Analysis of application design based on TV platform

Microsoft's Xbox 360 Kinect has sparked a sense of interaction since its launch. Many people in the industry began to study the various possibilities and extensibility of somatosensory interaction. I happen to be in Lenovo to do a similar project, the following will be in this project for more than two years of harvest slightly collated, with you to share:

The characteristics of TV platform

Large TV size, maximum support to 1920x1080

Operating distance far, generally speaking, the distance between the TV and the 2~3 meters

Position fixed, generally in the family living room, belonging to the half public space

Users typically do not perform complex and time-consuming operations on the TV, such as document processing, mail-receiving, etc.

The user mainly carries on the entertainment (television program, the easy control game and so on) and the Information view (weather, stock and so on).

Second, the application of style classification

Users rarely use efficient applications on televisions (for the definition of highly effective applications, see "Application design based on mobile devices" in my blog). Based on the application of TV platform, mainly divided into the following two kinds:

Tool class application: Simple tasks that require little user input. Users use tool class applications to view quick statistics or perform simple tasks for limited objects.

"Weather", "Stock query" and other applications is a typical tool class application.

The application of tools is visually appealing, but its visual effects should not be distracting, and the information that needs to be highlighted should not be concealed.

Users use tool class applications to check the status of something or to query, so they want to quickly and easily locate the information they are interested in.

Based on the characteristics of TV screen, the interface should be designed in a concise and relatively centralized function. You should not provide multiple complex functions in an application-because PC platforms are more appropriate for complex applications.

Figure I: The weather on Lenovo Ebox

When designing a tool class for a ebox platform, you need to observe how users use this type of application, then decompose the application's tasks into multiple subtasks that are easy to complete, and then, based on these subtasks, have a choice to design your application.

Tool class applications may need to support regular change settings or change information sources, so they often provide these settings on the main interface's functional bar.

Tool class applications, typically organized in a flat list format. Users typically do not need hierarchical viewing. A typical approach is that each view provides the same data organization and level depth.

In addition, in the tool class application, as far as possible uses the GUI to provide the control, in the visual style also should as far as possible unify with the GUI.

Immersion Application: Content-related user experience, rich visual environment, rich interactive environment application. The game is a typical immersion application.

Figure II: Lenovo Ebox Game

The immersion application of TV platform avoids displaying a large amount of text information and avoids complicated setting. A lot of text information, complex settings can affect the user experience.

Immersion applications tend to use a custom user interface rather than a device's user interface to enhance the user's sense of engagement in product usage. User discovery and Discovery behavior is part of an immersive application experience, so it is appropriate to use non-standard controls.

Immersive applications are usually presented in the form of games, stories, etc. For this reason, immersion applications typically use custom navigation methods to replace standard, data-driven methods in the application of a tool class.

The user experience model of immersive applications is determined by the experience of the application.

Iii. Porting of PC applications

Based on the application of TV platform, in the user habits and the PC is very different, in the user experience users will have different expectations.

TV is a family-unit platform, the age span of the crowd is very large. This means that we want to design very simple, easy-to-use applications.

Note: If your PC version application provides complex tasks or a range of tasks, you need to check how people use them to understand how to disassemble tasks into a series of easily completed subtasks and then design them selectively.

In application design, 80-20 principles are adopted. It is prudent to decide whether to introduce features that are powerful, but that are used by a small subset of users. More attention should be paid to features that meet the needs of the vast majority of users-because PCs may have a better environment to provide these capabilities.

Iv. PC application Transplant Case: Weather application

On the PC platform, most features can be displayed together in a single window. Because of the precise operation of the mouse, the proximity of the person to the screen, and the clicking of the cursor across the screen, this is the characteristic of the PC.

But applications on television platforms are more similar in some ways to mobile devices such as mobile phones: people need simple weather applications, and they want to quickly access core functionality.

Figure IV: Weather applications on PCs

So you need to streamline the user interface to make the interface look neat and easy to use. In addition, you need to streamline the menu structure, simplify the structure and level of the menu, so that users can open the application, and immediately the desired operation.

Figure V is the main interface for weather applications. Weather applications, mainly consists of two parts: to see the weather in a particular city, the city list to delete and increase operations.

At design time, the task is decomposed into three parts: View City weather, add City, delete city.

Among them, the weather is shown as the main interface. Adding and removing cities exists only in specific states (add and remove cities). At design time, we will add the city and remove the city design to become the configuration icon, placed in the semicircular function bar below.

This method, simple and intuitive, avoids unnecessary operation. After sampling test, people of different ages and different knowledge backgrounds can be easily used.

Figure five: The weather on Lenovo Ebox

Attached: Principles of Excellent user interface

Metaphor: As much as possible based on objects and actions in the real world as a model of objects and actions in your application. This helps users to quickly understand and use your application.

Note: Unless you choose a metaphor that is generally accepted, using standard controls and actions is a better way to extend real-world objects and actions than just to fit the user interface of your application.

Design idioms: In many cases, you cannot find the right metaphors, such as processes, memory addresses, etc. This situation, reluctantly using inappropriate metaphors, but will increase the user's confusion. So, designing a simple idiom is more appropriate--enough simple and intuitive idioms that are no more difficult to understand and use than metaphors.

Direct manipulation: This means requiring users to feel that they are controlling something tangible, not abstract. The advantage of following the principle of direct manipulation is that it is easier for users to understand the results of their actions.

Preserve the visibility of an object when the user is manipulating it

User-controlled results require immediate feedback

Less input multiple selection:

Programs are better at memorizing options lists, commands, data, and more.

Keep the least text input in order to free users from the input that takes a lot of time.

Avoid a large number of error entry checks in your program.

Instead of thinking about how to do things, it's better for users to focus on the tasks that are done rather than the input.

Feedback: Based on the principle of direct manipulation, in addition to the final results, users need to immediately see the results of their operations. And the real-time state in the long process of the system.

You should show some visible changes to each action and state.

Animation is a good way of feedback because it is clever and informative-but animations are used to enhance the user experience, not to attract the attention of the user.

User controllability: User controllability allows the user, not the program itself, to start and control the action. This requires:

Keep actions simple and intuitive so that users can understand and remember-use standard controls and standard behaviors that are familiar to the user as much as possible.

Provide sufficient cancellation opportunities before the operation starts and prompt for potential disruptive behavior of the user.

Allows the user to gracefully stop an operation in progress when an unexpected or user action error occurs.

Overall aesthetic sense: the overall aesthetic sense is not a quantitative interface is how beautiful indicators, but refers to the application of the appearance and function of how the degree of coordination of standards.

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