[IxDA Discuss] Neonode N2 and gesture-based UI

[Petteri Hiisilä]

keyur sorathia kirjoitti 1.10.2007 kello 19:32:

> I have bit different point of view.

I somewhat agree with your points, but in my opinion they will turn  
out to be much less important in real life than they seem at first.

I'm not arguing that the N2 is for everybody, quite the opposite. It  
is an expensive device that isn't 3G, WiFi or a smartphone. But it's  
an interesting little case to study, because it's so different, in a  
good way, and I hope that it won't fail as a business.

> 1. This phone requires constant attention, as user is always  
> sliding his/her finger to operate.

... sure, but other phones - even the iPhone - need constant  
attention too, imho. In N2 the atomic operations are performed with  
sweeps at the edges of the screen. These idioms are new to almost  
everybody, but they are very natural and easy to learn. You'll feel  
the edges of the screen, so there's not as much need for visual  
attention as in (m)any other touchscreen(s).

For example, you won't have to look at the phone to take or end a  
call (unless you want to). You also won't have to orientate your  
finger to the Close button, wherever that might be in a particular  
app, because you'll simply do the No sweep from your muscle memory.

> 2. To close some application user has to move the finger from right  
> to left. how would user know about this type of interaction to  
> close the application.

They wouldn't know, of course, but I'd argue that it doesn't matter.  
The perpetual intermediate knows it. A personal phone shouldn't be  
optimized like some information kiosk at the train station in Helsinki.

The Yes and No gestures are trivial to learn and almost impossible to  
forget for most people. Same goes for Change view gesture, Tap  
gesture, Scroll gesture(s) and Close gesture. The interaction  
vocabulary is small and it makes sense.

> 3. To view the complete menu user has three steps of interaction ,  
> while in iphone complete menu can be viewed on the screen (may be  
> because of large screen)

This is true. It's a 60 gram (0.13 pound) device and doesn't have a  
lot of screen estate, so there is some navigation if you want to see  
every item.

Entering text messages and browsing the phonebook didn't look optimal  
either, since there was no coasting and some on-screen items seemed  
quite small. The device is really really tiny: smaller than a credit  
card. It's a bit thick, though.

Hopefully they'll improve these.

Petteri

-- 
  Petteri Hiisilä
  Palveluarkkitehti /
  Senior Interaction Designer /
  Plenware Oy / +358505050123 /
  petteri.hiisila at plenware.com

  "Simple is better than complex.
   Complex is better than complicated."
   - Tim Peters