A father gave advice to iPad app developers

It took me a long time to buy and test the iPad app for my children. Specifically, I would like to do this for my two-year-old baby daughter, even if she has successfully occupied my iPad. Through this period of observation and research, I also found out what is very effective for my daughter, so I summarized the four basic specifications, hoping to give developers some inspiration.

1. The function is visible as Wang Dao

Most children applications show a series of different things. You can click to trigger some actions. The cows are called, the window is opened or closed, and the honeypot needs to be collected. However, most applications do not specify which elements are interactive and which are not. This is often frustrating. For example, in the big dog and bear games, you need to carefully try to discover the actually interactive elements.

The solution is simple: Affordance is visible in the function ). Place the element in a problem situation to remind users that it is touchable. Disney Puzzle Book is doing well. For example, in Winnie the Pooth Puzzle Book, the swing of the beehive prompts that children need to touch them to collect.

2. Paging is a basic action

Paging is so important for most children's apps, but it is often a swamp. Various processing methods vary. The most common paging method is based on touch arrows and gestures. Both of these interactions are feasible, but because the fl operation is clumsy for a small finger, the gesture needs to be accurate, so the arrow is most suitable for children.

In addition, the bottom of the screen is also a hot spot. If the paging control is placed at the bottom, the children will often mistakenly click this part, causing some trouble. I like the paging method of Old MacDonald: the forward and return arrows are clearly marked at the top of the screen.

3. Menus are uncommon secondary actions

For the top of the screen: do not place any interaction elements-especially menu operations. Once the user follows the application, it is seldom needed. Many times I had to stop and cancel some menu misoperations ...... Dangerous! Mickey Mouse Puzzle Book is the representative of such frustrating application instances:

PalyTales adopts a clever strategy for menu actions. First, the menu button is placed in the upper-right corner to avoid misoperation. Of course, the top center is better, which avoids conflicts between left and right paging navigation .)

Most importantly, it uses the two-click method to start the menu. The menu icon is transparent under normal conditions. After the first click, the transparent layer will be removed, and the second click will start the menu. Although it is not very simple, it is a good way to avoid mistaken click.

4. If you try to trick my child into buying something, you will die.

I'm staring at you, Talking Tom Cat. Many applications do this, but Talking Tom Cat is second to none. The screen is like a mine, and some icons are placed, so it is easy to make a purchase operation due to incorrect clicks-not including advertisements that attract attention by random changes. GoDaddy's dark patterns always tricks users into buying more domain names and belongs to the same category. However, if you try to use persuasive design on my young daughter, you are excited. Otherwise, your application will be deleted and there will be no interest in the future.

Conclusion
It is very difficult to design applications for children. It is not only difficult to create high-quality content that matches age, but also difficult to design application processes and interactions, because designers must avoid using advanced gestures that make their children frustrated and confused, as do their parents ). All applications should stick to basic things. We hope that the above four points will benefit children's applications.

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The two design principles mentioned in the article-dark patterns and persuasive design-are worth studying.

The child is ignorant. Remember to watch tom cat for his 4-5-year-old cousin during the Chinese New Year. It will take half a day for the evening, and I will make a quarrel every day. Indeed, interaction and interest are both good, but it is a bit "evil" to make money by mistake of an ignorant child. My parents are tangled, and my children love it, but they have to pay for it accidentally. In the end, they have to reluctantly delete it. Although the App ultimately serves children, developers also need to know that the App's pipeline is parent, and you cannot see the end user even if your parents are close.