Reading Reflection+Notes.

"4 Surprising App-Design Principles"
*design the app like no one is going to see it
*design it simple, easy to navigate
*keep navigation the same throughout, from home screen to last page
*don't force users to sign in/up
*repeat, repeat, repeat

I never really thought that to design an app, I should focus on the fact that the user isn't paying attention or has something else more important in front of them. I thought that you should just design like you have their attention or take it; so it's a bit different that design when I think of posters and other promotional materials.

"How Tech Is Changing the Museum Experience"
*apps are slowly being created to simplify the museum experience from navigation to certain exhibits or pieces in the museum to adding more context on pieces of work
*GPS + the use of navigating within a museum requires a high/fast wireless network and hot spots throughout the museum, which not all places can afford
*Smithsonian is one of the top museums right now to be designing and working in conjunction with additional user interaction
*apps for tour guides are the minimum at the current usage of smart phones and museums

It's interesting to me that the ideas mentioned above were a lot of similar ideas that we talked about last class; thus obviously something to continue. I think GPS in museums would be pretty awesome and nice to be able to easily get yourself to the newest exhibit of your favorite artist and quick.

"Icons"
*easy recognition of icons should be high priority, make it easy on the user
*should be based on newer associations of objects, don't reference styles of the object that is no longer readily available+popular
*keep the style consistent
*if creating a productivity style app, have the standard app icons in their native form, not words or blank
*for other tab icons, there are websites that have icons for you to use or you can create your own following closely the guidelines

I never realized that there were "standard icons." At least, I never realized this consciously; I think I had just accepted because I was able to figure out the app and what to do without having to read instructions. Using a standard set of icons leads me to think that using these would help the user be able to navigate the app without their full attention + thus create a success.

"Gestures"
*there are standard gestures for multi-touch that many apps include, adding the familiarity of navigation
*most custom gestures, those outside of the standard are often used in games, art or music
*keyboard stays the same for searches; keep consistent
*when designing think about what the finger or hand is covering when using to navigate the app
*focus on simplifying and testing with audience group

The first thing I thought of when reading about gestures was the Paper Fox, storybook app that I had recently been playing with on my iPhone. For one of the games, the gesture for moving to look in the tree was opposite of what my laptop was, so I was disoriented at first but slowly remembered how I needed to move my fingertips to create the action. What the lead me to think more about is, would people in many cases just get upset with the app and leave because it was not in the same movement as they are used to. But the focus here is to make sure that I have testing groups to check out my app and see if it makes sense to them.