Title: Tablet UI/UX Design Considerations Date: 2011-05-13 23:22 Author: Michael Category: Design Tags: Android, UI, UX Slug: tablet-uiux-design-considerations Status: published
User Interface / User Experience design is obviously a major aspect of app design/development and one worthy, in my opinion, of considerable pontification. I’ve watched several videos regarding UI / NUI design and skimmed a few books. This aspect of development is really interesting to me and I plan on writing about it a lot more.
I really like the video here (click the picture above to play embedded version). Bill Van Hecke is the lead UI/UX designer for the Omni group and narrates the entire video. As I madly (digitally) scribbled notes (I love Evernote)… I thought I’d share. Full disclosure: Yes, the video is for iPad… Android is obviously my platform of choice, but I recognize a good design when I see it. We can learn a lot from the iOS ecosystem.
Notes:
- Brutally Massacre Features - is the app still useful to the average user without this feature? If not, kill it dead.. at least initially. Simplify your UI as it helps make it more intuitive. It also helps to keep the project manageable from a development point of view. As with most things in life; the KISS principle applies.
- The Android tablet is not a giant phone - I’m super guilty of this as of this writing and I intend on rectifying this post-haste. Don’t simply reuse your main layouts for the large and extra-large resource layout files. Not only is it super lazy design, its a total waste of space. Furthermore, you are missing an opportunity to enhance your UX, thus making your brand and app more desirable.
- Adding design “space filler” isn’t good practice - Now that you have more space, adding elements and widgets to fill whitespace isn’t good design. You don’t want a NASA Space shuttle cockpit. You need to think about; control occlusion, accuracy, distractions and context. Hide buttons/menus behind logically groups menu and button items. Only display relevant controls for the context of the object in focus.
- Progressive disclosure - Universal Principles of Design. If you need three columns stuffed with controls; you are probably making your user think way too much, increasing the chance of distraction and not using the power of contextual menus/buttons. Taps are cheap from a cognitive load perspective, so make more objects “tap-able” and provide useful contextual actions based on those taps. The rarer something is, the more acceptable it is to bury the item deeper in lists.
- Taps are especially cheap in the Steering wheel zone - The 90 or so pixels going down the side of the app are super easy for users to reach and tap while holding the tablet with two hands. Try to implement the most actionable / relevant UI elements in this zone. The “middle” of the app is a great place to display the users content. Be cognizant of control occlusion.
- Think about your user eating a sandwich while using your app - I think this is pretty self explanatory. Gestures are really neat and fun when used in the right context. However, if your user constantly has to maneuver the tablet or reposition themselves to use the app, you are making them think too much.
- Tap, drag/swipe, touch & hold, double tap, pinch / un-pinch, rotate - These are iOS’s gestures. Like it or not my fellow Android-ians… the Apple Marketing machine has cleverly trained future tablet users while marketing their wares. They show these “basic” gestures in commercials and elsewhere and research has shown these to be easily performed with one hand. Other gestures can be included for “power-users” but don’t make them required.
- You have approximately 250ms to show users that a command was understood before they become confused, angry, anxious or other emotional state that is undesirable. When a user interacts with the app, it should respond with “something” be that a glowing, changing of state, movement, etc. Let your users know that the action they just performed is valid, even if it wasn’t.
- Forgiveness - Enable and empower users to explore and exercise control over the app. Help them feel adventurous. Don’t make them afraid to explore for fear of breaking or ruin something. Playful | fearless, a big part of the reason why children are better with new technology than adults. They are AWESOME at failing.
- Modality - Lots of basic gestures mean the exact same thing. For example, the drag can be panning, moving an object, selecting multiple objects and the list goes on. Setting explicit modes of operations separates concerns and helps to clearly define how the gesture will behave in mode. Usability testing becomes very important here. this can be complicated for the developer and SHOULD make it easier for the user.
- Organize the app by meaning, not based on opinion - Your work-flow may radically differ from your users work-flow. Embrace this, as I really think this makes designing and implementing the app better for the user and easier for the developer. DO think about how users will use the app. DON’T try to predict and code to those assumptions.