toy with a primary colored GUI and big buttons, BrewSmith isn't for you but if you want a powerful tool that is a solid workhorse, then yes, get BrewSmith.

Sheesh, iPad generation....

I use Excel regularly for structural and geotechnical engineering problem solving. It isn't that I can't use the software, it is that I don't like the interface.

Helloworld · Jul 6, 2015

djonesax said:
I should clarify, I like the software and will continue to use it but the last UI seemed easier on the eyes.

David

Although I didn't see the old version, this is the only point I was trying to make. I use it for every recipe. I just don't like the user interface. Everyone seems to think I looked at it once and decided it was too hard because I am stupid.

blizz81 · Jul 6, 2015

kh54s10 said:
Brad has said that he is doing a new work up on Beersmith. I think that when he has finished it will be more what everyone is looking for.

I guess I wouldn't expect a miracle. As a guy who has worked in coding some personally and professionally, it has felt like to me over the life of Beersmith that the dev (Brad) is the type that likes / excels at doing logic and calculations, but is not proficient at design and UI. Maybe I'm wrong and he just doesn't have time, but I've seen my share of UI guys that "don't get" the back-end and back-end guys that struggle going the other way (myself included, possibly Brad). Every once in a while, you get devs that are great at both.

jaydlaw · Jul 6, 2015

blizz81 said:
I guess I wouldn't expect a miracle. As a guy who has worked in coding some personally and professionally, it has felt like to me over the life of Beersmith that the dev (Brad) is the type that likes / excels at doing logic and calculations, but is not proficient at design and UI. Maybe I'm wrong and he just doesn't have time, but I've seen my share of UI guys that "don't get" the back-end and back-end guys that struggle going the other way (myself included, possibly Brad). Every once in a while, you get devs that are great at both.

That's my thought as well. If feels like a DBA or database developer made the ui. I see that there is more info there and as I get more advanced I may change my stance and utilize it but right now I'm happy with brewers friend

JordanKnudson · Jul 6, 2015

It's interesting that many of the people who have had a complaint with BeerSmith on this thread have also noted that they are IT folks. I wonder if they are evaluating it based on more software-development-specific expectations than I am (not that you can't dislike it for totally legitimate reasons). But as someone who is not a tech guy, I approached BeerSmith without any expectations of what a "proper" user interface should be, and just learned to use it as it is. I've had absolutely zero problem with it coming at it from that perspective. I do wish certain features were included (wish I could add custom ingredient items to the database, for example), but I feel that such omissions are inevitable in any software, and part of the ongoing development process is to identify and improve these areas. I guess what I'm saying is that, having learned BeerSmith without any preconceptions about how it "should" operate, I don't find it clunky and I have no problems working with it.

Also, without meaning this as a jab, it seems to me that if you are an IT type, you should have a way easier time with it than me, so I'm wondering why so many of you find it difficult...

blizz81 · Jul 6, 2015

A cumbersome interface is a cumbersome interface regardless of who is using it.

I think Beersmith is largely good at what it does at its price point / intended audience. I don't ask much of it & I'm happy with what I paid for it. That said, there's still things I've written on my own for my brewhouse that I use alongside BS, and I use other free web-based tools as well.

passedpawn · Jul 6, 2015

JordanKnudson said:
It's interesting that many of the people who have had a complaint with BeerSmith on this thread have also noted that they are IT folks. I wonder if they are evaluating it based on more software-development-specific expectations than I am (not that you can't dislike it for totally legitimate reasons). But as someone who is not a tech guy, I approached BeerSmith without any expectations of what a "proper" user interface should be, and just learned to use it as it is. I've had absolutely zero problem with it coming at it from that perspective. I do wish certain features were included (wish I could add custom ingredient items to the database, for example), but I feel that such omissions are inevitable in any software, and part of the ongoing development process is to identify and improve these areas. I guess what I'm saying is that, having learned BeerSmith without any preconceptions about how it "should" operate, I don't find it clunky and I have no problems working with it.

Also, without meaning this as a jab, it seems to me that if you are an IT type, you should have a way easier time with it than me, so I'm wondering why so many of you find it difficult...

.
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

- George Bernard Shaw

Iseneye · Jul 6, 2015

To the original question - yes it is clunky. One item that bothers me is when I am editing a recipe it doesn't list the hops in order of boil time. Bit of a pain when you have two hops at the same boil time but they're in different parts of the recipe.

Volumes and efficiencies are unintuitive as well. Best advice I have read on here is to set trub loss to 0 and scale batch volume up to account for trub.

Anyway, I love the software because scaling recipes is super easy. I use non-standard volumes so it's a simple matter of getting a recipe and hit scale. I then easily scale the IBU and OG to account for different efficiencies. Brew steps are also really good.

ChemEng · Jul 6, 2015

I love beersmith but there are so many settings that I ALWAYS do something just a little wrong. Like on saturday I brewed a pale ale and forgot to check the box that says "adjust temperature for equipment" so I mashed in 5 degrees low.... frustrating.

My fault, but it's an easy thing to miss.

JordanKnudson · Jul 6, 2015

passedpawn said:
.
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

- George Bernard Shaw

Haha, touché! To be fair, this applies well to invention and innovation (which is obviously what we're talking about here), but fails miserably in the realm of social progress and diplomacy. So...maybe not *all* progress.

passedpawn · Jul 6, 2015

JordanKnudson said:
Haha, touché! To be fair, this applies well to invention and innovation (which is obviously what we're talking about here), but fails miserably in the realm of social progress and diplomacy. So...maybe not *all* progress.

I'm not going to argue with you there, but these guys wanted a word...

JordanKnudson · Jul 6, 2015

passedpawn said:
I'm not going to argue with you there, but these guys wanted a word...

True, although that reminds me more of a different wordsmith...

fine-well-make-our-own-society-with-blackjack-and-hookers.jpg

jaydlaw · Jul 7, 2015

JordanKnudson said:
It's interesting that many of the people who have had a complaint with BeerSmith on this thread have also noted that they are IT folks. I wonder if they are evaluating it based on more software-development-specific expectations than I am (not that you can't dislike it for totally legitimate reasons). But as someone who is not a tech guy, I approached BeerSmith without any expectations of what a "proper" user interface should be, and just learned to use it as it is. I've had absolutely zero problem with it coming at it from that perspective. I do wish certain features were included (wish I could add custom ingredient items to the database, for example), but I feel that such omissions are inevitable in any software, and part of the ongoing development process is to identify and improve these areas. I guess what I'm saying is that, having learned BeerSmith without any preconceptions about how it "should" operate, I don't find it clunky and I have no problems working with it.

Also, without meaning this as a jab, it seems to me that if you are an IT type, you should have a way easier time with it than me, so I'm wondering why so many of you find it difficult...

U actually make a very good point. Perhaps we are more "pickey" based off of our experiences and expectations.

fuzzy2133 · Jul 7, 2015

JordanKnudson said:
I do wish certain features were included (wish I could add custom ingredient items to the database, for example), but I feel that such omissions are inevitable in any software, and part of the ongoing development process is to identify and improve these areas.

You can add custom ingredients to all categories and yes you can leave fields blank if you want to. :mug:

JordanKnudson · Jul 7, 2015

jaydlaw said:
U actually make a very good point. Perhaps we are more "pickey" based off of our experiences and expectations.

I appreciate that -- I figured everyone would just tell me that I didn't know what I was talking about! :mug:

That said, it's not like those complaints aren't legitimate, I just think they aren't as objectively true as some folks are making them out to be. I do think the program could be improved in some ways too, though.

fuzzy2133 said:
You can add custom ingredients to all categories and yes you can leave fields blank if you want to.

Really? See, this is where I have a gap in my knowledge of the program. How do I do that? I have just been adding an existing ingredient to the recipe and then editing it to whatever I'm actually using.

EDIT: Went ahead and looked for this feature, and found it. Turns out it was in a pretty obvious spot, I just never tried that before! Thanks for pointing me in the right direction!

Wrinkletusk · Jul 8, 2015

Iseneye said:
One item that bothers me is when I am editing a recipe it doesn't list the hops in order of boil time.

Double click on the "#" column header in recipe view.

jaydlaw · Jul 8, 2015

I've decided to try it out again. I can see why people like it, but there are 2 things that i immediately noticed. first and foremost is the look and feel. it feels in need of a update. it give me a 90's-2k vibe. User interfaces have advanced in terms of ascetics, this one seems past its prime. the second thing i noticed is that you cannot delineate from the list when selecting a yeast for fermentation. my last couple of batches i utilized a product (saisonsteins monster) from Omega Labs (OL). OL is fairly new and while i wouldn't expect them to be on the list, i would expect the ability to choose "other" and write in what i am utilizing. to be fair, brewers friend is somewhat lacking as well. they give you the option to choose "other", but they do not allow you to specify what "other" is. my personal preference is for brewers friend, but they have their share of issues also, and they need to get their phone app squared away sooner rather than later. i feel like their (brewers friend) new (purchased) phone app. Currently, it is nothing more than a toy, something that i utilize when i'm bored and playing around. When in a brew session or doing anything meaningful, i utilize their website from a laptop. each its own, that is the great thing about having choices.

Homercidal · Jul 8, 2015

jaydlaw said:
I've decided to try it out again. I can see why people like it, but there are 2 things that i immediately noticed. first and foremost is the look and feel. it feels in need of a update. it give me a 90's-2k vibe. User interfaces have advanced in terms of ascetics, this one seems past its prime. the second thing i noticed is that you cannot delineate from the list when selecting a yeast for fermentation. my last couple of batches i utilized a product (saisonsteins monster) from Omega Labs (OL). OL is fairly new and while i wouldn't expect them to be on the list, i would expect the ability to choose "other" and write in what i am utilizing. to be fair, brewers friend is somewhat lacking as well. they give you the option to choose "other", but they do not allow you to specify what "other" is. my personal preference is for brewers friend, but they have their share of issues also, and they need to get their phone app squared away sooner rather than later. i feel like their (brewers friend) new (purchased) phone app. Currently, it is nothing more than a toy, something that i utilize when i'm bored and playing around. When in a brew session or doing anything meaningful, i utilize their website from a laptop. each its own, that is the great thing about having choices.

You can actually just add that as a NEW ingredient I think. I've had to add a couple of things that I use commonly that weren't in there by default.

Click on Insert at the top of the program and choose yeast from the drop down. Then fill in the information you want to put in there.

I do get what you mean, though. It might be nice to have a generic option. Not sure how it would handle any calculations related to the yeast. That may be why they want you to add it as a new ingredient.

DocDriza · Jul 8, 2015

I like the software I bought the PC version and got the mobile app for free since I got a Google play gift card. I do think it's kind of clunky though. I'm sure his software would be better if it were being worked on my tons of people. I think it's just him though.

Does anyone else find Beersmith clunky?

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