#10ft ui

This is just a WIP list of things I learned from designing the 10ft. UI for TV. This post will keep growing as I will, or sure, learn more from it.

1. Commit a status update on the UI on screen (where the user will make decision) not on the gesture made by the user. Most of the time, a gesture on the remote is to trigger an UI on the screen. Not until the user taps/clicks on a certain button from the UI, some feedback or update should not take place. A simple concept is that guesture is the interface to the UI and the UI is where the user make decision.

2. Mode switching model - Help the user switching their mental model with explicit modes so that particular gestures can only work with the context of the mode. 

3. Context is important for re-oreient user and help they learn UI pattern more efficiently. Especially when the product itself is complicate

4. Stop making decision for the user. – Land on detail page or the list page for TV shows. Do we land the user on the last episode they watched or the next available episode they will want to watch? If we follow the convention on the web, this would be similar to the visited link that changed its color or form to hint the user they have taken the path. On the TV UI, to land the user on the last watched episode would help the user to keep track of their path. There are cases where an episode might not have been fully finished so the user can easy make decision on staying on the last watches content or move on to the next available content by simple one tap or swipe to it.

5. Don’t try to push all the features out the first day product is going to be in the market since it will be easy to frustrate users with numbers of new things to learn. It also makes the product difficult to please its users. So what is the trick? Know your product and set its roadmap to give it a chance to grow. It will benefit both the user and the engineers.