Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Happy hour app
Thoughts on elements needed for Happy Hour app:
Device : iPhone 4
Screen specs:
Portrait: 640 x 960 pixels
Landscape: 960 x 640 pixels
Device orientation: vertical primarily but can be used horizontaly
App software type: iOS app iOS SDK to run natively on iPhone4
What is the primary task?
· Help users locate nearby happy hours as well as specials offered.
What page elements need to exist to perform this task?
Main page
· Local map that shows locations of nearby happy hours
· Locations shown by drink icon
· Rating system on rollover
Selected Location page
· Bar/pub info:
o name
o location
o hours
· Deals: separated into food and drinks
· How to get there:
o Directions (nav style?)
o Distance- estimated walking time
· Community feedback
o Comments
o Ratings
o Enter feedback
What elements need to be highlighted in order for the user to be able perform the main task easily and efficiently?
Main element is the map that is generated from user location data and database of happy hours. The rollover effect will give the user a snapshot of feedback and the best deal from the bar.
What are secondary tasks that can be performed with the app?
The secondary tasks are aiding the user decide on which of the nearby locations would their best option, based on happy hour times, the deals available, and user feedback ratings. After deciding on where to go the user will get help in navigating to the location. Finally the user may leave feedback to help other users in their happy hour decisions.
Ideas for iPhone app
Concepts for iPhone App:
1. Dive bar app- An application that allows you to locate dive bars nearby, by using your location to ascertain the closest dive bar. Also allows you to rate the dive-iness of different bars and keeps a scoring system so you know how the bar you want to go to rates among dive bars.
2. Event finder app- An application that syncs up with web calendars from sites like Seattle Weekly, The Stranger, Seattle Times, seattle.gov, ticketmaster, brown paper tickets, events.king5.com, www.cityofseattle.net, www.iloveseattle.org. The app also allows you to do searches for events as well as sets reminders for items such as: event date, as well as times when tickets go on sale. The app will also allow you to purchase tickets and will display the barcode for scanning when entering an event.
3. Happy Hour app- An application that allows users to locate the nearest happy hour. This app is time and location focused so you will know when and where the best happy hours are. This app has a rating system so users can give feedback for other users. The app also gives ballpark drink pricing to help users find the best happy hour.
Week 8 Readings
Steven Krug’s final chapter “Help my boss wants me to _______” was one of my favorite chapters because he lays out how to explain to the upper brass in a company why their ideas may not be the best for the website that you are developing for them. I agree with his reasoning that too much personal data is invasive and makes me feel dubious of the website I am visiting when they are asking for this excessive information. “Are they selling this info? Will I get tons of spam?” these are some questions that come to mind when I am asked for more that the essentials in terms of personal data. I also agree with the notion that upper brass wants websites to have excessive pizzaz when this is not always necessary. The extra flashy elements can be a distraction as well as increase load times for web pages. I like how Steve used a generic email format to address these questions. It seems that these two problems are very common and having dealt with a boss that wants something added to what you are designing that is not necessarily in sync with the design that you have been developing and having to tell them this is difficult.
Week 7 Readings
I found the iOS Human Interface Guidelines to be very helpful when laying out the concepts for our iPhone app project. I find it interesting how specific Apple is when setting out specifications for app developers. This makes sense since Apple and the apps all have a very similar feel. What I found really useful was how to go about conceptualizing the app based on what the user needs to accomplish. I found that having this as a starting point really helped with decisions of what were the primary task and what we would need to incorporate into the app for the user to have a successful experience. The element user guidelines really helped with how the look of elements needs to be consistent to fit within the Apple feel. The custom icon and image creation guidelines really help to take a lot of the guess work in term of what elements need to be sized to and how they will be incorporated into the app.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Week 6 Readings
Steven Krug’s chapter 10 “Usability as a common courtesy” was about the reservoir of good will that people have coming into a new site and how to avoid depleting this reservoir by doing things that are helpful for users and avoiding things that will annoy users. The reservoir idea reminded me of this x-girlfriend I had that would talk about as she called it “The trust bank”. It is basically the same idea as the good will reservoir but based around trust. You add to the bank whenever you do things that are considered trusting and you withdraw from this bank whenever you do things that are negative or untrustworthy. I think the illustration on page 162 was a good way to illustrate this but what I found to be missing was that the last two images could have been stronger if the bar went below the neutral line and actually turned red to show a level of anger or frustration for the user.
Steven Krug’s chapter 11 “Accessibility CSS and you” is about how CSS (cascading style sheets) can be used to design websites for people with accessibility issues. It also describes how design for accessibility is not just about making websites that visually challenged users can access but about how a well designed website s easier for people with disabilities as well as for normal users.
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