building sexy user interfaces in servoy

0Servoy World 2011

Building Sexy User Interfaces in ServoyServoy World 2011

Thomas Immich

Servoy World 2011

AGENDA

• Background Information

• IntroductionThe impact of a well-designed user interface

• Intuitive, sexy and cleanAttributes that make up a great UI

• Good and bad practicesScreen design and icon design samples

• Live Demo

3

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Servoy World 2011

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Thomas Immich

• Design-developer hybrid

• Specializes in high-fidelity user interface prototyping

• Lead design consultant at several large-scale projects in agile development teams

• CEO and co-founder of Centigrade

Servoy World 2011

SELECTED CLIENTS

Clients from different industries and countries:USA, Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Austria, Switzerland, Germany

The impact of a well-designed user interface

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INTRODUCTION

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THE IMPACT OF A USER INTERFACE

• For the user, the user interface is the application

• Question is not only

“What can I accomplish with the software in theory?”

but also

“How good can I accomplish my goals in practice?”

Servoy World 2011

THE IMPACT OF A USER INTERFACE

• Feature tiredness

• What good is a feature that no one ever finds?

• How does the software stand out from the crowd when competitors offer similar features?

• The user interface has the most significant impact on how the software is perceived

Servoy World 2011

THE RELEVANCE OF USER INTERFACE DESIGN

• User Interface Design is about making user interfaces effective, efficient and satisfying to use

• To memorize:

• Effective

• Efficient

• Easy to Learn

• Engaging

• Error Tolerant

Servoy World 2011

THE RELEVANCE OF USER INTERFACE DESIGN

• Disciplines that pave the way for this:

• Usability Engineering

• Visual UI Design

• UI Development

Attributes that make up a great UI

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INTUITIVE, SEXY AND CLEAN

Servoy World 2011

INTUITIVE

• Intuition = Understanding without apparent effort(just one of many definitions)

• Intuition is also about making fast decisions without having to compare options

“Don’t make me think”

13INTUITIVE?

14INTUITIVE?

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USABILITY ENGINEERING

• Discipline stemming from psychology(e.g. cognitive psychology)

• Solving the right problems(by understanding users’ needs and context)

• Conceptualizing the fundamental information designand interaction design

• Validating that design decisions really work (by evaluating them with real users)

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USER-CENTERED DESIGN PROCESS

Think user-centric, involve users

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LOW-FI PROTOTYPES (WIREFRAMES & SCRIBBLES) 18

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MACRO VS. MICRO-INTERACTION DESIGN

• Macro-Interaction Design

• Defining what is needed where for users to solve their tasks

• Designing the flow and navigation through the application

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MACRO VS. MICRO-INTERACTION DESIGN

• Micro-Interaction Design

• Defining how a component behaves in detail(mouse and keystroke level)

• Influences the application’s feel most

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VISUAL UI DESIGN

• Enhancing the application’s look

• No visual abstractions anymore – pixel preciseness

• Ideally, visual UI design builds on usability engineering artifacts and “enriches” them

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VISUAL UI DESIGN CARES ABOUT…

• Screen (fine) layoutDistances, proportions, dimensions, alignment

• GUI element stylesAffordance, clarity, colors, fonts etc.

• IconsIntuitive, easily recognizable and aesthetic imagery to rapidly communicate application functionality

• AnimationsTransitions between different GUI states that improve orientation

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FROM A WIREFRAME… 24

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…TO A HIGH-FIDELITY MOCK 26

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WHAT IS SEXY ANYWAY?

• In this context, it’s definitely not about reproduction

• However, it is about attractiveness and appeal

• Again: intrinsic values can also be sexy

• If we talk of a UI being “sexy” we think of:

Aesthetics and Desirability

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IS THIS A SEXY DASHBOARD?

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IS THIS A SEXY INVOICING SCREEN?

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PUTTING „SEXY“ INTO CONTEXT

• Attractive things work better than unattractive things and are perceived as being „more usable“• Emotions can evoke the “I want to have it” effect

• The look and feel defines how a software is being perceived• Stable

• Professional

• Trustworthy

• etc.

Servoy World 2011

PUTTING „SEXY“ INTO CONTEXT

• Whatever shall be accomplished via visual design: constraints must be considered• Readability

• Support for the color vision impaired

• Standards compliance

• Cultural aspects (BiDi-support, color semantics etc.)

• Technical limitations

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CLEAN

• Everything’s in place

• Unnecessary stuff is kept out of sight

• Same things look the same and therefore are familiar

• If we talk of a UI being “clean” we think of:

Information Throughput

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IS THIS A SEXY INVOICING SCREEN?

Screen Design and Icon Design

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GOOD AND BAD PRACTICES

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BAD

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GOOD

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BAD

• This sample does not reflect dependencies between controls.

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GOOD

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ONE STYLE PER COMPONENT CLASS…

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…VS. ONE STYLE PER USAGE CONTEXT

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COMPLEXITY…

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…REDUCED

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DOES THIS WELCOME SCREEN WELCOME YOU?

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DOES THIS WELCOME SCREEN WELCOME YOU?

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THIS IS NOT AN ICON…

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BUT THIS ONE IS…

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…AND SO ARE THESE

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WHY ARE THESE ICONS RECOGNIZABLE AT 16X16 PIXEL?

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COHERENT, BUT…

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STILL COHERENT, BUT MUCH MORE APPEALING

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A DEFINITELY UNSEXY SPLASHSCREEN…

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…PUT IN ANOTHER DRESS

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STYLISTIC DEVICES

• Modern user interfaces require certain stylistic devices

• Alphablending (for shadow and glow effects)

• Textures (for realistic material effects)

• Fluent transitions between different UI states (for better orientation)

• Non-rectangular shaped UI elements

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DEFINING STYLES

• Basic colors and fonts should be defined descriptively (just as known from HTML and CSS)

• However, pure descriptive mechanisms (still) have limitations

• Alternative: image-based approaches

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MODERN VISUAL EFFECTS

• GUI elements are assembled from simple pixel-graphics

• Advantages• Modern effects can be used (almost) limitlessly

• High rendering performance

• Designers can work with the visual tool that they know best: Photoshop

Servoy World 2011

NORMAL SCALING VS. 9-SLICE-SCALING

• Problem: Pixel-graphics cannot be scaled arbitrarily without suffering from quality issues

Scaling of a buttonwithout 9-Slice-Scaling

Scaling of a buttonwith 9-Slice-Scaling

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USING 9-SLICE-SCALING

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9-SLICE-SCALING METHOD

• Allows to resize a GUI element without any loss of quality

• This method works in Java Swing and CSS3

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“Fine. But… so what?”

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READY-MADE SOLUTION

• We are happy to announce that for the Servoy Smart Client all this is now available out of the box:

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LIVE DEMO

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OR watch on YouTube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFtSJ60B2QY

Servoy World 2011

FROM STANDARD…

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…OVER BIZLAF UNTAGGED…

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…TO BIZLAF WITH ADDITIONAL STYLES

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QUESTIONS

87

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MORE ABOUT CENTIGRADE

• Articles on UI design topics and UI design inspirationhttp://www.centigrade.de/bloghttp://www.centigrade.de/gallery

• More about BizLafhttp://www.centigrade.de/bizlaf

• Browse stock icons with Icon Bookhttp://www.centigrade.de/iconbook

Servoy World 2011

MORE ABOUT THE SPEAKER

• Follow me on Twitterhttp://www.twitter.com/thomasimmich

• Contact methomas.immich@centigrade.de