- This 1999 article by Deborah Kreuze listed her top 10 interfaces of the 20th century. Read the article for details. They were:
- Loudspeaker
- Go to Reynolds Razorback Stadium to hear an excellent loudspeaker system
- Touch-Tone Telephone
- Most of you have never "dialed" a phone but we still use that word
- Steering Wheel
- How did you react to the Tesla rectangular steering wheel? See video below:
- Tesla Rectangular Steering Wheel
- Now Tesla is charging extra
- Also see the Mercedes Benz joystick driving system video below
- Mercedes Benz Joystick Steering (video)
- $10M Mercedez Joystick steering (video)
- Experimental interface using two joysticks to steer an automobile.
- The test driver got used to it quickly but reported some problems in recovering from a skid
- I believe the steering wheel is not ever likely to be replaced in an automobile driven by humans.
- However, the steering wheel MAY disappear once self-driving cars take over (video)
- How did you react to the Tesla rectangular steering wheel? See video below:
- Magnetic-Stripe Card
- Notice that retail systems now give you the option of using your magnetic stripe or the embedded chip of your credit or debit card
- Traffic Light
- Comedian George Carlin tells joke about red and green lights (video)
- Remote Control
- Discussed below
- FYI: my first remote for a VCR connected by a 12' cord
- Cathode Ray Tube
- The original display for TVs and later for computers, recognizable by the thick back
- Liquid Crystal Display
- Another early display technology
- Mouse/Graphical User Interface
- Replaced command line interfaces (see below for more)
- Barcode Scanner
- Universal code for products worldwide invented in 1973
- FYI: if you are buying old products like Little Golden Books, and they have a barcode, then they are not old
- Loudspeaker
- In CS 2002 I asked the class to list some interfaces.
- Some of them were quite original
- body armor: stop bullets and knives
- elevators: many SAU buildings have been retrofitted with elevators
- shoes: my father-in-law got his first pair of shoes when he went to first grade in Ogden, AR!
- toilet paper (I'll bet you stocked up back in spring 2020)
- answering machine (what's that?) : now a cell phone app
- drive through windows: Covid has amplified these
- doors: obvious interface
- FYI: my wife bought a nice corner cabinet many years ago. When she brought it home I asked how she was going to get it in the house. It was wider than any door in the house! I had to temporarily remove and replace a double window to get it into the house!
- automotive automatic transmission: the newest ones are computer controlled.
- GPS: where am I?
- walls: many new homes delete walls to create an open plan
- cell phone: game changer for sure
- Computer screens
- GUI (graphical user interface)
- Command line interface in BASIC:
- 10 INPUT "ENTER TWO NUMBERS SEPARATED BY A COMMA:
20 LET S = N1 + N2
30 LET D = N1 - N2
40 LET P = N1 * N2
50 LET Q = N1 / N2
60 PRINT "THE SUM IS ", S
70 PRINT "THE DIFFERENCE IS ", D
80 PRINT "THE PRODUCT IS ", P
90 PRINT "THE QUOTIENT IS ", Q
100 END
- 10 INPUT "ENTER TWO NUMBERS SEPARATED BY A COMMA:
- Apple Computer Interface Guidelines for iOS (iPhones and iPads, mostly)
- Apple provides guidelines for iPhone and Macs
- Display
- medium size, high resolution
- Ergonomics
- One or both hands, close viewing distance
- Inputs
- gestures, keyboards, voice
- Apps may use: personal data, gyroscope, accelerometer
- App interactions
- Usually multiple apps open at once
- What apps do you use?
- System features
- Include: widgets, home screen actions, spotlight, shortcuts, activity view
- Best practices
- Limit onscreen controls
- Make secondary details discoverable
- Allow appearance to change seamlessly
- Put controls where they will naturally be accessible
- With permission, use data on iPhone already rather than requiring redundant data entry
- More interface factors
- Clarity
- Legible text, precise icons, important content highlighted and interactivity obvious
- Deference
- Content paramount, blurring and translucency hint at deeper content
- Depth
- Hierarchy made obvious by layers, good transitions guide user to discover function
- Aesthetic Integrity
- Task determines this factor
- Serious apps vs games
- the first should not distract from task
- the second should immerse the user
- Consistency
- An app should not distract by changine display unecessarily
- Direct Manipulation
- The user should immediately see the effect of inputs
- Feedback
- The app should indicate that an action has taken place
- Metaphors
- Apps should take advantage of actions learned in real world
- desktop
- files
- trash cans
- designers should use metaphors appropriately
- Apps should take advantage of actions learned in real world
- User Control
- the user should be in control not the app
- designers should allow users to directly interact with the interface (e.g., mouse clicks)
- WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get)
- designers should use WYSIWYG
- In other words, screen images and hard copy should match
- designers should use WYSIWYG
- Real World Interfaces
- Let's look if these common real world interfaces follow Apple's suggestions
- Automotive door handles (driver's or left side, USA standard)
- 1951 Ford,notice how it pulls down and how gravity has affected over its long life
- HondaCRX.this one invites you to pull it out with your left hand
- 2003 Dodge Caravan,this one, too, requires your left hand
- 1999 Chevrolet PU,here you must pull up with four fingers with either hand
- 2003 VW Beetle, another left handed pull required
- Remote controls
- FYI: The design of remote controls really bugs me and many others, see HERE
- Notice his wall of remotes
- My cable TV remote looks like his in Figure 4
- My mother used to keep a flashlight next to her remote, obviously an indicator of bad design
- He goes on to critique Apple TV's remote and the newer Siri remote
- He suggests a better design at the end (Figure 17, reproduced below)
- Notice that he adds a separate game controller because watching TV and playing game are distinct tasks
- Two students mocked up in Play Doh the remote control below
- Remote Control 1, These next two were student exercises in a previous cognitive science class in designing a TV remote Remote Control 2
- They made the remote to fit the hand. The ball of the top would move a cursor and the buttons on the side would start or stop actions
- Sony Remote, The students had not seen this SONY remote before
- So, the remote control interface is not one easy to design for engineering, conceptual, or esthetic simplicity
- Remote Control 1, These next two were student exercises in a previous cognitive science class in designing a TV remote Remote Control 2
- Automotive door handles (driver's or left side, USA standard)
- Tiny houses are another new and complex interface
- Tiny House Blog, interesting to consider a whole house as an interface and to try to minimize it to its essentials
- Karen's Cottage only has 450 sq ft of living space (Video)
- According to this website, the average Arkansas house is 1792 sq ft
- Karen's Cottage only has 450 sq ft of living space (Video)
- Tiny House Walkthrough (Video)
- Can you see yourself living in a tiny house? I cannot.
- Tiny House Blog, interesting to consider a whole house as an interface and to try to minimize it to its essentials
- QR codes
- An interface for phones and computers
- Most smartphones have software to read QR codes
- With QR codes you can:
- go to a web page
- give someone your "business card"
- connect to a wireless network
- send a text
- send an e-mail
- call a phone number
- update your calendar
- geolocate a latitude and longitude
- and more
- A few years ago this class created a fullsize bulletin board display in Peace Hall. It only had QR codes so users had to use their phones to "read" them
- Notice that QR codes are good example of human-machine interface (HCI)
- Read this one and do what it says...
- My example above is just a little better than Little Orphan Annie's in Christmas Story (video)
- Let's look if these common real world interfaces follow Apple's suggestions
- Wearable computing
- Smart watches are the biggest member of this category
- FYI: I resisted getting an Apple Watch but now I like it. I wear it all day and revert to my automatic winding watch at night. The watch face I chose (below) has four "complications" added. These are buttons that I can press.
- Upper right is weather,
- lower right is date,
- upper left is a map,
- and lower left is sun cycle times.
- I also use the workout options. I can wear the watch while swimming laps or while taking a walk. BTW the camera makes the face look more beat up than what my eyes see.
- Smart watches are the biggest member of this category
My main watch face
My Complications
Weather
Map
Sun
Plan
Other complications from Third Party vendors include: Spotify, PCalc, Sleep ++, Map My Walk, Motivation--Daily Quotes, and many more.
- Traditional Electric Power Meter
- Electric Meter notice how hard it is to properly read the meter below, the dials spin in different directions
- Newer meters give a digital readout like the one shown in the inset
- Cell Phone Class Exercise
- One CS class tried to design a smartphone web page for SAU. Which one do you like best?
- The SAU Web page on an iPhone
- Users scroll down
- Apply
- Tour
- Give
- Future Students
- Current Students
- Parents and Visitors
- What would you like to study?
- News
- BUT can still not access the Main SAU Page
