Pennant for iPad

Last year I posted about some outstanding projects from the Parsons MFA Design and Technology show. One of them, Pennant, an “interactive exploration of baseball data,” is now available in the App Store. I implore you to check it out; it’s quite stunning, and a steal at $4.99.

Idea to Market in 5 Months: Making the Glif

On July 11th, 2010, Tom Gerhardt and I had an idea for an iPhone accessory: a tripod mount that doubled as a stand. Five months later, customers began to receive our product, the Glif, in the mail. This turnaround, from idea to market in five months by two guys with no retail or manufacturing experience, signifies a shift in the way products are made and sold — a shift only made possible in the last couple years.
 
The best compliment anyone could give us about the Glif project is that it inspired them to take their creative idea to fruition. The purpose of this piece is two-fold: to give an inside look at our creative process, and to offer guidance and inspiration for those who have their own ideas they’d like to see brought to reality.

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Voice and Tone

I was browsing through the Windows Phone 7 design and interaction guide (pdf) today and enjoyed this section towards the end about voice and tone:

Many users consider text displayed on computers to be another language called computerese, a jargon-filled, soulless, completely impenetrable foreign language that torments them by hindering their ability to complete tasks and asks nonsensical questions in dialog boxes.

Windows Phone 7 banishes computerese entirely and developers should as well. The Windows Phone 7 voice and tone should be human, clear and consistent.

One method to check if text has the proper voice and tone would be to see if it sounds like a friend assisting another friend with something on the phone. An example would be helping them understand an error message that appears in the application. A developer shouldn’t offer a rigid, uninformative response when trying to explain an issue such as, “Error Code: 4B696C626F.” Many people could be confused or frustrated by that message, as it provides no context or potential solution. However, something such as, “There is some info missing here. Please enter your name in the text box to move to the next page,” is clear, friendly and provides a helpful suggestion.

It is imperative to give users a meaningful response in a casual, comprehensible manner. Help them fix the problem in a way that they can understand.

Consider the string, “Synchronize the phone device.” It sounds mechanical and stilted. Instead, “Sync your phone,” sounds much more like what someone would tell a friend to do.

Another example is, “Schedule a calendar event for tomorrow through Outlook.” It is neither friendly nor representative of how a friend would speak. An alternative could be “Set up an appointment for tomorrow in Outlook.”

Seems obvious, but Microsoft of all companies would know this isn’t always the case. It’s good to see they’re attempting to make things right. This is good advice for copy writing in general for any application: make it conversational.

Yves Béhar Gets It

Short interview with Yves Béhar in the New York Times:

The role of designers and product makers is to really become much better editors. What kind of functionality is actually needed — and truly delightful — to consumers? Remove all the extraneous stuff.

As an aside, I just got the Béhar designed, Lonely Sandwich approved Jawbone Jambox and am enjoying it immensely.

Making the Glif

Tom and I put together a short film, mostly to document the behind the scenes manufacturing process of the Glif. You can view it below.

(view on Vimeo)

Hopefully the Coudal Partners don’t have a stranglehold on the documentary-about-the-making-of-a-product-with-emotional-music-and-large-futura-type market. 

The Right Feel for an iPad Stylus

In general, iPad styluses follow an incorrect cognitive mapping. The vast majority of them are designed to look and feel like a pen. Why? Writing or drawing on the iPad feels nothing like using a pen or pencil. For one, the fidelity is way too low. Also, it is pretty awkward to rest your palm on the screen of the device because it throws off the capacitive detection. Writing on an iPad, to me, feels like writing on a dry erase board. Fast, simple, low fidelity. The perfect iPad stylus is one that feels like a dry erase marker.

I like the philosophy the 37signals guys take with their iPad app, Draft, an app designed to mimic the feel of quickly sketching out ideas with a Sharpie.

Making your own DIY stylus is actually pretty simple, as long as you happen to have some conductive foam lying around. I used these two videos as a spring board for the design.

All it takes is a marker, some wire, a q-tip, conductive foam, and some glue and tape. The aforementioned videos give a good idea of how to assemble the parts.

After removing the felt tip with a pair of pliers, I poked a small hole with a thumbtack to thread the wire through.

Wrapping the wire around the shaft all but guarantees it will make contact with some part of your hand.

Works as advertised. A bonus with this design is the marker can still be capped, so you can comfortably throw it in your bag without damaging the foam tip.

Nordstrom’s Employee Handbook

This is just great. For years, Nordstrom would supply its new employees with a single 5”x8” grey card that read:

Welcome to Nordstrom

We’re glad to have you with our Company. Our number one goal is to provide outstanding customer service. Set both your personal and professional goals high. We have great confidence in your ability to achieve them.

Nordstrom Rules: Rule #1: Use best judgment in all situations. There will be no additional rules.

Please feel free to ask your department manager, store manager, or division general manager any question at any time.

(via Signal vs. Noise)

PS. Only 56 hours left to get a Glif on Kickstarter!

Glif: an iPhone 4 tripod mount & stand

For the past few months my friend Thomas Gerhardt and I have been designing an iPhone 4 accessory. It is a tripod mount, and doubles as a stand to prop up your phone at various angles and orientations. As you can see from the image, and can probably guess as a reader of this blog, the goal was to make something simple and elegant. 

We are both very excited that the design has come to fruition, but we are not finished yet. Today, we launched a project on Kickstarter to help fund the injection molding manufacturing process that we will use to create the Glif. For anyone interested in owning one, consider this a pre-order for your very own Glif. 

We hope that you all love this thing. Here’s what it can do:

Help fund this project: Kickstarter
More info: TheGlif.com 
Receive project updates via Twitter: @theglif 

Votive Candle Solution

A clever solution to a common frustration (if you’re in the business of lighting lots of votives, that is): add a slit down the side for the match. Kind of a moot point if you’re using a lighter, but if matches are all you’ve got, the slit prevents a) burnt fingers, and b) dripping hot wax if you invert the votive to light.

(via Core77 and From Us With Love)

Controlling Apple TV

There has been a lot of chatter recently regarding the assumed upgrade of Apple TV. A lot of the discussion and conjecture has been about price ($99), OS (iOS), hardware (smaller form factor, no physical hard drive), and release date (September). What interests me (naturally, as an interaction designer) is the interface, and how it will be controlled.

Using iOS for the new Apple TV is not a trivial task. Moving from a touch based UI (iPhone, iPad) to a focus based, 10-foot interface does not offer a direct translation. Thankfully, they are both “low resolution” interfaces (as opposed to a cursor based OS, which is high resolution. Apple’s recently unveiled patents on this are interesting). Android has kind of solved this, albeit jankily, on devices that contain a touch screen and a rollerball nub.

That being said, I do believe the interface for the new Apple TV will retain the focus based interaction it currently has. So the question becomes, how do you improve the experience of controlling it?

John Gruber and Dan Benjamin (on The Talk Show, episode 4) brought up a good point about remotes: although it may be possible to control the Apple TV with an iPhone or iPad, that can’t be the only way. I agree that Apple would never require a user to have an iPhone / iPad in order to use their Apple TV.

I think ultimately, Apple TV will be able to be controlled in a variety of ways. Keep in mind this is pure conjecture.

Default: Apple Remote

Every new Apple TV will come packaged with a simple, cheap remote. Very similar to the current Apple Remote, with one key distinction: the 5-way directional pad is replaced with the classic iPod scroll wheel. I believe this would improve the remote tremendously, and am a little surprised it hasn’t been this way all along. Scrolling long lists would be a breeze, as opposed to the tap-tap-tapping required on the old remote. Plus, it’s an interface hundreds of millions of people are already familiar with. Another added advantage of the scroll wheel is it makes seeking / scrubbing through videos infinitely easier. One minor change: the track advance forward/backwards buttons on the right and left sides of the scroll wheel would be replaced with left and right arrows (for navigating horizontal options). Lastly, the remote should connect with Bluetooth, not IR. If the Apple TV does in fact have a smaller form factor, people will be more inclined to tuck it out of visible sight.

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Option 1: Bluetooth Keyboard and Trackpad

This is kind of an oddball option, but interesting nonetheless. I personally think the Magic Trackpad is a little weird to use on a desktop machine, but it could turn in to a killer remote. A lot of the gestures translate well, like swiping to scroll and tapping to select. Other gestures have potential as well. When an item is highlighted, the user could pinch outward to reveal details about the item, for example.

In this scenario, a bluetooth keyboard could be connected as well. Nothing is more excruciating than attempted to enter text with a traditional tv remote, and the physical keyboard would ease the pain.

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Option 2: iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad

The no brainer option is to use a preexisting iOS device. Using an iPhone as a remote is not a novel concept: Boxee has a remote app for controlling their media center, and of course Apple has their own Remote app for controlling iTunes. These two apps take different approaches. Boxee attempts to mimic a traditional remote by offering a touch version of the 5-way directional pad, while Apple’s Remote app translates the program’s (in this case iTunes) interface to the screen of the device. Both of these solutions have their merits, but I am more partial to the later. Why use one device to select something on a different device when the manipulation is able to occur directly on the original device? Sounds kind of like, using a mouse to select something on a screen instead of just tapping the object on the screen directly.

Using an iOS device as a remote also opens up some pretty awesome “interactive tv” options. Kevin Rose touched on that a bit on his blog.

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Option 3: Game Controller

This one is the least realistic (for Apple at least) but the most fascinating. Apple was able to elbow its way into the mobile gaming market, why not console gaming? Having an App Store on my tv with a huge selection of inexpensive, indie games is a very exciting prospect, but the problem is, all of the above remote options make horrible game controllers. iPhones and iPads are great in some contexts (like for storing Scrabble tiles, or being used like a Wii remote), but they break down as a traditional controller. The lack of tactile feedback is its undoing. So, why not an Apple made, bluetooth game controller? Can’t say they haven’t been there before:

Update: It appears that the current Apple Remote App is already capable of controlling the current Apple TV. It looks like it essentially turns the iPhone into a touchpad. More details here. Thanks to reader Dov for the heads up.

Hidden, without hiding

A key part of design (interface or otherwise) is getting the user to notice something. The need to keep the design clean and uncluttered is contradicted by the user’s desire to not have to hunt for things, or worse, make an irreversible error.

I recently purchased a book shelf from CB2 and had it shipped to my apartment. It was packed pretty efficiently; the shelves overlapped/interlocked and were padded by these cardboard and styrofoam inserts:

I had been tossing these aside (in the trash pile), until I got to this insert:

A mysterious red ribbon was taped to the bottom of the box itself, and the other end was taped to the bottom of the insert. It essentially acted as a breadcrumb, or giant red arrow, pointing to this:

There is a high probability I would have thrown the hardware away (or had a frustrating time rummaging through the trash shrapnel) had this red ribbon been absent. It seems kind of crude and inelegant, but it served its purpose flawlessly, and was implemented without changing the arrangement of the packaging materials, or adding significant overhead.

Cute.

(via Core77 and Scholz & Friends)