A quick insight on Jakob Nielsen’s 10 Usability Heuristics for Interface Design.
Tag Archives: Design
Posted in Uncategorized
This is how Nokia Lumia 800 was born!
NokiaConversations has released the ‘behind the scenes at Nokia’s London design studio’ video documentary, starring Stefan Pannenbecker, VP of Industrial Design at Nokia, Chris Linnett, Head of Lumia UX design and Kate Freebairn, Creative Director for Lumia UX design.
The video portrays the story behind the creation of Nokia’s first Windows Phone and their tight collaboration with various teams at Microsoft.
Posted in Uncategorized
Posted in Uncategorized
The fascinating Art of Substance and Absence
http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf
by Alwar Balasubramaniam via TED Talks
Posted in Uncategorized
Posted in Uncategorized
31 Most Interesting Features of Android Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0)
Last week in Hong Kong, Google and Samsung unveiled Google’s new flagship Android device, the Nexus Prime, a 4.65″ Super AMOLED-toting, 1.2GHz LTE and HSPA+ smartphone. However nice the hardware of the new device is, it is second to the fact that it is the first device to run Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS), the newest build of Android that unifies tablets and smartphones under a single OS for the first time.
“People like Android, they need Android…but they didn’t LOVE Android,” said Google’s Matias Duarte in today’s presentation. To remedy this, Google has not only introduced new and practical functions to ICS, but gave it a slicker look, faster responsiveness, and some extremely impressive bells and whistles.
Here are 30 of the most interesting new features:
1. “Roboto,” Android’s own font
2. Even more live wallpapers
3. Newly-designed lock screen
4. Disappearing homescreen command buttons
5. Tabbed apps/widgets drawer similar to Honeycomb
6. Resizeable homescreen widgets
7. Redesigned foldering capabilities
8. Hardware accelerated 2D drawing
9. Wi-Fi Direct support
10. “Favorites Tray” at the bottom of the screen that travels across the different homescreens
11. Native Screen grab capability (Press Power+Volume Down)
12. Improved notification bar, customizable notifications
13. New Music player notification in tray controls player
14. Improved keyboard
15. Improved typing error correction
16. In-line spell check and suggestion mode
17. Cut/Copy/Paste similar to Honeycomb, but with animated dragging and dropping
18. Speech for text entry has been improved with no delay
19. “Face Unlock” facial recognition for unlock screen (Did not work in demo)
20. New Browser (Includes new tab management feature. “request desktop site” feature, syncs to chrome, save pages for offline reading)
21. New Gmail (New action bar with compose, search, labels, refresh; offline search by default that searches the last 30 days of email)
22. New Calendar with pinch-to-zoom
23. Updated all of the native Google apps: YouTube, Maps, Google+, Google Music
24. Mobile data usage metrics in system controls, allows users to self-limit their mobile data consumption, and track data usage down to individual app level
25. All-new camera app with slider zoom, facial detection, “zero shutter lag” speed, launchable from home screen
26. Photo editing tools in “edit” menu in the camera
27. Native panoramic camera shot, similar to Sony’s “Sweep” panorama
28. 1080p video capture, continuous focus, includes the ability to zoom while recording
29. Incredible new Time Lapse photography feature
30. New tile-based “People app” interface for contacts, very similar to Windows Phone
31. “Android Beam” NFC-based content sharing with multiple ICS phones (Web Addresses, contacts, maps, YouTube videos, app sharing)
Posted in Uncategorized
The Role Of Design In The Kingdom Of Content
While reading an interesting article written by Jason Gross on ‘The Role Of Design In The Kingdom Of Content‘, I was intrigued by the kind of examples he mentions about the importance of design when world is still craving for content.
Excerpt from article : “The role of a UX designer is not always to make everyone feel all warm and fuzzy inside. A rich Web experience could include the emotion of happiness, humor, discontent, sadness, anger or enlightenment. A well-designed website enables us to attribute our emotion to its source and connect us to that environment through a range of senses. A UX designer should understand why and how to utilize the principles and techniques they have learned to support the website’s precious content.”
Read full article here.
Posted in Uncategorized
“Do a Barrel Roll” on Google, and You Won’t Be Disappointed
“Do a barrel roll” has become a trending topic on Twitter and elsewhere, thanks to an easter egg on Google Search.
Type the phrase in Google, and the screen will tumble around (it’s a barrel roll, after all). The same thing happens if you search for “Z or R twice.” Because it was built in HTML5, it doesn’t work on all browsers. Firefox and Chrome seem to support it best.
Both phrases are references to Star Fox 64, the classic 1997 Nintendo game that sucked up a giant chunk of my life when I was a kid. Peppy, the game’s veteran space pilot rabbit, tells hero Fox McCloud to “do a barrel roll” (a feat accomplished by pressing “Z” or “R” twice) multiple times throughout the game. The phrase spawned an Internet meme that has stood the test of time.
I have no clue how long the Google easter egg has been around, but I love it. It’s yet another testament to Google’s quirkiness and nerdy demeanor.
Posted in Uncategorized
Kinect + Augmented Projectors + Microsoft Research = A roomfull of awesomeness !
Microsoft’s research division has created augmented projectors, a new technology which use data from up to four Kinects to let you interact with a 3D model of any room you’re in. At its simplest, the projector shines an image which you can interact with by casting shadows, but the other applications are both more complex and more interesting.
The Kinect sensors within the room can define the space digitally, and then use the projector like a magic flashlight to expose and interact with the digital facsimile of the real room. Objects can be placed on walls, hanged in empty space, and electronic versions of real objects can be cloned and moved within the virtual reality.
Compare this to the bulky and expensive original Microsoft Surface and the augmented projectors could bring similar types of interaction to any room in your house in a fraction of the size. While the resolution isn’t very high and holding a projector seems jittery, it’s still one step towards Microsoft’s vision of the future.
Posted in Uncategorized
Toyota’s “Window to the World” Augmented Reality Concept
The new system from the Japanese automobile manufacturer’s European Research division was developed with the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design and turns windows into interactive screens designed for education and play.
As shown in the video, with “Window to the World,” backseat passengers will be able to draw objects that will then integrate with the outside world, estimate distance to outside objects, zoom in on objects, translate written language on signs, and learn more about outside objects by selecting them.
Toyota also says the technology can be applied to sunroofs and, at night, constellations and their information can be studied with the night sky as the backdrop.
When kids are bored on the drive, parents can once again tell children “Look out from the window for a while.”
Posted in Uncategorized
