Last Thursday I had the opportunity to attend Interaction 12, the IxDA‘s annual conference in Dublin’s shiny new Convention Centre (the staff of which deserve a round of applause for keeping us endlessly feed and caffeinated). Unfortunately, I could only attend on one day, but the full schedule of events included workshops at IADT, three days of speakers in the Convention Centre and lots of evening gatherings.

The highlights of my day included the keynote talk from Luke Williams of Frog. Williams is the author of ‘Disrupt‘, and his talk The Disruptive Age: Thriving in an Era of Constant Change followed these lines with my favorite quote of the day “A disruptive hypothesis is an intentionally unreasonable statement that changes your thinking”. He tied this to interaction design by pointing out that we make cliches of interactions to make processes easier but balanced this with stating that disruption for the sake of disruption is a bad thing. However, when the correct balance is struck (like Littlemissmatched who sell socks in sets of 3, none of which match) a business can make a real success of shaking up the status quo.

The next memorable talk came from August de los Reyes from Samsung (who would not reveal exactly he does for them) on Design and the New Modern: Three Things You Should Know. Influenced by the time he spent with designer Massimo Vignelli, this (beautifully styled) presentation focused on how a UX should uphold the principles of being semantically correct, syntactically appropriate and still be practical. De los Reyes emphasised and that we are shifting from vertical structures (narrow and deep) to horizontal ones (broad and shallow) and drew the correlation between prevalence of scrolling interactions verses swipe interactions and ended with another of the poignant quotes of the day, “Interaction designers create not just interfaces, but states of mind’. Much of this was further driven home by the next talk I attend from Kel Smith, whose talk Innovations in Accessibility: What We Can Learn from Digital Outcasts featured an example video on Virtual Pain Distraction, showing just how powerful a state of mind can be.

After a leisurely lunch of networking, I attended Giles Colborne’s (from cxpartners) talk Artificial Emotional Intelligence: Designing Interactions for Emotional Awareness which emphasised that there is a right and a wrong way to fake emotional intelligence in our everyday digital interactions. The right way focuses on empathizing with positive and credible responses while the wrong way is opitimised by Clippy from Microsoft Office. Colborne employed methods described in ‘Dealing with Difficult People‘ to help understand a user’s behaviour and by matching that personality to the interface both designers and users can get better results. I later asked him how this could be incorporated into the interaction design process and was intrigued to find that he recommended applying it as another layer rather than as part of the personas commonly used in developing and testing user interfaces.

Rachel Hinman, a researcher and designer for Nokia later took the stage to discuss the Mobile Frontier, as a place of remarkable opportunity for innovation if we just stop trying to replicate traditional metaphors that eased people into digital interaction such as ‘desktops’ and ‘pages’. Instead, she backed up August de los Reyes and promoted a shift from graphical user interfaces (GUI) to natural user interfaces (NUI) where we design for systems in which content unfolds by being is its own interface.

Anthony Dunne, head of the Design Interactions programme at the Royal College of Art in London closed the day with his keynote What if… Crafting Design Speculations that focused on how we can be more innovative by broadening our spectrum of thinking on the future of innovation to include not only what is probable, but also what there is the potential for and all that could be possible. While many of the projects he featured were very experimental he showed that there is a whole other world of human-computer interaction out there and drove home that innovation requires stepping outside the comfort zone.

The only damper on the day came from Katey Deeny & Søren Muus’ talk Celsius vs. Fahrenheit: Degrees of Difference Between EU and US IxD. It was the one I anticipated most as a US expat now working in Ireland, so I was disappointed that they focused on identifying what differences exist rather than what is being done to overcome them. Some practical advice included using symbols instead of words, exploiting shared cultural references and that lengthy explanations are not required when you can allow for a learning curve. Personally, I think there are some good examples of how this can be achieved, such as Clear (a mobile app that is about to be released and contains no buttons or labels in its interface) and the iPhone itself (go on, switch yours to a different language to see what changes and how easy it is to use once you are used to it) and would have enjoyed more positive discussion on this.

It was hard to choose which talks to attend on Thursday and am disappointed that I cannot go to the likes of Fabian Hemmert (whom I had the opportunity to talk with about his ‘weight-shifting, shape changing, life-like’ mobile phone prototypes’) so I hope the IxDA post videos or, at very least, slides online soon for all of us to draw out as many nuggets of wisdom as possible. Even without the luxury of re-watching the presentations, the main thing that I took away from Interaction 12 were to take control of how we use mobile devices by employing UIs that break the conventions many OS have imposed on users and developers.

As an aside, I was also struck by the similarities between what we as interaction designers do, and what architects do in regards to creating environments. This has been a recurring topic for me personally as I have an avid interest in architecture and it was encouraging to hear both August de los Reyes and Rachel Hinman allude to this. I also had the pleasure of speaking with two former architects during lunch who reiterated this and I am interested to explore what architects can teach interaction designers about process and vice-versa. If you have any thoughts on this or anything else raised at Interaction12, drop me a line here or on Twitter at @aprilmeyerft

A lot of times when we are talking to clients about our process here at Furious Tribe, they ask about personas. Often personas are not something prospective clients have even heard of and they don’t understand the role of personas in the design process.

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To the barking mad like tribal symbols or one I had the other day where an image with musical notes in it appeared. Trying to decipher these images at the best of times is difficult but an image with musical notes? Bit ridiculous no?

For test purposes I tried a couple of ridiculous ones to see what response I would get and the captcha below worked as “pentendo hiili”.

Not a clue how this is correct. I’m wondering could they not be a bit easier to decipher, or atleast get rid of the musical notes and tribal symbols?

A couple of months back my iPhone kept popping the following message up for no reason:

Since then I’ve been meaning to let everyone know what I did to fix it as I remember how frustrating it was. A lot of the blog posts I came across said this happened when you plugged the phone into speakers that didn’t comply with it. My problem though was that it kept popping up randomly, either when I was just in the home screen or checking mail and there didn’t seem to be a pattern of when it was popping up.

The reason for the randomly popping up message was that there was a build up of dust within the dock connector. There was mutual discouragement of trying to blow the dust out as you could end up blowing moisture against the adapter (which isn’t good). The solution that worked for me was to get a dry unused toothbrush and brush the dock connector very gently or, for the big bits of dust get a piece of paper fold it and gently scrape them out, be careful though because the adapter is very sensitive.

The latest generation of consumer electronic devices have many more capabilities than ever. We can stream live television to a games console or pin-point exactly where we are in the world on a mobile phone. As a feature set of a device increases, so too does the potential for that device to go beyond the bounds of what it was originally intended. This principle can be seen in the Nintendo Wii and the Apple iPhone.

The iPhone has not only revolutionized how we interact with touch screen devices, it has also allowed developers to create truly innovative products. An example of this would be within the “Medical” section of the iPhone App Store. It’s full of reference guides and learning aids for the healthcare industry. These applications give medical students and professionals the power to learn and research the latest treatments and drugs as they are given up-to-date information from reliable sources.

The use of motion-sensing games such as those found in the Nintendo Wii is now being used to help with physiotherapy. Patients with muscle problems are being given games such as Wii Sports to play to help with their range of movements. Research is being done into the cognitive effects of such games also. “Boom Blox” is a game for the Wii that was developed by EA from a concept that was devised by Stephen Spielberg. It’s a puzzle game where the player uses the Wii Remote as a pointer to interact with blocks on the screen. The aim of the game is to knock over the blocks by using certain tools provided (for example one level may give the player a block to throw whereas another provides dynamite). Japanese research has shown that this game helps to improve the cognitive and spacial reasoning in children. The reason for this is the game prompts the user to consider the physics behind their actions, how falling blocks interact with each other etc.

“Thinking outside the box” has allowed developers to craft truly ingenious ways to use information that can be of benefit to everyone and allow researchers to see the potential for healing and rehabilitation in something as simple as a computer game. As more and more new features are added to these sorts of devices, we can only dream of what benefits they hold.

Making sweet iPhone Apps is a lot like making chocolate, you need the right ingredients, attention to detail and of course a delicious recipe! Over the last year at Furious Tribe we have been busy refining and perfecting our recipe for delivering top quality iPhone Apps for our customers. We have learnt quite a bit along the way and picked up some really great clients. Here we reveal all and discuss openly how what our recipe for success is:

Strategy

With the explosive growth of mobile devices and apps, our clients sometimes can jump on the mobile bandwagon for all the wrong reasons. We firmly believe that any organisation moving into the mobile space should have a solid strategy and product road map.

We develop strategic mobile plans in close consultation with our clients, we look at the commercial aspects of developing for mobile platforms and where the client can generate revenue or return on investment.

We either identify direct strategies for monetising mobile content or identify the soft benefits of going mobile – such as increased customer satisfaction or reaching the widest possible audience. The strategic plan also covers how the mobile content goals tie in with other digital initiatives within our client’s organisations.

User Experience Design & Prototyping

When it comes to making apps for the iPhone, its all about the user experience. The application’s layout, user interaction and graphical interface IS this product, and thats what you’ll be judged by. Users wont appreciate how clean your back end code is, or how cutting edge the technology is – all they care about is how it looks & feels.

We firmly believe that in order to create the best apps the idea must be king so we spend a lot of time prototyping, solving any issues that may arise before the development phase. The first thing we do is have a brainstorming session discussing the apps look and feel as well as how it should function, taking notes and drawing images to paper along the way.

Once we have a better idea of the app we wish to produce we begin to draw up sample interfaces using Notes Pods whichs helps us to visualise how the app may look and feel.

Once we are all satisfied how the basic user interaction, and high level information architecture should be implemented, we use our trusty iPhone stencils to create App wireframes and bring the prototype up to a higher fidelity.

This can be very useful as it helps our clients to easily visualise how the finished app may look and feel. We move through a number of revisions on paper until we have created the blueprint for implementing the application.

Graphical Design & Production

Now that we have the design set out on paper we can easily transfer this into photoshop. In order to do this correctly we use a special iPhone interface template which allows us to rapidly build our screen comps for discussion with the client.

We craft the user interface in close consultation with our clients to ensure that we adhere to brand guidelines and visual goals. We also have be be very careful that the application is compliant with Apple’s strict human interface guidelines.

Development & Testing

Once the design has been finalised our team of highly experienced developers (qualified and approved by Apple) begin development. This involves programming the application using Objective-C, Xcode and the iPhone Development Kit. During this stage, we extensively test the app using both a Simulator and test devices. User feedback is gained from testers that allows us to optimise the applications functions and streamline the user interaction, giving the user the best possible experience.

The application will also be tested for performance and speed using Apple’s developer tools. We deploy the application internally as an alpha release, all of our staff have an iPhone and participate in the testing, we then improve the app based on internal feedback.

Once the internal feedback has been implemented we can deploy a test beta app to our clients devices for user acceptance testing, after this phase and in accordance with the strategy developed earlier we get the app ready for a public release.

Publishing to the App Store

After the app has been developed and tested, it is ready for submission to the App Store. This process involves sending the application to Apple for approval to ensure it passes the strict quality controls in place. After the app is approved, it is published to the iTunes App store.

Applications can be deployed on a country-by-country or on a worldwide basis. After publication we offer regular maintenance based on user feedback which gives your app a competitive edge. We offer a comprehensive package that brings you from an idea, to a published app within an number of weeks and within a realistic budget. If you want to talk to us about an app idea, give Patrick a call on 353-1-6572558 or email patrick at websplash.ie we look forward to hearing from you.

Natural User Interfaces will be the next big thing in the computing world. The principle behind this method of user interface design is simple. Make an interface that behaves exactly like real world objects. For example, in our piece on the Microsoft Surface, we showed you how the “Scatter View” control allows the user to move around objects that drag and pivot according to how they are touched. The objects in the scatter view behave exactly like pieces of paper or photographs that are laid out on a table.

A computer system built around this natural user interface will allow new users to be able to interact with all the functions of the computer with the smallest possible learning curve. The problem with devices and systems that use this design pattern is that, so far, they are either prohibitively expensive or built into mobile devices such as the Apple iPhone.

Experimental projects using this concept have produced impressive products. One such experiment uses a projector pointed at a coffee table that is used to control the entire living room of a house. The table has access to the entertainment system, lighting and even a robotic vacuum cleaner.

Another experiment you can try right now (providing you have access to an iPhone or iPod Touch) is the iPhone light table. This project uses JavaScript to create a user experience akin to the scatter view of the Microsoft Surface. The project can be tried at iPhone Light Table and can be read about at TL Robinson’s Blog.

As with any emerging technology, devices that use a natural user interface will gain mass-market appeal and become more commonplace in our daily lives. This sort of design will allow computing to move away from the mouse that it has been tethered to for the last twenty years.

First of all we would like to say a big thank you to our customers, supporters, friends, family & well wishers.  The last 5 years as a web development agency has been a roller coaster ride.  Our work equal parts blood, sweat & tears of joy.

Most importantly we’ve loved every minute of it & are thankful to have a young and energetic team.  As many of you may know already Furious Tribe has been moving in a very different direction to main stream web design & development agencies.

We neither wanted to or could resist this change any longer.  As of Wednesday July 8th we will be known as Furious Tribe UX (user experience) and will no longer be accepting full scale end-to-end development projects going forward.  Instead we will be focused on totally on designing for the user experience, so what does mean?  The best way to explain it is to tell our story: we started out in 2003 developing websites & web applications.  As we evolved over the years we found that our core business moved further away from large scale web development projects towards consulting in the field of user experience design for the web & lately….consumer electronics.

We are witnessing lots of our clients taking their work in-house, especially on the technology side of things.  We find that in-house development teams are highly skilled at programming but don’t really have the skills to craft an effective user experience.  For this reason we have decided to focus on offering specialised help to internal teams within organisations.  We offer this specialised help to clients in the form of user experience consulting.

We typically won’t be doing any server side programming or technical work & and will mainly be hired by technical or development teams looking for specialised help on their projects.  Things have been going in this direction for some time & we are proud to make this official with the launch of our new website & company strategy.  We will be of course retaining a compliment of development staff to service our existing customer base that require development support.  We would like to congratulate our team for their hard work in relaunching our company website, being so busy with client work these days its a rare opportunity that we get to work for ourselves.  Special thanks to our good friends at brightsky.ie for their work on our cartoon staff portraits – they look awesome.