Designing for Windows Phone and other touchscreen devices - A presentation given at the recent BizSpark Camp event at Microsoft HQ in London on design and UX considerations for the upcoming Windows Phone
5. Analogue to Digital to Human
INTERACTIONS
photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/josefstuefer/18697485/
6. Who wants a challenge?
MOBILE UX DESIGNERS!
Pressure Accelerometer Time of day Gesture
Microphone Haptics ...
photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dunechaser/174945526
48. human behaviours
understand the behaviours
what finger do we use to press the
doorbell with?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tscarlisle/107776922/
49. (changing) human behaviours
understand the behaviours
what finger does the younger market
press the doorbell with?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/phototropism/62931265/
50. Time for a snack...
DATA-SNACKING
small snippets of info
30-60 seconds
simple, but repetitive
regular
51. Re-use learnt behaviours
Re-use interactions inherent in the device
Minimise the number of surprises
soft key positions colour
menu navigation tone of voice
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8586443@N03/1491516038/
52. More than just a phone
WAKE UP CANON & NIKON
Source: http://www.flickr.com/cameras/
53. Mobile is not about making
things smaller
Miniaturisation vs Mobilisation
http://mobilewebbook.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tridi_animeitor/2224661744/
54. Simpler interfaces are better
Minimise the subconscious questions
Balance efficiency, effectiveness & satisfaction
Improve glance-ability
photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lagiuspo/92136687/
55. Simpler != dumb
JUST REMEMBER TO FOCUS ON THE CORE FUNCTION
an eReader app
should focus on the
‘reading experience’
photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lagiuspo/92136687/
56. Think twice about your
audience
IT PAYS TO DO YOUR HOMEWORK
Analytics
Network provider
Device platforms
Devices
Firmware versions etc...
photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/thomashawk/155918164/
66. 1 in 7 phones are returned
BACK TO THE SUPPLIER
Source: 2005 Which report (UK study)
photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/andricongirl/4567650298/
67. Source: http://www.wdsglobal.com/news/whitepapers/20060717/MediaBulletinNFF.pdf
63% of returned phones have
no hardware/software faults
SO, WHAT’S THE PROBLEM?
Handset configuration / settings issue
Struggling with functionality / usability of device
Device did not meet expectations
photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tom_lin/3208454911/
68. Source: http://www.btplc.com/inclusion/Usefuldownloads/index.htm#designs
Massive market for usable
phones & apps
YOU NEED TO DESIGN ‘INCLUSIVELY’
By 2020, over half of the UK population will be > 65
1 in 3 Europeans can benefit from an inclusive approach
65% of americans have lost interest due to complexity
photo source: http://www.elmbrook.org/UserFiles/Image/Volunteer%20Opportunities/Elderly%20Hands.jpg
71. The little things count
Polish makes the UX and app stand out
photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tom_lin/3186488124/
72. Passion
“I haven’t worked in 3 years”
Be curious. Question everything
photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/taraethers/
73. thank you
@ribot
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ronlayters/2402199783/
Notes de l'éditeur
hello
a mix of general mobile UX and Windows Phone UX
it’s the UX that makes the platform and your app stand out
Golden nuggets
Quite a simple and straightforward session
7 years in mobile
designer/developer/entrepreneur
push ui boundaries,
ideas lab for mobile user interfaces
Physical interactions e.g. Touchscreen, haptics, etc
Tangible era, 20 years
So many things to consider and more so in the future...
Constraints make mobile interesting. A challenge.
If you're not aware of the constraints, the UX will be poor.
Note: Constraints make mobile interesting. A challenge.
If you're not aware of the constraints, the UX will be poor.
Efficiency, relevancy,
fingernail interaction rather than a finger interaction
Broken app store (discoverability)
Poor UX
Many good lessons learnt
Past experience with Zune HD...
lovely. Just make it a telephone
wohoo!
Windows phone 7 is different...
raising the bar...
Modern, clean, fast, in-motion
Forms the foundation of a set of principles
Highly glanceable
Allows users to find their way
Simple, elegant, powerful, universal
Not overpowering
Chrome-less experiences
You should assume that everything is touchable
this is metro
Only what you need
Build apps that utilise existing behaviours and compliment the native os
Focus on the primary tasks
Do a lot with very little
How much should you showcase to the user? - Bit of an art
“delightful” use of whitespace
Feels fast and responsive
“fierce reduction” on unnecessary elements
Beautiful, not just legible
Weight, balance and scale
feels responsive and alive
give context to improve usabily
where are you going and where are you coming from
transition between UI is as important as the design of the UI
 
direct interaction with the content
content is the UI
reduce visuals that are not content
 
Design for the Form Factor
Don’t Try to be What it’s NOT
Be Direct
Simple and modern
via live tiles
simple search
common behaviours
glance
search
Resonate with Anna and Miles
What emotion do you want to evoke?
Does my app make me smile?
Higher level principles by which the Windows Phone OS is built upon. Known as Red Threads
intimate.
private
Phones are personal. And they should be designed to be personal.
There for your memories, via camera, or social networking services, SMS, or email to discover what others are doing and telling them what you're up to.
These phones should be simple and intuitive.
Both the hardware and software should work the way you want, not the reverse.
Delightful, fun
It should make you smile
Custom glance-able content via Metro UI's live tiles, and via panoramic experiences called hubs that surface information into the phone UI and don't require you to dive deeper. Unless of course you want to.
Live tiles - the things that are most important to you
se things that are most important to you.
Task-centric, not app centric. Organize your life around the things you want to do.
Contextually relevant
connected to social networking services,
other online services (email/messaging, storage).
Cloud service
People want to be connected, to each other.
Connected to all your touch points.
Most people struggle to get their photos off of their devices
the phone is updating itself automatically
Game Hub
personal due to avatar,
relevant showing your scores,
connected across multiple devices
e.g. Weather abilty to add to their start screen, your city,
Delight
Personalise
Provide heirarchy
So, you can utilise native controls and metro guidlelines, but theme the controls with a colour for the panels within an app, not system-wide.
Looking above, these colours relate to the system, and i think the user can control the colour generally at the settings level.
Own customer font designed for the device...
Weight, size, scale...
Very easy to overdo
Helps narrative. Where from. Where To.
The more you use it the less special it becomes
Familiar = easy to use
Consistent and predictable ux
 
Microsoft are taking control of the hardware
Good idea of the level of performance
Start
Search
Back
Camera
Volume
Power
understand your users
understand your users
Like a large bag of chocolate buttons
single early failure - non returning user
Glance and Go
Motorola
Exit, Quit,
Swiss army knife. Technological advancement and usability
pink: iPhone 3GS, green: iPhone 3G,
the rest: single-function devices aka cameras
blue: Nikon D90
Miniaturisation (shrinking things down) vs
Mobilisation (process of selecting the features most important to the user given the mobile context)
If you can't get it right in 2D, don't even consider going into 3D. Complexity and poor UX for the sake of an 80s buzz word.
    
Simpler, more usable interfaces - consider the forgotten (and rapidly growing) markets
dig as much as possible
don’t make assumptions
Blackberry’s biggest market is not enterprise
It’s games. Why. BBM and qwerty keyboards
Rec. touch Target size is 9mm
Min touch target != < 7mm
2mm min spacing
Visual size is 60-100% of the target size
Makes the experience more usable
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Tap, dbl tap, touch and hold, pan, flick, pinch and stretch
consistency is key
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Up to 4 icons
Don't feel that you need to fill all 4 slots
Swipe up bar to bring up menu
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Separates multiple tasks
Tap or Flick to change
should be rich, immersive, aggregate from multiple sources
example 1: people
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rich, immersive, aggregate from multiple sources
example 2: Office Hub
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Can it be a simple single page app
Hubs should be special
Hubs should have multiple sources of information
Hubs should have a maximum of 4 sections
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tell me more....
UX is an art and is hard
minimising the number of subconscious questions the user needs to make
minimising the number of subconscious questions the user needs to make