Lonely Planet on iPhone
Posted September 19, 2009 – 3:39 pm in: Interaction Design, MobileLonely Planet guides are now available for iPhone users. The price for the application is £0.59 which includes a free San Francisco guide. The price for the Lonely Planet iPhone guide is £8.99 comparing with the price of the book at Amazon UK which is £6.49… The clear advantage of the iPhone version is the [...]
No Comments | Tags: city guide, iphone, lonely planetSelf Checkout Nightmare
Posted August 2, 2009 – 4:01 pm in: Interaction DesignSelf checkout machines were tested already in 1997. According to NCR, the leading manufacturer of this product, more than 140 retailers from 12 different retail segments and over 20 countries use their solution.
The benefit for the customer is shorter queues but the reality is that these machines can be a usability nightmare. Using the product [...]
Babylon is misbehaving
Posted July 8, 2009 – 11:11 pm in: Interaction DesignFor quite a while, I was using a Babylon plugin for Firefox which enabled me to mark text and get instant translation. Recently, the plugin forced me to update and after the update was completed I noticed that my browser default search and homepage was changed to Babylon. I thought that this was a dirty [...]
No Comments | Tags: babylon, firefox, translatorYou know when it is Rocol
Posted July 8, 2009 – 10:32 pm in: Interaction DesignRocol ltd is one of the rail industries oldest suppliers of anti-slip panels and treads.
If you have ever used the tube, it is almost certain that you have walked over a Rocol product.
What I found fascinating about Rocol’s anti-slip panels is that on almost each one of them the name of the company and phone [...]
Back To The Future 2009
Posted July 5, 2009 – 7:16 pm in: Interaction DesignIf Back To The Future was released in 2009, what would the interface look like?
A touch screen with an easy date drop down selector. The ‘last time departed’ area will become a history tab with recent journeys. You will be also be able to decide on the location you want to appear in the past/future… [...]
Why Last.FM started to annoy me…
Posted June 18, 2009 – 9:05 pm in: Interaction DesignLast.FM introduced two new features which make you want to listen to something else.
The first one is ‘Are you still listening?’- For a non registered user, not interacting with Last.FM interface for 45 minutes will pause the music and display the ‘Inactivity bear’ icon prompting you to click ‘resume’ if you want to continue listening. [...]
Does anyone understand what this ‘CAPTCHA’ is saying?
Posted April 20, 2009 – 11:02 pm in: Interaction Design‘CAPTCHA’ is an interface element, designed to distinguish between human and a computer programme. A typical ‘CAPTCHA’ will ask the user to type in a word displayed in a distorted form. While I completely understand the fight against SPAM, some of these ‘CAPTCHAS’ are even getting difficult for humans to decipher. Trying to create a [...]
3 Comments | Tags: captha, challenge, gmailOne good thing about the iPhone…
Posted March 23, 2009 – 12:59 am in: Interaction DesignOne good thing about the iPhone is the hard key for silence mode. This is such a highly used feature that it’s quite shocking that Nokia didn’t think about this before… On a Nokia phone you will have to select ‘Menu’ then ‘Profile’ and then ‘Silence’ – not so quick… Hard keys on mobiles are [...]
No Comments | Tags: hard key, iphone, silenceThree headphone cables approaches
Posted March 15, 2009 – 7:54 pm in: Interaction DesignWhat is the ideal cable length? Depends on where you use the headphones. If you use them at home, you probably want quite a long cable so you can connect it to your stereo and still be able to move around. If you mainly use headphones on the move, a long cable becomes messy and [...]
No Comments | Tags: cables, headphones, knotsAn elevator which will not let you change your mind…
Posted March 7, 2009 – 12:17 pm in: Interaction DesignImagine you have a meeting on the 6th floor… You select the number ’six’ from the control panel outside the elevator. You go inside and suddenly realize that you forgot your mobile on the 2nd floor… The control panel is not available anymore… You can try speaking with the elevator, but this would probably not [...]
No Comments | Tags: control panel, elevator, lift