Declarative UI - SwiftUI

I’ve been super impressed with the new SwiftUI framework, with the admirable aims of:

• Declarative, meaning that we say what we want rather than how we get there.
• Automatic, meaning that it takes care of many things we had to do by hand previously.
• Compositional, meaning that we build small things and combine them together into larger things.
• Consistent, meaning that we don’t see strange fault lines between Swift and Objective-C like we did previously, or very old APIs mixed up with very new ones.

For example, here’s some SwiftUI from the examples:

I can’t help but think back to some other UI declarative tools I’ve used in the past … for example, using Dialog Tag Language (DTL) back in the day (ok, in the '80s):

which produces the screen like this:

I know that SwiftUI takes the declaration to a sophisticated, modern level, but it's good to see good ideas come back into use.

iOS 7 - User Interface Quirks

I'm liking the new interface with iOS 7 ... but am still amazed by the lack of consistency.

It's even worse when Apple itself slips up. 

For example: my auto update setting updated the iBooks app recently, to version 3.2. In general, a cleaner, simpler look. But, I was surprised when I hit the Store button, and saw the icons along the tab bar at the bottom:

For some strange reason, the current tab has a glow effect - in addition to the blue highlighting. Strange.

What makes it even stranger is the lack of glow in other apps. For example, here's the App Store - showing the version history for iBooks itself ... 

Strange indeed.

For reference, the Apple design guidelines for tab bar icons are here.

TweetBot UI

After the recent changes to the official Twitter iPhone app, I've done as others have - and looked at options.

At the moment, I'm trying TweetBot - self described as a Twitter app with personality.

And I'm really liking it. The transitions, animations and sounds make for an enjoyable experience.

But, there's a few little things which I think would improve it even further - one of which has been annoying me slightly (disproportionately to it's actual impact) - and that's the shape of the custom back button.

Let me illustrate ... here's a comparison shot between TweetBot - and the standard iOS back button:

I've highlighted the "problem" area - which shows:

• the standard button has a much steeper angle, and finishes with a slight curve to the line
• the TweetBot button is essentially a straight line (of a shallower angle) with a small curve at the end.

Like I said - not  a major issue. But every time I see it, I think how it would be nice to have it as the standard shape.

Real World Usability

This is a post on usability - in the "real world" - which may become something of a series.

The subject today is a ticket vending machine - not super exciting, but it's a a new model being rolled out in south east Queensland, so could be considered topical.

First, a picture:



Mmmm, what ever could be a problem with this shiny new design.

Well. A few things unfortunately. Let's see.

1. the coin slot. There's not enough room for a right handed person to insert coins, without constantly scraping them up against the side of the machine. Why?
   
   
   
   
2. the "ticket/change/receipt" hopper is too low. I understand that the machine needs to cater for people of all heights, including wheelchair access - but this is just too low. It requires constant stooping to fetch change and tickets.
   
3. the touch screen. I'm not sure where to start with this one, since there are so many aspects ...
   
   1. the responsiveness (or lack of). there's a lag in the response - so that after you've pressed a soft button, you're not really sure if it's really pressed or not
   
   
   2. the angle - unless your eyes happen to be perpendicular to the screen, your screen presses will be off the mark - it seems that there is enough of a gap between the surface of the touch screen, and the actual LCD screen that this is a real problem.

Then there's the interaction flow. The series of screens you have to wade through to get a ticket is just plain cumbersome. Some issues are:

1. To select a destination station, you need to go through a multi level alphabetical menu, or select from a "map". The map isn't too bad, but in combination with the "angle" problem, it's a little hard to use as well.


2. There are no direct keys for common stations


3. why not allow a one touch "daily to Central" from suburban machines?

I realise that these concerns will not be as prevalent once the smartcard side of things is operational (since most commuters will just use them to top up the value on their cards) - but they will still be relevant for paper tickets.

A little bit of research shows that these machines aren't a one off design for Translink - they're a customized version of an existing design which goes by the name of "Universal Vendor 1000". I wonder how much usability testing they did?