Category Archives: User interface

[updated July 1st]
When designing mobile phones there are always compromises. The trick is to make sure that the compromises that a manufacturer chooses are the right ones for their target market.
With iPhone, Apple have have chosen to omit physical buttons and go all touch: The upside is that there’s much more space available on the handset for an enormous colour screen with an innovative “double touch” interface. The potential drawback is its impact for one-handed control and for writing SMS or email.
Early US reviews are mixed for text input: Mossberg says he got over his initial dislike, NYT is lukewarm: “text entry is not the iPhone’s strong suit” US reviewers have focused attention on mobile email as the main application that requires text input. In Europe, it’s different. Mobile email usage in Europe is fairly niche: Just 10 percent of consumers use mobile email.
iPhone is a consumer-centric phone, rather than a business one. So, SMS is the key application requiring text input in Europe, not email. SMS has been ubiquitous here from the launch of the first 2G networks in 1992-4. Every European digital mobile phone has supported SMS from the start, and interoperability here has always been a given, rather than a promise.
European mobile users are adept at texting with a standard phone number pad. They haven’t embraced the US-focused Danger hiptop devices with their qwerty keyboards in any volume partly because of this, and have found little desire to investigate Treo’s for their thumbpads. Treos have been strongly business focused devices.
Almost one fifth of Europeans send more than 10 text messages a day mostly on phones with conventional interaction methods, like number pads. More casual SMS usage is ubiquitous.
For a European, SMS is an absolutely integral part of making a great mobile phone, rather than an added feature.
My concern on iPhone is whether the text input experience delivers while mobile: How does it feel while writing a text one handed while walking down the street? How does it feel over days and weeks of texting, and one-handed dialling usage?
Without physical feedback — haptics — it’s almost impossible to use an on-screen keyboard without looking…. and on the move that leads to the experience of walking into things or getting run over.
The other compromise with foregoing physical buttons is, ironically the available screen real estate. While Apple gains space to include a vast screen on iPhone, the UI but has to display an on-screen keyboard when needed for input. So, the extra screen size becomes most usable for consumption/playback experiences, and is not so useful for input/creative/text communication ones. And, an on-screen keyboard that is designed for fingers must be even bigger than one designed for a stylus, and Apple have gone for a finger-based UI.
It’s all about trade-offs and compromises and Apple have differentiated from existing mobile phones with their UI approach, as they need to do as a new entrant to the market.
These input compromises will not prevent the current iPhone from selling. People are different. Not everyone will find this an issue, and there will be enough people worldwide that don’t use SMS heavily that Apple can still hit its 10 million target.
If Apple ever wants to become a mass market mobile handset maker in Europe — and that goal is not certain in any way, as Apple may choose to focus on the high end — Apple must either persuade consumers that its text input approach is better, or create a family of iPhones including models with different interaction methods. If any company can convince consumers that its way is best, that company is Apple.