Tag: interface

Alternative user interfaces

I studied interaction design in university and always had an imprecation for good interaction and interface design. Recently I seen a few examples which have got me a little excited.

Ubuntu’s scopes
I like ubuntu’s unity paradigms of scopes and lens, even though I prefer to use Gnome Shell as my default on the desktop. The scopes and lens really make a lot of sense. It was fascinating to see Ubuntu apply it across their phone and tablet. Be interesting to see how it works on Ubuntu TV if thats still ongoing?

Pebble timeline
When I first saw the pebble time interface, I instantly thought, when are they going to roll that across there existing line of smartwatches? If not, maybe I might invest in one of the new ones. Division of a interface by future, present and the past on a watch makes a lot more sense than anything else I have seen to date including the Apple Watch.

Android Material Design
Ice cream sandwich or Android 4.0 was a massive step up in style for Android but Android 5.0 Lollipop really was the first Android when the interaction design was thought about at a deeper level.

I don’t necessarily  like the style of flat plates of colour for example the Google hangout app is just the wrong kind of green for my pallet but the interaction model is nice. Although I have spotted a few places where the rules are broken by certain apps.

Remix is the future!

Theres the intenet 1% rule which seems to pop up all the time.

I’ve been thinking recently out of 100 people using social media , 1 person will want to create and upload their own media. However 9 people if the user interface is effortless, smooth and simple, would make slight changes to either reflect their own decisions, point of view, etc.

This is reflected in the 1% rule where 90% are lurkers, 9% are contributors and 1% creators.

Its strikes me that many things are missing the 9%. They miss the fact that the 9% can also contribute to the enjoyment of the 90% and be even more interesting than the 1%.

What makes the 9% even more interesting is the fact they are socially creative, sharing as they go.

Everything is a remix and that includes,

  • Git repo forks which is beautiful way to build upon something you’ve seen or used.
  • Creative Commons which encourages you to remix media
  • The fans who spend their own time building on top of the official works to create fan art at places like Deviant Art
  • The millions of meme created pictures which fill social media feeds,  even I became a meme thanks to Tim and Josh.
  • The insane amount of feeds, webservices, APIs and even headless websites which encourage you to build on top of them.
  • The pinterest fans who collect and arrange their pinboards to indicate there choices and style
  • The many fan fiction stories which take characters out of one world and combine them in others

This is why I feel the DJ hackday could be a start of something extra special .

Windows phone 7 interface

Windows phone 7

I actually like the new interface of Windows phone 7. The Zune type interface works well on a small device and to be fair it all makes a lot of sense. I’ll be honest and say its fresh and somewhat exciting to see Microsoft’s Mobile team take a total step back and attempt to redesign the whole experience of the mobile again. No icons, no chrome, no backgrounds, just a sliding scope which logically makes sense. Impressive! I can’t believe this is the same company who worked hard on version 6.5!

I’ll have to reconsider writing off Microsoft in the mobile world.

Windows Mobile software gets smart

Pocket CM software

I'm going to say something very positive about the Apple iPhone please don't be shocked. Since the iPhone launch, its been amazing to see the quality and attention to user experience windows mobile software has increased. I've been using this windows mobile locker for quite a while now but Nizam pointed me at 2 contact managers icontact and my prefered choice PocketCM. Who needs the HTC Touch when you got applications like PocketCM?

I found a site leading the charge in this area – http://whoneedsaniphone.com/. From the site.

We also want to let everyone know that the intent of this project IS NOT TO DUPLICATE THE IPHONE INTERFACE… we just want to take some of the principles of that interface and bring them to Windows Mobile users! One of the big keys here is operating the phone with just your finger… I have always hated having to pull out the stylus to do certain things… bigger buttons and more scrolling without scroll bars and stuff like that…

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