Designing for Interaction: Creating Innovative Applications and Devices

✍ Scribed by Dan Saffer

• Publisher: New Riders
• Year: 2009
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 241
• Series: Voices That Matter
• Edition: 2nd
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

From the Back Cover
Building products and services that people interact with is the big challenge of the 21st century. Dan Saffer has done an amazing job synthesizing the chaos into an understandable, ordered reference that is a bookshelf must-have for anyone thinking of creating new designs."
- Jared Spool, CEO of User Interface Engineering
Interaction design is all around us. If you've ever wondered why your mobile phone looks pretty but doesn't work well, you've confronted bad interaction design. But if you've ever marveled at the joy of using an iPhone, shared your photos on Flickr, used an ATM machine, recorded a television show on TiVo, or ordered a movie off Netflix, you've encountered good interaction design: products that work as well as they look.
Interaction design is the new field that defines how our interactive products behave. Between the technology that powers our devices and the visual and industrial design that creates the products' aesthetics lies the practice that figures out how to make our products useful, usable, and desirable.
This thought-provoking new edition of "Designing for Interaction" offers the perspective of one of the most respected experts in the field, Dan Saffer. This book will help you
learn to create a design strategy that differentiates your product from the competition
use design research to uncover people's behaviors, motivations, and goals in order to design for thememploy brainstorming best practices to create innovativenew products and solutionsunderstand the process and methods used to define product behavior
It also offers interviews and case studies from industry leaders on prototyping, designing in an Agile environment, service design, ubicomp, robots, and more.

✦ Table of Contents

Chapter 1: What Is Interaction Design? 1
What Are Interactions and Interaction Design? . . . . . . . . .3
Tree Ways of Looking at Interaction Design . . . . . . .4
Why Interaction Design? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5
Focusing on Users . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6
Finding Alternatives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6
Using Ideation and Prototyping . . . . . . . . . . . . .6
Collaborating and Addressing Constraints . . . . . . . .7
Creating Appropriate Solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . .7
Drawing on a Wide Range of Influences . . . . . . . . . .8
Incorporating Emotion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8
A (Very) Brief History of Interaction Design. . . . . . . . . . .8
1830s to 1940s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9
1940s to 1960s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
1960s to 1970s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
1980s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
1990s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
2000s to Present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
A Stew of Disciplines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Products and Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Why Practice Interaction Design? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
For Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Chapter 2: The Four Approaches to Interaction Design 31
User-Centered Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Activity-Centered Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Systems Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Genius Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
For Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Chapter 3: Design Strategy 47
What Is Design Strategy? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Design Strategy and Business Strategy . . . . . . . . . 49
Framing the Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Traditional Research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Design Brief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Stakeholder Interviews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Metrics and Return on Investment (ROI) . . . . . . . . 59
Competitive Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Determining Differentiators. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Fighting Feature-itis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Pricing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Visualization and Visioning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Vision Prototypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Project Planning and Roadmapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
Product Roadmap . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
For Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Chapter 4: Design Research 73
What Is Design Research?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Why Bother with Design Research?. . . . . . . . . . . 75
Research Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Costs and Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Recruiting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Moderator Script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Conducting Design Research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
What Not to Do . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Ethical Research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
What to Look For and How to Record It. . . . . . . . . 84
Research Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Interviews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
For Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Chapter 5: Structured Findings 93
Preparing the Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Make the Data Physical . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Manipulating the Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Analyzing the Data. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Summation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .101
Extrapolation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .102
Abstraction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .103
Conceptual Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .103
Personas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .106
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .111
For Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .111
Chapter 6: Ideation and Design Principles 113
Creating Concepts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
Getting Started. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .118
Structured Brainstorming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .119
Organizing Concepts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .122
Creating Design Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .122
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .126
For Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .126
Chapter 7: Refinement 127
Constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .128
Te Laws and Principles of Interaction Design . . . . . . . . .129
Direct and Indirect Manipulation . . . . . . . . . . .129
Affordances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .130
Feedback and Feedforward . . . . . . . . . . . . . .131
Mental Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .133
Standards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .134
Fitts’s Law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .134
Hick’s Law. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .135
Te Magic Number Seven . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .135
Tesler’s Law of the Conservation of Complexity . . . . .136
Te Poka-Yoke Principle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .137
Errors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .138
Frameworks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .138
Metaphor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .138
Postures. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .140
Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .140
Documentation and Methods of Refnement . . . . . . . . .143
Scenarios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .144
Sketches and Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .145
Storyboards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .146
Task Flows. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .147
Use Cases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .148
Mood Boards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .149
Wireframes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .151
Service Blueprint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .156
Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .158
Non-traditional Inputs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .165
Voice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .166
Gestures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .166
Presence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .167
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .167
For Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .167
Chapter 8: Prototyping, Testing, and Development 169
Interface Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .170
Sound Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .174
Prototyping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .174
Low-Fidelity Prototypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .177
High-Fidelity Prototypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .179
Service Prototypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .180
Testing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .181
Heuristic Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .184
Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .185
Agile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .191
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .191
For Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .192
Chapter 9: The Future of Interaction Design 193
Te Next Five Years of the Internet . . . . . . . . . . . . . .195
Tools for the Next Web . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .196
Intelligent Agents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .197
Spimes and the Internet of Tings . . . . . . . . . . . . . .197
Human-Robot Interactions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .199
Wearables. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .203
Ubiquitous Computing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .205
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .210
For Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .210
Epilogue: Designing for Good 211
Ethics in Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .212
Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .213
Deliberate Choices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .213
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215