Designing the iPhone User Experience: A User-Centered Approach to Sketching and Prototyping iPhone Apps, Rough Cuts

Description

• Copyright 2011
• Dimensions: 8 X 10
• Pages: 336
• Edition: 1st

• Rough Cuts
• ISBN-10: 0-321-69961-0
• ISBN-13: 978-0-321-69961-9

This is the Rough Cut version of the printed book.

"In her book Designing the iPhone User Experience, Suzanne Ginsburg takes a fresh look at cutting-edge, user-centered design from the perspective of designing mobile user experiences for the iPhone. Her book brings together everything you need to know to design great products for mobile contexts."
—Pabini Gabriel-Petit, UX Strategy & Design Consultant and Publisher and Editor in Chief of UXmatters

“It’s about time! Suzanne Ginsburg takes the best of User-Centered Design (UCD) principles and tweaks them with a dash of mobile and a lot of hints about what it means to implement the Apple Human Interface Guidelines for iPhone. Your idea for an iPhone app has much better chances of being accepted by iPhone owners (and by the iTunes watchdogs guarding entry to the App Store) if you follow even half of the suggestions in this book.”
—Nancy Frishberg, Ph.D., User Experience Strategist and past Chair of BayCHI

Given the fiercely competitive state of the iPhone app landscape, it has become increasingly challenging for app designers and developers to differentiate their apps. The days are long gone when it was possible to crank out an app over the weekend and refine it after receiving a few not so flattering user reviews. Users now have choices -- lots of them. If your app is difficult to use or doesn’t meet their needs, finding another one is just a tap away.

To illustrate, consider the ever-growing field of Twitter clients. There are hundreds of variations in the App Store but only a handful stand out from the pack (such as Tweetie or Twitterific). For most apps, it boils down to one thing: the user experience. The same is true for countless other categories within the App Store; well-designed apps are more likely to attract and retain users. Of course there are other critical aspects of iPhone app development: the coding, the marketing, the customer support. All of the elements must come together.

Designing the iPhone User Experience will help you tackle the user experience part of the iPhone challenge. Three key themes will be reinforced throughout the book: Know thy user, the Design Lifecycle, and Attention to Detail:

• Know Thy User
  Millions of people depend on iPhone apps to get them to work, find their next meal, and stay in touch with family and friends. Professionals of all kinds also rely on iPhone apps: doctors look up drug interactions; photographers fine-tune lighting; cyclists find the best routes. To truly understand how your apps can fit into their lives, designers and developers must learn how users do things today, what’s important to them, and what needs have not been met. Part II, Introduction to User Research, will introduce a variety of user research methods.
• The Design Lifecycle
  Award-winning designs rarely happen overnight; they usually only occur after many rigorous design cycles. To illustrate this point, consider USA TODAY's iPhone application, which went through at least seven iterations for the article view in their app. These kinds of iterations should happen before you launch your app, since it will save valuable time and money, not to mention the headaches a bad design could create for your user. More importantly, you may only have one chance to impress your users -- you do not want to sell them half-baked ideas. Part III, Developing your App Concept, will explain how to iteratively design and test your app concepts.
• Attention to Detail
  Most professionals know that attention to detail is important, but hundreds of apps fail to incorporate even the most basic design princ
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Sample Content

Table of Contents

Preface xv

We’d Like to Hear from You xxvii

Acknowledgments xxix

About the Author xxxi

Part One: iPhone Application and Device Overview 1

Chapter 1: iPhone Application Overview 3

Utility Apps 4

Productivity Apps 7

Immersive Applications 12

Summary 17

Chapter 2: iPhone Device Overview 19

Reviewing the iPhone and iPod Touch’s Features 20

Multi-Touch Display 21

Light, Proximity, and Motion Sensors 27

Location and Compass Information 29

Bluetooth 30

Still and Video Cameras 31

Microphone and Speaker 33

Summary 35

Part Two: Defining Your iPhone App 37

Chapter 3: Introduction to User Research 39

Common User Research Questions 40

Shadowing and User Interviews 43

Documenting User Interviews 47

Diary Studies 49

Choosing a Research Method 53

Planning Your Research 54

Recruiting 60

Facilitating Interviews 63

Related Research Activities 67

Summary 67

Chapter 4: Analyzing User Research 69

Share the Wealth 70

Analyze Notes 71

Document Implications and Ideas 74

Report Findings 75

Create Design Tools 79

Revise the Product Definition Statement 86

Summary 86

Case Study 1: Windspire 88

Case Study 2: Aardvark Mobile 90

Chapter 5: Evaluating the Competition 93

Benefits 94

Apps to Include 95

Methods 95

Choosing a Method 105

Impact on the Product Definition Statement 106

Summary 107

Part Three: Developing Your App Concept .109

Chapter 6: Exploring App Concepts 111

Creating a Design-Friendly Environment 112

Effective Brainstorming 113

Sketching Your Concepts 117

Common Questions 128

Summary 129

Case Study 3: Foodspotting 130

Case Study 4: Not For Tourists 132

Case Study 5: MUSE 134

Chapter 7: Prototyping App Concepts 137

Why Prototype? 138

Common Questions 139

Prototyping Approaches 142

Summary 157

Case Study 6: Prototyping at Dan4, Inc 158

Case Study 7: What&

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