In order to bring back some funk to it’s Hotmail brand and to compete better with the likes of Gmail, Microsoft has spruced up the interface design of and added new features to their webmail service. Over time the nature of the content of inboxes has morphed from a majority of mails coming from people you knew. Today’s inbox includes a lot of spam (which now makes up 90% of webmail traffic), mail from other services such as social networks, newsletters and other types of mail such as sending yourself a document which you want to be able to access later away from your computer. The new Hotmail  segregates the different types of email to let you know exactly which types of mails you have received allowing to directly go to the desired type (such as mails with photos attached to them for example) from the revamped homepage.

A great new feature is the sweep function which allows you to move all mails from one or more contacts into a desired folder (such as the trash folder) with a couple clicks. Furthermore this feature can be made to work automatically. In effect MS is trying to make Hotmail the service of choice to centralize your emailing as POP mail such as Gmail and Yahoo Mail Plus can be forwarded and automatically swept into their own folders. Photos are automatically previewed and can be viewed as a slideshow all without leaving Hotmail.  Those sending photos can have their photos made into an online album on MS’s new free cloud-hosting service, SkyDrive, for all users to see, comment, tag friends or add photos regardless of email service used.

As the saying goes ‘if it ain’t broke don’t try to fix it’. When Microsoft released Office 2007 to succeed Office 2003, users were treated to a revolution in the popular office productivity suite’s interface design as some of the core handling patterns learned by using previous iterations of the Office no longer applied. The menu buttons and toolbars on the interface design of Office 2007 were a radical and unexpected departure. MS implemented its new Fluent User Interface design ‘Ribbon’ to replace the previous system of layered menus, toolbars, and task panes with a new system “optimized for efficiency and discoverability”. In many ways Office 2007 in comparison to its previous iteration was like Vista to Windows XP. Some users that had gained mastery of XP found themselves unable to do things on Vista they could easily do on XP. Even power users were stumped by Office 2007’s learning (or should I say re-learning) curve leading many to simply stick to their guns much in the same way many never felt compelled to upgrade to Vista. Some who upgraded to the 2007 iteration even used add-ons that simulated the classical menu user interface design.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg ended his silence about the recent privacy controversies in a letter to tech blogger Robert Scoble and via an op-ed piece in the Wall Street journal. Zuckerberg acknowledged that Facebook security features were too convoluted and stated that “in the coming weeks, [Facebook] will add privacy controls that are much simpler to use”.  In addition, Zuckerberg promises that Facebook users will be given a much easier method for opting out of all third party services.

Zuckerberg’s response was prompted by a tidal wave of fury about Facebook’s lack of easy-to-understand and easy-to-use privacy options in its interface design from users across the globe.  An initial security glitch, in which some users were able to view the private chats or messages of their friends, created a snowball effect among users as they also began to complain that Facebook’s interface design was a conveyor of confusing privacy policies and made their private data to easily available to third parties.  One of the main problems with Facebook’s interface design, according to many users, is that there are too many settings and the settings are anything but usable or clear in terms of allowing users to make their desired selections.

Firefox has long been a big draw in the crowded web browser market even landing in the Guinness Book of World Records when iteration 3.0 became the most downloaded software in a 24 hour period after being downloaded over 8 million times in that period. Iteration 4.0 is slated to be released in November 2010 and it promises speed and a revamped interface design. According to the lead Firefox developer, Mike Beltzner, “Something UI designers have known for a long time is that the simpler an interface looks, the faster it will seem. The less the user has to take in with their eye, the quicker they can process it and the quicker the entire application will seem. So we’re actually looking at making our interface faster by changing the way it looks.”

Advances in speed are to be brought about by more than just offering a cleaner interface design with less clutter and GUI controls for the user to cope with. Navigation will also be improved via a “switch to tab” tool designed to better manage tabs by facilitating jumps between them and reducing their overall number. This in effect is done by adding further functionality to the Home button, allowing it to double as a kind of tab repository. Firefox 4.0 also embraces the powerful emergent HTML5 standard allowing for Geo-location and reducing the need for plug-in-based rich internet applications. This latest iteration will also support multi-touch technology, extentions that can install without the need to restart, and easier layout and styling with CSS3.

Facebook’s new privacy feature changes have many users in an uproar.  After embarking on the creation of a tutorial to help users  better understand these changes, The Electronic Frontier Foundation decided to inquire among Facebook and Twitter users alike, imploring them to find a catchy new term to describe social networking site faux pas’ and frustrations (The EFF did not explicitly refer to Facebook). Terms like “Confuser Interface Design”   “bait-and-phish” and “bait-and-click” were among the many tart ideas submitted by users. It was clear to the EFF that social networking site users were a little more that miffed.  But before you dismiss the masses of incensed Facebook users as “naïve” about the internet and privacy, make sure you understand what the anger is all about: interface design.

All users know the internet is not a private place.  Using social networking sites means you are on some level willing to make your life public, open for all to see. Naturally, there are risks associated with posting pictures of family, addresses, and telephone numbers on the web.  Facebook users are well aware of the hazards.  The real reason they are angry is because they perceive Facebook’s interface design to be tricking them into divulging or making public information they deem private.  For the sake of time, let’s look at one example of Facebook’s interface design involving partner sites.

It’s no secret that consumers are flocking to the internet to fulfill their shopping needs. Online shopping has become one of the most popular forms of commerce in the last ten years.  According to Reuters, consumers spent 27 billion dollars online during the 2009 holiday season—and that was only in the United States.  It’s easy to see why eCommerce is so alluring.  In theory, the internet should be a shopper’s paradise—click a few buttons and buy anything you want from the comfort of your own couch. But in reality, online shopping isn’t always such a delightfully efficient experience. No matter how interesting the product or beautiful the graphic design, many consumers lose patience with online shopping sites because they simply aren’t usable.  Usability is the driving force behind eCommerce and if your site isn’t functional due to poor interface design, the consequences can be disastrous for you and your company.

A number of iPhone users who can’t do without Facebook were in for a rude awakening on Tuesday the 13th when some third-party Facebook apps were disabled without prior warning! Among those given the boot is the Emoti for Facebook app. According to an article on CNET, alleged copyright infringement seems to be the problem. Facebook has been wiping developers’ credentials from their system, which are necessary for third party apps to function. All Facebook developers are given a unique set of credentials that allow their apps to communicate with Facebook’s APIs.

Facebook holds that the use of the word Facebook in an app’s name constitutes copyright infringement. This is understandable but instead of erasing developers’ credentials, wouldn’t prior warning allowing offending parties to rectify their ways be an option? Another app to receive the persona non grata treatment is iLoader, which uses an ‘f’ in its icon.

Beyond Storyboarding

Some of these wireframe tools that you can use for your storyboards even include interactivity and collaboration, offering you as an interface designer a dynamic innovation process that really brings your storyboard to life. You can create fully navigable wireframes with interactive elements, such as buttons, check boxes, and drop-down menus. These features let you create wireframes that allow you to actively simulate your website’s functionality. This is extremely useful because it facilitates communication and understanding between you, your clients and prospective users.  Collaboration features mean that several designers or even clients can simply log into the wireframe software and simultaneously make changes and/or provide feedback concerning storyboards or interactive wireframes. This obviously goes beyond the quick storyboards but may be immensely helpful in certain scenarios. In a world where time is of the essence, utilizing specialized wireframe software programs is concurrently smart and vibrant — features that do not always go hand in hand.

Storyboarding Resources

Of course, this bog post is too short to go into great detail about storyboarding. So I’ve compiled a short list of resources that may help you learn more about storyboarding as a means to optimize the interface design of websites.
Here are some helpful links:

•    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyboard – A great article on the origin and wider uses of storyboards. It explains most of the relevant terminology.

•    http://www.boxesandarrows.com/view/comics-not-just-for – Comics: Not Just For Laughs! By
Rebekah Sedaca. This article goes into some details on how quick comic-like sketches can be immensely helpful in an effort to communicate concepts and create a great user interface design.

•    http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~landay/research/publications/storyboard-tr/storyboard.pdf – Just Draw It! Programming by Sketching Storyboards by Landay, J. A., & Myers, B. A. (1995).  An article for all those interface designers and usability experts out there who are interested in the more academic background of storyboarding.

•    http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~landay/research/publications/CHI96/short_storyboard.pdf – Sketching storyboards to illustrate interface behaviors by Landay, J. A., & Myers, B. A. (1996). Another rather academic article that is quick to read and builds on the previous one.

•    Rosson, M. B. & Carroll, J. M. (2002). Usability Engineering: Scenario-Based Development of Human Computer Interaction.

Smart Storyboarding

Would you rather work smarter or work harder? If you tend towards the first, then you may find that utilizing a software program for your storyboarding purposes is a very effective option. Unlike with paper prototypes, with a software program you can use pre-fabricated building blocks for your storyboards allowing you to increase the efficiency of creating, but even more so of adapting or changing your storyboard. Wireframe tools, for example provide you with boxes, lines, shapes, and text to quickly create great storyboards. Of course, you can use programs such as Photoshop or Adobe’s Illustrator to create wireframe storyboards, but they may lead to a focus on graphical details thus slowing down the storyboarding process. Programs like Pidoco or other specialized wireframe software applications offer wireframe tools that are intended to be rapid by avoiding often unnecessary details.

Our conclusion of interface design software: It’s got the look and feel of pen and paper, but adds interactivity (making wireframes animated) and enhances developing speed through re-usable elements and layers. Many (real-time) collaboration components enable interface designers to new ways to work with higher efficiency, leaving more time for the creative process that really counts.