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Variable Fonts and Wide-Screen Layouts: Adopting Data-Driven Progressive Enhancements

November 25, 2018Nov 25, 2018 | Article: 4 minutemins to read

The NN/g website homepage now incorporates variable fonts and a wide-screen layout — 2 technical adjustments which improve the user experience for a subset of users on supported devices.

Intelligent Assistants: Creepy, Childish, or a Tool? Users’ Attitudes Toward Alexa, Google Assistant, and Siri

August 5, 2018Aug 5, 2018 | Article: 12 minutemins to read

Users assume that assistants have a low level of competence for complex tasks and find them to be socially awkward to interact with.

Intelligent Assistants Have Poor Usability: A User Study of Alexa, Google Assistant, and Siri

July 22, 2018Jul 22, 2018 | Article: 23 minutemins to read

Both voice-only and screen-based intelligent assistants work well only for very limited, simple queries that have fairly simple, short answers.

Audio Signifiers for Voice Interaction

September 10, 2017Sep 10, 2017 | Article: 11 minutemins to read

Provide explicit, implicit, and nonverbal signifiers to help users understand their options in voice-interaction interfaces.

Technology Forces Us To Do Things We're Bad At. Time To Change How Design Is Done (at jnd.org)

January 25, 2017Jan 25, 2017

Distractibility isn't a human problem; it's a design problem. We need to reverse the normal technological strategy of asking people to fill in for gaps in machine performance. Instead, we should require machines to fill in for gaps in human performance.

Design, business models, and human-technology teamwork (at jnd.org)

January 19, 2017Jan 19, 2017

Technology is undergoing rapid change, which means that business models must change as well.

Augmented Reality: What Does It Mean for UX?

September 18, 2016Sep 18, 2016 | Article: 5 minutemins to read

AR technologies can impact the user experience by decreasing interaction cost, cognitive load, and attention switching.

WeChat: China’s Integrated Internet User Experience

August 21, 2016Aug 21, 2016 | Article: 13 minutemins to read

User research finds that tightly integrated services with simple and unified design make people use WeChat; mainly through traditional GUI interactions, not a “conversational UI.”

Voice Interaction UX: Brave New World...Same Old Story

January 31, 2016Jan 31, 2016 | Article: 7 minutemins to read

Although voice interaction is markedly different from graphical user interfaces, classic usability principles are still critical to the quality of the user experience.

Apple Is Making Us All My Grandmother

October 11, 2015Oct 11, 2015 | Article: 6 minutemins to read

Sometimes the form doesn’t follow function and usability must be sacrificed for the sake of beautiful design and business goals. The iPhone is an example.

Smart-TV Usability: Accessing Content is Key

September 20, 2015Sep 20, 2015 | Article: 8 minutemins to read

UX design for television UIs should focus on minimizing user effort and providing quick and smooth access to content.

Very Large Touchscreens: UX Design Differs From Mobile Screens

August 23, 2015Aug 23, 2015 | Article: 10 minutemins to read

Only a few mobile-design skills and design recommendations translate well to designing for very large touchscreens, as found in kiosks and other nonmobile use cases. Users’ field of vision, arm motion, affordance, and privacy are a few of the different considerations for such screens with up to 380 times the area of a smartphone.

Tablet UX Research From the Pioneer Days

January 25, 2015Jan 25, 2015 | Article: 3 minutemins to read

The PenPoint tablet was ahead of its time and too expensive and heavy, but had gestural syntax and personal-productivity benefits that we can still learn from.

Smartwatches Are the Future—But Samsung Galaxy Gear Only Partway There

December 8, 2013Dec 8, 2013 | Article: 16 minutemins to read

The Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch poses unique problems due to the tiny touchscreen. The use of gestures and streamlining content are reasonable solutions, but need to be implemented in a more usable manner.

The Paradox of Wearable Technologies (at jnd.org)

July 24, 2013Jul 24, 2013

Can wearable devices be helpful? Absolutely. But they can also be horrid. It all depends upon whether we use them to focus and augment our activities or to distract. It is up to us, and up to those who create these new wearable wonders to decide which it is to be. Article available at Technology Review.

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