Are functionality and ease of use mutually exclusive in a smartphone? Looking at whole gamut of handheld devices, from cheap organisers to the Nokia N95 and iPhone, I try to map out where each device sits and to predict where the future lies.
Read on in the full article.
It's amazing how many parts of all kinds of UIs (including the Macintosh's current UI incidentally, for those Apple fans who wish to chime in at this point) have severe inconsistencies in the way they're used, and make unreasonable assumptions about how much the user is willing to read the manual.
The main problem seems to be that the designers don't want to break with how the previous UI worked for fear of upsetting existing users, so any complexity simply appears as bloat rather than forming an integrated part of a simple interface. It alienates people new to the UI.
"I pleaded with her that her smartphone could do everything the pink bit of plastic could do and 100 times more besides and that it was a LOT easier to use into the bargain. To no avail. The Barbie thing was pink. And looked cool."
Well, at that age I don't know if any piece of intricate technology is going to be that significant compared to the appearance of its casing, but even so I've seen exactly the same reaction in adults when they buy a phone in a shop.
A lot of people carry these attitudes with them all their life, which is why I pleaded with manufacturers to experiment a little with their smartphone casings:
http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/features/item/S60_Smartphone_Colours.php
Smartphone manufacturers are throwing away sales if they insist on taking a 100% technophile approach to aesthetics with no options for other people.
A LOT of people simply won't buy devices if they look dull or techie, no matter how useful they are or how easy or fun they are to use. It's the technological equivalent of trying to get people to use sensible shoes when they really want trainers. Colours have a lot of appeal. They're simple but powerful.
The Nintendo DS sales skyrocketed in Britain when the pink model came out, you could not get one anywhere and canny ebayers at the time made a very nice profit (and they can still get their money back if they care to sell a second hand Nintendogs pink DS bundle). It wasn't technically any different to the silver DS, but it looked so much more fun and less like a calculator.
Which of the following would extend the appeal of smartphones, the official black and dark blue 6290, or the 6290 done up in the following colour schemes:
http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/images/features/article6290phoneslittle.jpg
?
Steve said: "anything complicated (like setting up WLAN) should be handled by wizards that gently walk the user through any information needed"
Sorry have to disagree - the notion of simply whacking some UI ontop of 'please enter the SSID' and calling it a wizard is just wrong. - No real people in the real world (let alone half us techies) have or want any deep understanding of most of the config nonsense - we just want it to work.
Wifi is a classic case of 'lets have as many options as possible simply because we can' - wrong - NO options are required other than it just WORKS all the time - no excuses about blackspots, oooh theres a bit of pipe in the wall etc.
To make a Smartphone truely smart the whole concept of 'Settings' or Control Panels or any other thing that even vaguely goes anywhere near, WLAN settings, IAP settings, SIP settings, access points, certificate management, network modes, email settings, SMTP server name, SMSC address etc ad-infinitum simply needs to be binned.
A real smartphone would be able to perform all the tasks there is an icon for on the phone with precisely zero config, like chat, PTT etc.
At the moment phones dont even seem to be able to setup their own date and time... - how does bunging a wizard ontop make it much easier to do something that a proper smartphone should just do.
Rant mode off -😊
