mobile

Distracted Learning

April 4, 2012

In addition to distracted driving, and walking, now there is increasing awareness of distracted learning.  This has long been a problem in academic circles but it’s finally getting some news coverage. Some professors in Ottawa want the right to ban laptops in class: The University of Ottawa is considering a proposal which would give its professors the power to ban [...]

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Revisiting an academic’s use of the iPad

March 9, 2012
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With the introduction of “the new iPad” (i.e., iPad 3) I thought it would be a good time to update one of the most popular posts on this blog. That post was about incorporating an iPad into my daily work and play routine. It was written when the iPad was first introduced in 2010 and was mostly an exploration of [...]

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Mobile Phone Design Constraints

June 14, 2011
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Harnessing your digital breadcrumbs

May 31, 2011
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This story in the Wall Street Journal discusses the wide-ranging research implications of collecting millions of data points from cell phone users. Most people carry smartphones. In addition to holding your contacts, your emails, and text messages, even the cheapest of todays smartphones are equipped with advanced sensor technology like accelerometers, GPS, magnetometers, etc.  It knows where you are even [...]

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Does this color make me look fat?

May 2, 2011
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Funny post from Consumer Reports showing that perceptions are altered by color: Wearing black is the time-honored technique for appearing thinner without shedding an pound. Apparently it works for the iPhone 4, as well. Recently an avalanche of news and tech sites reported that the white iPhone 4 was thicker than the black iPhone, even showing side-by-side photos claiming it [...]

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When poor usability costs you your job?

March 30, 2011

You may have heard that an employee who managed “social media” for Chrysler accidentally posted on Chrysler’s twitter account about *ahem* poor driving in Chrysler’s home city of Detroit. Click here for the original story. The guy who sent the tweet blames the program he used for multiple twitter accounts. The article calls it a “glitch,” which would not necessarily [...]

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Apple, UCD, and Innovation – A Guest Post by Travis Bowles

February 25, 2011
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This guest post is in response to the article User-Led Innovation Can’t Create Breakthroughs: Just ask Apple and IKEA at fastcodesign.com From the article: One evening, well into the night, we asked some of our friends on the Apple design team about their view of user-centric design. Their answer? “It’s all bullshit and hot air created to sell consulting projects and [...]

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“It’s better for real”…not really [3D phones]

February 14, 2011

This has to be one of the silliest use-cases for including 3D in a mobile phone. I guess when there really isn’t a reason to include 3D, you have to make one up.

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Usability vs. Providing an Experience

January 10, 2011
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Some humor for 2011: a “Things people have never said about a restaurant” website. My favorite excerpts: “I really like the way their cheesy elevator jazz interacts with the music I was listening to in iTunes.” “I hope the phone number and address are actually images so I can’t copy and paste them!” “I go to restaurant websites for the [...]

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HF Potpourri

September 20, 2010

Social networking for your car? As if we need another distraction while driving.  A new system (Bump.com) connects drivers by license plate so you can text message that person that cut you off (Thanks Paul!). Harry Brignull (of the 90percentiseverything blog) collects egregious examples of evil interfaces in his Dark Patterns website. Dark Patterns: User Interfaces Designed to Trick People [...]

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Almost Here: Designing Displays for Older Adults

July 20, 2010
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After a long process and over a year of work, Anne’s and my book on user interface design for older adults is almost available!  The cover of our book has been finalized (shown below).  The book will be released September 21st, 2010 and will be available where fine books are sold or directly from our publisher CRC Press. We’ll give [...]

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Usability Potpourri

July 2, 2010

HF/Usability Potpourri returns with two recent items. iPhone Reception Display Reports from some sites suggest that at least some of the cellular reception issues of the new iPhone 4 are due to improper display of signal strength.  This is a neat HF issue because it involves user’s trust in automation (the display of reception bars is actually a computed value, [...]

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Update on an Academic’s Use of the iPad

June 29, 2010
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There seems to be a huge amount of interest in the use of iPads in academia as evidenced by the popularity of my last post on the iPad. This is just a follow-up post with some more app recommendations and more thoughts on how well it substitutes for my laptop after over a month of use. I recently went on [...]

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Usability Potpourri

June 23, 2010

First, some thoughts on mobile usability from Google user experience designer Leland Rechis. Next, decisions, decisions, decisions…when did buying gas become so difficult? As Travis says, At this point, why not let me use a slider to create my own mix? That’s a keyboard, touchscreen and 5 grades of gasoline. From somewhere in Florida on I-75″ (Thanks Travis Bowles). Finally, [...]

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iPad is everything the Kindle isn’t (for my use cases)

May 25, 2010
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I acquired an Apple iPad a few weeks ago and am very impressed with it. Just as background, i’m a PC person (a desktop at work, home, and a Fujitsu P1620 ultramobile tablet, all running Windows 7).  My portable computer weighs about 2.5 lbs but the iPad is a full pound lighter and the battery lasts about 10 hours. Less [...]

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Soft Keyboard: Smart Idea or Incredibly Frustrating?

March 22, 2010

ThickButtons is a replacement soft-keyboard for Android phones that works in a very unique way. It uses the predictive word functionality available in many soft keyboards (where it can predict what word you are likely to be typing based on what you’ve typed) but takes that one step further by enlarging the next letter on the keyboard. Take a look: [...]

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