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London College of Communication

course: Digital Media Production

BA Dissertation

Mobile Phone’s Unified

Graphical User Interface

Pilot Study 2008.03

By Bart Sakwerda

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Table of Contents .................................................................................................................................................... 2

Table of figures:....................................................................................................................................................... 4

Abstract ................................................................................................................................................................... 5

Methodology: Objectives ........................................................................................................................................ 7

Qualitative Research (A-C)...............................................................................................................................13

A Independent Content(Software) Developers, NETWORK OPERATORS ....................................................... 13

“Fragmentation” VS. “DIVERSIFICATION”, HANDSETS, CONTENT, DEVELOPERS.................................................. 13

touchscreen impact, UNIFCIATION and USER EXPERIENCE – APPLE PRODUCTS .................................................. 15

GUI TRENDS........................................................................................................................................................... 16

Outsourcing PLATFORM porting, GUI librariers (+ appendix A) ............................................................................ 17

B. perspective of Operating System/Handset PRODUCERS ............................................................................ 18

Mobile Phone Operating systems ......................................................................................................................... 19

Possible effects of the Universal GUI on handset producers business models:.................................................... 24

C. the perspective of the mobile phone User.................................................................................................. 25

Usage of the mobile phone phones ...................................................................................................................... 25

Quantitve Research (D1-D3).............................................................................................................................27

METHODS: Operational Variables, concepts for the further study................................................................. 28

Variables................................................................................................................................................................ 28

D1 Quantitive research: User Experience........................................................................................................ 30

Methodology......................................................................................................................................................... 30

Findings ................................................................................................................................................................. 31

D2 Quantitative research: User Attitude Survey (2008-02) ............................................................................ 33

Methodology of the survey................................................................................................................................... 33

Questions and variables, Analysis ......................................................................................................................... 34

Findings ................................................................................................................................................................. 35

D3 Quantitative research User sentiment (2008-02) ...................................................................................... 38

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Methodology of the survey................................................................................................................................... 38

Questions .............................................................................................................................................................. 39

Findings ................................................................................................................................................................. 40

FINDINGS, INTERPRETATION AND RECCOMENDATIONS .................................................................................44

Findings derrived from the Qualitative researcH............................................................................................ 44

Findings from the Quantitative ....................................................................................................................... 46

The QNT research confirmed the following: ......................................................................................................... 50

Effects .............................................................................................................................................................. 51

Resources [6000 words] ...................................................................................................................................52

Index...................................................................................................................................................................... 52

References............................................................................................................................................................. 53

Appendix A - Trends in Research & Development of the Mobile Phone User Interface....................................... 61

Appendix B - Desktop UIs ...................................................................................................................................... 64

Appendix C - Content Development Platforms ..................................................................................................... 65

appendix D - Major Handset producers ................................................................................................................ 70

Appendix E - Mobile Phone, GUI - Definitions and classification .......................................................................... 73

Appendix F - Academic and ANALYST research..................................................................................................... 75

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TABLE OF FIGURES:

Figure 3 Nokia Devices 1984 - 2006 1

Figure 4 Mobile Phone Abstraction Layer 1

Figure 6 NTT DoCoMo Japan - FOMA 905i phones 1

Figure 1 iPhone UI elements - Chinese language 1

Figure 5 Flash Lite 2.x UI component Framework in Actionscript 2 1

Figure 7 Symbian OS development milestones 1

Figure 8 Microsoft's Windows Mobile 6 1

Figure 9 Windows Mobile 'Today Screens' Versions 5, 4, 3, 1 1

Figure 10 Microsoft windows SBS Skin 1

Figure 11 London Apple Store – iPhone stand 2008-02 1

Figure 12 Comparison of subjective usability criteria MPUQ with the existing usability questionnaires modified

from Keinonen (1999) by Ryu, SmithJackson (2007) 1

Figure 13 Apple Store – London Regent’s St 1

Figure 14 2008-02 User's Attitude Survey - Model 1

Figure 15 D3 Questions 7, 8, 9, 10 1

Figure 16 D3 Questions 7 & 8 1

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ABSTRACT

Both Mobile phone content and hardware production, are a rapidly changing industries.

Market is shaped by the hardware producers, software developers, technology and Operating System vendors,

interlinked by the complex business relations enhancing fierce competition and shortening of the product life-spans.

This challenging environment lead to high level of diversification, resulting in technology and Graphical User Interface

fragmentation of content and mobile phone’s interactive layer.

User Experience has been assessed quantitatively by the marketers and critics in cases of numerous portable digital

devices, however, as for March 2008 very little attention has been spared, in order to, analyze the use and the design of

the Mobile Phone content and its services. This however, was deemed to be necessary to develop prototype of the

software implementing concept of the Unified Graphical User interface pilot study.

The contribution of this evaluation are the following:

• report of the current state of the GUI (perspectives of Users, mobile content developers ad manufacturers)

• a basic survey model assessing User in relation to mobile phones’ Graphical User Interface and

• data from mobile phone user experience and satisfaction surveys

Report provides a qualitative assessment of the Industry from the key perspectives, establishing the basis for the further

Quantitative research, its methodology and model..

The model allows user to express Experience, Satisfaction and Preference in a non-technical terms, implemented in

subsequent User surveys conducted at the retail outlets of Apple store, beginning of 2008 in London..

The findings will be implemented in further development of the functional Graphical User Interface concept application.

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Figure 1 VisonMobile – User Interface Industry Map

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METHODOLOGY: OBJECTIVES

Mobile Phone devices in 2008, are no longer limited to making voice calls. The ‘post 2005’ devices, are capable of

accessing the internet and operate sophisticated hardware and sensors. The range of services allowed by the technical

capacity, reaches far ahead of sending text messages or serving as a alarm-clock, and extends to Location Based services,

Multimedia, organisation and productivity tools. (NTT DoCoMo, 2008) Graphical User interface is on the forefront of the

mobile phone capabilities.

Personal Computers, TV screens, multimedia players, game console and personal navigation devices, all share similar

abstract elements of the Graphical User Interface, such us on/off switches, grid menus, icons etc...

To serve the purpose of the increasing capabilities of these connected devices, there is a need for a appropriate UI.

Until the advance of 3G networks allowing mobile phone devices to access the internet at much higher speeds, main

Graphical User Interface look, feel and graphical style was governed by the software GUI libraries of Operating System

and software runtime platforms. As a result, the business model of handset producers, content developers encouraged

differentiation through the implementation of various Graphical User Interfaces leading to fragmented and diversified UI

environments.

In contrast, human cognition and attention is more constrained (van Bilijon, 2006) and some mobile phone users find it

difficult to operate devices because of the a) unfamiliar concepts and b) fragmentation of the GUI.

This paper is focused on the 1) impact of the GUI on the Users, and 2) effects of the Unified approach to the design of the

content (software) designated for the mobile phones, and 3) trends in the mobile phones’ Graphical User Interface

design.GUI assessment have been conducted from four different perspectives (Content developers, Operating system/

Handset producers, Academic/Analyst industry, Mobile Phone User), through qualitative literature review, specialist

interviews and user surveys.

To date, there are only a few scientific/industry quantitative studies and qualitative analysis assessments of the Mobile

Phone User Interface. Studies examined properties and common problems in the context of usability (Users), platform.

Fragmentation, handset, software design (software developers, handset producers). The idea behind quantitative

research (Marti, S. 2007)

In 2008 mobile content developers and designers are facing major issues while designing interaction.

Interaction factors have a direct impact on a every element of the mobile phone industry: from the structure

development process, to content reach, its quality and distribution. Some of the direct implications depend on the choice

of the User Interface for all parties: the users, developers and network operators.

Research also aims to discover the role, that the Graphical User Interface (GUI) design plays within the wider, mobile

phone industry, i.e. direct implications of events like Apple’s iPhone or Google’s Android OS , and tries to answering the

following questions through the four ‘research perspectives’:

A Independent Developers

Is Unified GUI across platforms helping to deliver better products faster ?

Is there a need for a open source GUI framework/software libraries ?

B Operating System

How Operating Systems and Network Operators are affecting diversification in the

mobile phone GUI ?

What are the strategies and technologies of handset manufacturers and operating

systems companies?

C Academics

What are the current mobile phone GUI and the developments?

What is the academic/analyst stance on the GUI Unification ?

What we can expect in terms of GUI designs for the mobile phone web and new roles ?

D Users Does the User care about User Interface ?

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How User sees GUI ? What is his attitude towards the UI ?

How Graphical User Interface differentiation affects the User’s attitude and satisfaction ?

QUALITATIVE RESEARCH: MODEL, VARIABLES, OPERATIONAL CONCEPTS

Qualitative research draws from the insights of experts in the field of Interaction, Usability and Mobile Content and the

analysis of the state of the UK’s and worldwide mobile phone handset trends in 2007 and 2008.

Qualitative analysis of the mobile phones’ GUI is supported by deductive interviews and review of the literature and

articles written by the Usability academic, industry and content development practitioners. This is divided into 4 groups,

representing the perspectives of the following:

A. Content developers

B. Operating system/ Handset producers

C. Analyst industry

D. Mobile Phone Users ( Quantitative research: 3 surveys)

The knowledge base review, included:

• over 6 private, critical expert opinions,

• analysis of several published academic papers ,

• transcripts from Informa’s Mobile Usability conference in London 2007-12,

• over 10 publications on measuring mobile phone handset usability,

• references and guidelines aimed at the developers, published by the technology vendors,

• transcripts from the Mobile User Experience conference in London 2008-05.

• Case-studies

Analysis of the knowledge body are mostly subjective, and where it is not stated, they employ description from the

perspective of the Content Developer, therefore employing mostly qualitative concepts and descriptive constant

variables, i.e. elements of the physical phone User Interface i.e. touchscreen.

Information originating from the Operating Systems vendors and software platform was delivered in an explanatory,

hierarchical and descriptive manner, as a ‘white papers, design guidelines”

Primarily the purpose of the study, is to ascertain the proprietary framework for measuring Usability related concepts (i.e.

Users’ Satisfaction, GUI effectiveness ...). Qualitative Research aims to draw a conceptual framework from the

established body of knowledge, which from 2007 offered limited number of structured and verifiable resources

concentrated on Unification or assessment of the mobile phone Graphical User Interface . The telecom industry analysis

provided objective numerical and statistical data, however no information related to the ‘GUI experience’ per se has

been identified.

Secondarily, Qualitative research also complements quantitative research, by providing the scientific base for the Design

and Analysis of the Quantitative data collected in a series of surveys. This helped to establish the concepts by which the

survey questions were based and helps put collected data in the context of the industry dynamics – mobile phone and

content production.

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QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH:

Qualitative research identified the possible elements necessary to construct the conceptual framework of the later

surveys. Temporal structure, developed during the initial qualitative research, was based upon the variables derived from

the usability pool, i.e. navigation or User Experience. Relations between variables, were analysed based upon the

analogies between parallel thematic categories, their casual inferences and statistical syllogisms i.e. users’ satisfaction vs.

Users’ experience and Mobile Phone GUI elements vs. User satisfaction. The relation between the variables created,

dependencies, although some variables (or wider concepts) remained independent. Relations between variables,

including extraneous and intervening variables are described in corresponding quantitative research sections.

This theoretical framework employs reasoning based upon cause and consequence , in the sense, that one conceptual

category, causes changes to occur in another. Such relationships are interactions when one of the ends is a user

designing physical or abstract User Interface. (Jones,2006)

Analysis of the concepts like ‘User Experience’ revealed that, social aspects of User’s activities and preferences are

related to the technical specification of the device. This has been fairly similar with the following model proposed by

Stefan Marti (MIT Media Lab, 2002) Example of such ‘consequential relationship’ or. inductive or casual coding would be:

User( experience) dependent on the User(ownership time interval), or

User (satisfaction). Dependant on the Graphical User Interface and its complexity level.

“Although the ‘user interface’ can be looked at, as an dependent variable, it is clear that the relationship between social

impact and user UI is bi-directional. Although certain social phenomena calls for certain kinds of interfaces, a given user

interface design would also aggravate or alleviate desired social phenomena.” (Marti,S. 2002)

For the purpose of this paper the concepts have been divided into two items (or variable) categorisations: user centred

and mobile phone oriented models. (Jones,2006) the Usability Criteria have been divided into two groups:

1) Mobile Phone properties and 2) criteria related to the User perception.

‘Mobile Phone’ variables included: ease of use, learn-ability, task accomplishment, temporal efficiency, documentation

value, clarity of presentation.

‘User’ variables included satisfaction, experience and attitude.

Those variables, were derived from the Ryu’s Usability Questionnaire (MPUQ), which evaluated “the usability of mobile

phones for the purpose of making decisions among competing variations in the end-user market” and determined

alternative elements of the prototype GUIs during the development process. It also accompanied research process

during an ‘iterative design progression’. (Ryu, 2005) Dr. Ryu examined the following Usability Criteria: Satisfaction, Affect,

Mental effort, Frustration, Perceived usefulness, Flexibility, Ease of use, Learn-ability, Controllability, Task

accomplishment, Temporal efficiency, Helpfulness, Compatibility, Accuracy, Clarity of presentation, Understand-ability,

Installation, Documentation, Pleasure-ability, Specific Tasks and Feedback to the most relevant items. Therefore, in this

study, the response from an existing usability questionnaires (Ryu, 2005 ) –mainly Users’ sentimental attitude towards

elements of the GUI - were applied to the characteristics of existing handsets like Apple iPhone, Nokia N95 mainly using .

nominal and subjective (derived from the context) values illustrated by the table below.

Table 1 Example of concepts, variables and research methods (sample)

Concept Variable measurement / scale(magnitude)

User Experience USER(experience) Subjective / interval

Operating System MobilePhone.OS Nominal value

Tactile UI MobilePhone.UI( variable) Nominal

User Satisfaction USER(satisfaction)casual relationship Subjective / interval

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D0 PILOT SURVEY (CONDUCTED IN 2007-12 LONDON)

The primary pilot survey was conducted in December 2007 in London. The research

attempted, to reflect upon personal industry expert opinions and speculation and

recommendations assessing the concept of the Unified GUI on the mobile phones.

The initial pilot study aimed also, to establish the quality of the sample - UK customers,

present in the central London mobile phone retail outlets. Testing the sample had no

specific epistemology and has been employed to deal with the basic qualitative data

accumulated before December 2007.

The survey examined thirty randomly selected users of mobile phones in the flagship

retail outlet of iPhone producer Apple, Regent Street, London.

During the period the Apple Company was involved in the promotion of their new

portable device – iPhone, what could provide opportunity to poll users of the mobile

phone handsets, conscious of GUI, software and basic usability concepts.

On average respondents used mobile phone more than two years and were familiar with at least two mobile phones

(consequently, more than two different Graphical User Interfaces.) Thirteen short, simple questions were prepared, out

of which, section of dichotomous (‘yes/no’)

answers were gathering answers related with

the three different elements and variables of

no specific codification, i.e.:

• personal data(gender, age,

attitude...)

• phone usage (phone brands)

• Users’ attitude towards mobile

phones

Sample answers considered

1) 70% interested in Handset Usability, and

2) 60% satisfaction with the phone functionality. The survey confirmed also the ‘subjectivity of the User’s attitude’

towards the concept of satisfaction, productivity and user friendliness.

Crude answers designed to assess the sample, provided for the theoretical grounds and validity of the research area –

concept Unified Graphical User Interface, and authorized quantitative data originating from the public (Users) surveys

as a research method. This was achieved through series of a short surveys directed at the UK user of the mobile phone

handsets and contents, designed to assess User’s relationship with mobile phone, through Graphical User Interface .This

grounded the idea, of Users’ Experience and Satisfaction variables being assessed through subjective questionnaires

Pilot study confirmed findings of the model grounding papers by Judith van Bilion (van Bilion, 2006) and Sun Kyong

Lee(Lee,2007). It also approved further evaluation of the qualitative data, conducted through cross-referencing and

triangulation of the variables, employing replication of the qualitative research findings in further quantitative research.

Reference: Sakwerda, Bart (2007) Research methods: Mobile Phone user Pilot Survey 2007-12, London, LCC.

Image 1 D0 Pilot study survey

Initial Research Survey 2007-12 aims were to:

• establish the best way to asses User Satisfaction

• evaluate sample and its properties

• test the variable/concept model of the study

• establish working relationship with Apple Store London

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Figure 2 Nokia Devices 1984 - 2006

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QUALITATIVE RESEARCH (A-C)

A INDEPENDENT CONTENT(SOFTWARE) DEVELOPERS, NETWORK OPERATORS

“FRAGMENTATION” VS. “DIVERSIFICATION”, HANDSETS, CONTENT, DEVELOPERS

Many mobile phones used currently in the UK, are set apart

by the different Operating Systems, software platforms and

content in terms of Graphical User Interface styles, file

system organization and physical appearance. The industry's

handset manufacturers, network operators and platform

vendors have created a mobile eco-system, which is fragmented at every level:

I handset Operating Systems,

II. default Operator internet(content) portals,

III. application platforms

These however have negative implications on mobile application developers and the users. This trend has already been

spotted in Nokia’s 2004 S60 developer guidelines:“Diversification between handset designs and capabilities has greatly

increased. This has resulted in minimal similarity amongst competitive devices in terms of screen size, keypad, browser,

and other elements of the user interface. Applications, services, and other content have to be adapted to these different

devices.”(Nokia,2004)

Nokia has made the Series 60 Platform available for licensing by other handset manufacturers enabling them to bring

phones to market with equivalent and compatible functionality. “Standardizing the application environment helps

service creation and application interoperability. Common input methods, APIs, and supported technologies allow

services and applications to interoperate seamlessly, but still give licensees the freedom to innovate and design

excellent smartphones.” (Nokia,2004) Nokia stated two main benefits of the Unified GUI (for the content producers):

1.a larger market – increasing potential revenues;

2. a market that is accessible through one common platform – lowers the costs of the development.

Although some handset manufacturers are focused on providing consistent User Experience (i.e. Nokia introduced very

little changes to its default OS GUI since 2005), they provide facilities for operators to customize the Experience by

implementing custom, branded GUI.Network Operators use the opportunity to modify the suppliers GUI, not only to

“reinforce the Operator’s brand”, but also to guarantee the revenues from the content sales on the default internet

portals on the devices. (WirelessDev,2007)

Differentiation of the content and distribution channels, can be illustrated by the practices of the UK operators like

Vodafone, O2, Orange and others and their implementation of branded GUI of Operating systems and internet portals.

“ The difference is one of approach. Whereas Orange has actively chosen to spin out separate mobile portal and on-device

portal offerings for distinct user groups or interest groups, other operators have chosen to stick with the one-size-fits-all

model, providing users with features to re-configure their own content positioning and even pull applications straight to

the homepage, if required. Likewise, O2’s spotty use of content recommendation is in stark contrast to the broader

initiatives of leading competitors to leverage both operator-driven and user-driven recommendation to steer end-user

content choices. The treatment of location-based technology is also creating some major differentiation between the

competitors’ portal offerings, both at a functionality level and at a services level.”

(Mohr McClune , Current analysis 2008)

“The structure of the mobile industry is killing

application developers.”(Taylor,2008)

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Negative impact on the content developers is yet increased, by the introduction of new software platforms or software

environments, i.e.: Java ME/Brew in 2004, Symbian S60, Windows Mobile in 2006, iPhone AppleMacOS in 2007, Adobe’s

Flash in 2001(Japan), Google Android in 2008 and plethora of Linux Mobile variations since 2004.(Nokia, 2007)

As a result, portability of applications between platforms inhibits growth of the developer community, spawning

platform-specific ecosystems and an applications testing industry, consuming development resources and affecting User

Experience. “Often, the only way to be certain a product will deliver the user experience envisaged by its creators is to

invest in physically testing it on every handset on every network. It would be like asking web developers to buy every

model of PC and test it on every broadband supplier.” (Carl Taylor, Global Tech Strategy, Hutchison EU, 2008)

“There are both advantages and disadvantages to the user in having a common user interface on all mobile

phones. One the one hand, implementing a common UI would provide consistency when upgrading and may allow for

greater sharing of content(applications and data) between users.

By standardising the UI, handset manufacturers could focus on working together to develop hardware innovations and

new applications. However, I believe there is a far stronger argument that standardising the UI would have a negative

effect. It would limit customer choice and prevent the cycle of competitive innovation which ensures there are a wide

range of different UIs to suit all needs and all users. The objective of the mobile industry should be to ensure every user

feels as if their handset has been designed for them as an individual. If anything, we should be encouraging even greater

diversity in UIs and perhaps even looking at how we can give users simple tools to customise their own interfaces.

The advent of touchscreens in the mass market provides greater flexibility to customise the user interface (the iPhone is

the best example of this, where almost all of the UI is implemented in software). However, they are more expensive than

traditional screens and currently they lack the tactile feedback so important to the mobile experience (check out

www.immersion.com for an example of how haptic feedback can be added to touchscreen devices).

There are certain elements within the UI which could be standardised. Having a common visual language for certain key

functions, like mobile internet access or secure mobile payments, could help to promote usage by creating familiarity.

It would, however, be a significant challenge to standardise this between all the players involved – network operators,

handset manufacturers, OS developers and content providers.”( Marek Pawlowski, PMN User Experience Ltd., 2008-02)

To complicate matters further, developers which manage to overcome the technical challenges, face additional battle to

negotiate commercial agreements with the numerous companies that control billing relationships with their prospective

customer base. “These often result in terms that would be deemed punitive in any other industry, with distribution and

billing often accounting for more than 50% of the price, paid by the end consumer.” (Pawlowski, 2008) This also results in

implementation of yet another diversification in the GUI layer, this time in the content distribution.

“Small companies wanting to deploy services through the mobile channel face a minefield of self-proclaimed 'standards'

and incompatible software platforms. This increases technical development costs, staff requirements and time-to-market,

making it prohibitively expensive for small companies to prosper in the mobile phone business.” (Mobile User Experience,

2008)

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TOUCHSCREEN IMPACT, UNIFCIATION AND USER EXPERIENCE – APPLE PRODUCTS

Released in June 2006, iPhone sales reached global 8th position in number of sold devices (3th quarter of

2007).(WirelessDeveloper 2007) iPhone with its touchscreen, signalled transition towards haptic interfaces,

touchscreens in particular. This change has been quickly acknowledged by Users, competitors and developers however

clear ideas towards the main GUI style or Interaction models are yet to be defined based not only on the iPhone.

Success of the iPhone, certainly convinced decision makers in the leading handset producing companies, to follow the

footsteps of Apple in terms of technology i.e. touchscreens, accelerometers,etc What we can expect, is the

technological change in which the industry will be going – following the popular solutions among customers, like

touchscreen handsets 2006 LG Prada or 2007 LG Viewty (LG Mobile 2007).

However the necessity of change in the area has to include ‘new thinking’ of User Experience and content

consumption.Example of Apple products showed specific approach to all three layers of the graphical interface:

I handset Operating Systems: MacOS on iPhone is consistent with the GUI of the PC Mac operating systems, this includes

the icons and certain interaction elements like ‘sliders’

II. default internet portal or ODP (on device portal): despite iTunes functionality , iPhone and PC GUIs are identical

III. application platforms: elements of unified GUI are implemented in the iPhone API

Apple therefore is dedicated to provide great User experience through universal functionality and unified Graphical User

Interface. Approach which, is very different to established ones, i.e. represented by Nokia, with its clients – Network

Operators and content delivery companies having ‘customized’ or diversified GUI as default. In March of 2008, we can

speculate that the device-exclusive content distribution application might be also in the centre of Nokia’s transition, from

the hardware producer to software company.

Such approach could be confirmed by the non-mobile software products like Nokia PC Suite and Nokia MOSH content

delivery client. However at this stage, such speculations and non-professional assessment of the industry is extremely

difficult due to the extremely volatile consumer market caused by the 2007/2008 financial crisis and limited iPhone

effects studies and analysis. The impact however, might be assessed based on the public, semi –official developer

opinions, i.e. the following response to the “dominant iPhone GUI model” query on the online developers forum:

“I think Apple iPhone is okay, until you start comparing it -- then it's comes off better. Really the cell phone is a device in

transition. Smart phones are like saying "horseless carriage" and at about that stage of development.

And not even Apple is close to where things are headed, I look to Apple developers for some interesting ideas.

iPhone application Quickorde is one example. Frucall is another fusion of online and offline, "shop physical, buy virtual"

by Amazon... or BuddyBuzz. This UI completely upends the concepts of what can be done. ”(public response to my thread

on the http://groups.google.com/interaction-design, by john.soellner@gmail.com, 2008-02)

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GUI TRENDS

The idea of diversification, as a mean to create unique product and to create ‘unique experience’ is no longer an option.

Users are becoming more conscious about the User Interface (Quantitative Research A) and their comfort of using

content. As the market of mobile phone digital content matures, developers become to understand that their revenues

are connected with the number of Users who are satisfied with the experience. “It will be clunky, trouble-prone, and will

not match the level of user experience that the user is accustomed to on their device. Compared to the native apps on

the device, yours will be the "weird" one that somehow just doesn't work quite right.”(Hautameki, Froum Nokia 2007)

The challenge of providing positive User Experience became an important issue, as it may determine the success of all

parties involved. This issue has been a main theme of two consecutive events in London dedicated mainly to the content

developers: Mobile Usability & Application Design 2007-11 ,organized by Informa TM UK and Mobile User Experience

London organized by PMN 2008-05. This events focused entirely on the issues faced by Mobile Telecom industry and

delivered feedback from the Analysts, Academics as well as ‘wider industry’.

One of the MU2007 conference speakers, Maththew Menz, examined the development decisions and processes in

creating the first Motorola smartphone in presentation called “ Motorola Z8: Taking a More Agile, Pattern-Based

Approach to Development for Greater Usability “ He discussed The principals for pattern-based User Experience i.e. user

interface as a manifestation of sets of repeating patterns, ways to approach multi-interaction points . Overall theme

focused on achieving a lighter touch in specification by lessening the load of complicated style guides. (Matthew Menz,

Head of Interaction, Motorola, USA) This exemplifies the calls from the Handset production industry for common,

Usable interaction platform.

The need of change in the industry was also main theme of the MEX 2008 conference. Radical new ideas, like theme

“Content itself will be the interface of the future”, where icons “are dead” and the content itself is the interface.

Such proposals, inspired by the successful market entry of the iPhone, suggest “stripping away the confusion and clutter

of traditional interface elements” ,like menus, scroll bars and instead placing content, like photos, music and video at the

“heart of the user experience.”Thomas Kleist, Director of Interaction Experience (Native ) and Tom Airaksinen,

Interaction Designer, (Ocean Observations)Such concepts of the future interfaces, predict UI to be content- and context

aware, ranking photos and web pages content, on the same level of the interaction hierarchy, as voice calls and text

messages functionality.

Another example of developers innovation, usage of the activity logs, has been introduced by the Tom Airaksinen,

Interaction Designer, (Ocean Observations) Proposed idea makes Users think in terms of friends, tasks, days out,

favourite songs and web-sites instead of the present structure of functional separation.”Separating these elements into

individual application silos, the industry is limiting how big a role they play in the mobile experience.”(Airaksinen, 2008)

The Series 60 multimedia gallery, the CoverFlow system on the iPhone, Google Maps are all examples, of applications

where the content itself is at the heart of the user interface. “If a user wants to browse music, he should be able to flick

through the album art as if he was exploring covers in a record store. Photos should fill the screen and pan and scroll

when the phone is moved or tilted.” (Airaksinen, 2008)

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OUTSOURCING PLATFORM PORTING, GUI LIBRARIERS (+ APPENDIX A)

Increased costs of the development caused by platform fragmentation, created an industry of the GUI libraries. This

software components are intended to be the universal implemented in content and applications.( Appendix A )

Examples of such UI libraries: Japanese Acrodea(product: vivid UI), Digital airwaves (product: Kaleido) and TricastMedia

(product: TWUIK).

Such efforts introduce great User Experience, however it is once again diversified by new GUI standards. Great

technology is assumed to automatically equate to a great customer experience. Many argue however, that focusing on

what the user needs and finding practical solutions, regardless of how ‘advanced’ the underlying technology is

perceived to be. As of today, some developers are confused about the GUI diversification problem, current state and the

future of the platforms - period in which “companies confused the market by trying to sell platforms rather than

solutions”. (Pawlowski, 2008)

“…There are a couple of alternatives. One is a UI pattern library, very common to web design patterns. This allows for a

certain level of consistency without being overly constraining. The other is internal coherency or "internal integrity." Too

many of the interaction design problems of mobile UI is the idea of dumping a dozen or more discrete individual applets,

thinly lashing everything together, and pretending this is a unified whole simply because a graphic artist gave it a

makeover. That's not a UI, it's a bucket… “

(2008-02, public response on the http://groups.google.com/interaction-design, by john.soellner@gmail.com)

Similar trends might occur during GUI transition towards touchscreen interfaces. Already such diversification visible,

since touchscreen phones were introduced in 2006 by LG, FOMA and Samsung producers and dominated by the 2007q.

This already sparked UI competition in that area, i.e. development of several touchscreen GUIs Apple Touch, Samsung

Touchiwiz, Sony-Ericsson Touch G-series UIQ etc.

Figure 3 VisionMobile - application environments chart

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B. PERSPECTIVE OF OPERATING SYSTEM/HANDSET PRODUCERS

Recent developments in this fast-moving industry, i.e. release of the new software platforms: Google Android and Apple

iPhone, proved that, Graphical User Interface is a critical factor in this competitive field, yet still, until recently, it has

hardly been recognized/marketed as the handset’s or Operating system’s crucial feature.

Since approximately 1997, Mobile phones were equipped with the monochromatic screen displaying textual information.

The firmware, embedded Operating System’s GUI provided basic functionality i.e. voice calls, texts messaging , contacts/

book management, alarm-clock, phone’s status information and other embedded applications.(Nokia, 2008)

Introduction of third party applications through embedded (preinstalled) software platforms like Sun’s Java Micro

Edition or .net applications on the Microsoft’s Windows Mobile, has opened the platform for the external content. This

increased functionality and multimedia capabilities of the phones and turned them into multimedia devices, requiring

new and more sophisticated User Interfaces.

However, to serve required Handset Producers to employ third party Operating Systems [OS], like Symbian, Microsoft’s

Windows Mobile, Linux Mobile. Operating System development has become burdensome and expensive for the Handset

Producers like Motorola. Rapid pace of the handset market growth, coupled with quick technological development cycles

forced, forced American producer to employ third party Operating System. In case of Motorola, this resulted in shutting

down OS department and investment in venture like UIQ, which limited diversification. (UIQ, 2008)

Increasing number of companies producing mobile phones and Operating System, platforms delivered to the market,

lead to increased platform fragmentation. That caused an obstructions for content(software) developers, creating

competitive environment where handsets price and customization (desired by Telecom operators) caused inconsistent

environments for the developers and users. Proprietary Graphical User Interface were customized, to promote the

Operator’s brand by the network operator, or on the internet content portal.

In 2007, releases of handsets like Nokia’s N95, Apple’s iPhone proved that mobile devices production is one of the

most competitive and vibrant among digital device production. Core functions of the mobile phones, since its birth –

voice and text – are becoming less important, giving way to the data connection which can successfully emulate voice

and text, as well as, create environment where content consumption and apps functionality become the main role of the

mobile phone handsets . This affecting both the handset producers and OS vendors. (WirelessDeveloper,2007)

The business strategy proposed to the market by the Apple in 2007 and 2008, namely iPhone handset, iTunes content

distribution system and MobileMe PC sync tool, has lead to industry wide debate on the Implementation of subjective

Usability and User’s satisfaction,(WirelessContent, 2007), as well as, put focus on the Apples strategy of coherent and

unified design of the Graphical and physical User Interfaces across range of iPhone non-related Apple products, like

MacBook, iPod T, software products: MacOS, iLife, etc.... (Apple Developer, 2008)

“iPhone Effect” and Google Android prove that unification of the User Interface has positive effect on the content

Figure 4 NTT DoCoMo Japan - FOMA 905i phones

p. 19/78

consumption, development process and overall User Satisfaction. Great illustration of this, is a movement generated

both from by the handsets producers to copy the ‘proved concept’, as well as, by the user base i.e. through simulating

the Apple GUI appearance and customizing the GUI on devices running different operating systems and distribute them

freely using the internet peer-to-peer networks 2007. (Quantitative Research C)

MOBILE PHONE OPERATING SYSTEMS

Initially, (198x-2002 in Europe) Handsets were running on basic proprietary Operating Systems, (i.e. enhanced version

present in RIM’s Blackberry devices) however it changed with the Handsets Manufacturers strategies of lowering

production (R&D) costs to license designated mobile phone Operating Systems, including Symbian, Linux Mobile.(Nokia,

2007)

According to Canalys Research, in fourth quarter of 2007 Symbian had 67% share of the worldwide smartphone market,

followed by Microsoft on 13%, with RIM(Blackberry) 10%. (Canalys Research, 2007) however

, however, there is also growing trend among the handset producers (seeking lower costs) to employ open and free (no

licensing fees) operating systems.

Figure 6 Flash Lite 2.x UI component Framework in Actionscript 2

Figure 5 iPhone UI elements - Chinese language

p. 20/78

EMBEDDED LINUX – LINUX MOBILE

Linux is an Operating System developed on the UNIX platform, implemented in many mobile devices,

including following mobile phone devices distributions and GUI styles:

� Openmoko OS by First International Computer, Inc. (Taiwan) –open source OS/software platform

� LiMo Platform OS by LiMo Foundation (Motorola, NEC, NTT DoCoMo, Panasonic Mobile, Samsung, LG…)

� Android Linux based OS by Google

� Access Linux Platform by Access Co. Ltd (Japan, 2007-03 acquisition of Palm OS/Software), open source Linux

Solutions based on the open-source Embedded Linux platform are supported by the IT giant like Google and its Android

platform. (Google 2008) Two main reasons are capabilities and very low/free costs of implementation. Linux Mobile

developed by several organizations including Google and NTT DoCoMo, with Android platform and popular handsets like

Motorola RAZR is the fastest growing. (ABI Research, 2007)

We can assume, that Linux will become the third-biggest OS within a year from now on, however, according to the

research (ABI Research, 2007) Linux is particularly appealing to mobile phone makers such as Motorola who are

uncomfortable with the dominance of either Microsoft or Nokia, Symbian's largest shareholder. The software is highly

customizable and inexpensive, but is not as standardized as the Symbian OS, the report said, arguing that,

“fragmentation of Linux will continue to stagnate its growth."

Despite the low costs of implementation,. Linux mobile has no common Development policy in terms of GUI. As it is a

Open Source, community driven initiative, it has been difficult to gather developers attention around the issue of the

GUI(WirelessDeveloper,2007) Despite standardization initiatives, Linux mobile will probably be dominated by Google

Android, and its policy on unification: implementing Visual (GUI) style and maximization of the functionality, and we can

expect same look and feel of products like Google Search, Maps, Mail, Docs on the mobile platform. It is certain that such

strategy will follow Apple and its range of products. (Pawlowski, 2008)

Figure 8 Logo and concept at of the Google Android (source:

Google 2008-02)

Figure 7 NEO1973 Linux powered

phone

p. 21/78

SYMBIAN

Symbian Ltd. is a company established in 1998, in which majority stakes, are held by Ericsson

(15.6%), Nokia (47.9%), Panasonic (10.5%), Samsung (4.5%), Siemens (8.4%) and Sony Ericsson

(13.1%).

188 new million cumulative Symbian smartphones shipped since the formation of Symbian (Symbian.com,

2007)Symbian’s share of the overall mobile phone market grew from 5% in 2006 to 7% in 2007 (Symbian.com/Strategy

Analytics, 2007)

Symbian was designed, to operate on processors produced by ARM Corporation (75% of all embedded 32-bit mobile

phone processors)(ARM Corporation, 2007).

Symbian is [powering phones from Nokia and leading FOMA 905 handsets in Japan. (Symbian, 2008) Symbian OS are

competing, to dominate the platform with the most 'user-friendly and supported by developers OS. Its biggest appeal, is

the ability to customize the software's functionality and appearance "With increasing competition and high churn rates,

operators have felt the need to differentiate their products, whih was accommodated by the Symbain GUI system"

(Vora, Kenil ABI Research, 2008)

User interfaces designed for Symbian OS include:

� Nokia’s S60,

� NTT DoCoMo’s MOAP user interface for the FOMA™ 3G network’

� UIQ, UIQ Technology (Motorola and Sony Ericsson)

Mobile phone manufacturers that shipped Symbian smartphones in Q4 2007 are

Nokia, FOMA (Fujitsu, Mitsubishi Electric, Sharp) Samsung, Sony Ericsson, LG

Electronics and Motorola

Figure 9 Symbian S60 Menu screen

Figure 10 Symbian OS development milestones

p. 22/78

MICROSOFT - WINDOWS MOBILE

Windows Mobile is a Microsoft’s Operating system designed to operate on handheld mobile phones in 2002.

Windows Mobile is bundled with other Microsoft’s software products, including: Internet Explorer™ Mobile,

Office™ Mobile, Windows Media Player and many others. (Microsoft, Windows Mobile 2008)

Windows have been present on different mobile platforms, including Pocket PC™ and Microsoft’s portable

media player – Zune™. Graphical User Interface is consistent across range of devices. Some GUI alternatives

are available for the users i.e. Windows Mobile Shell by SPB, offered for the price of 30 U$D, extending its visual

functionality.

“ The success of the iPhone in 2007 may have focused everyone's

attention on the user interface, but SPB was already well on the way to

making the Windows Mobile platform more usable than ever. Version 1

of Mobile Shell brought large finger-friendly buttons and widespread

customization to the PPC interface to replace the stylus-sized icons and

unwieldy menu system. With version 2 it has refined the app further,

confirming its place as on of the first programs a new WM user should

install.” (PDA/GPS Essentials 2008)

“When we installed this shell on our communicator, it is a huge relief,

partly thanks to the fact that we didn't

have to take the stylus in hands too often,

if ever; and when we had no other option,

it was only in applications that weren't

optimized for finger-based navigation. On

the plus side, this utility doesn't require

your mobile device to be a powerhouse and has almost no effect on the performance of

fairly old or slow systems.” (MobileReview.com, 2007)

Figure 11 Microsoft's Windows Mobile 6

Figure 12 Windows Mobile 'Today Screens' Versions 5, 4, 3, 1

p. 23/78

APPLE - MAC OS

iPhone Phone in USA on September 2007 on AT&T network.(Apple 2007)In the UK telephone is present

since December 2007. iPhone, is said, to revolutionize the entire mobile phone handset and mobile

phone internet industries. (WirelessWatch, 2007)

Large part of the iPhone’s success, can be assigned to the unambiguous, simplistic or minimal approach to the Usability.

(ZDNet, 2007) The GUI has been acclaimed by the industry and has found many successors on other touch-screen

platforms.

Key features of the GUI, highlighted by the users who transferred the usability layer to different devices, point the

following issues: large icons, panels and graphical effects perfectly suit the navigational.

iPhone GUI has been hacked and distributed on the Windows Mobile devices

(xxxx). This proves, that iPhone’s GUI is seen as a ‘reference point’ in the User

Interface.

Figure 14 iPhone's consistent GUI in different applications

Figure 13 iPhone screens

p. 24/78

POSSIBLE EFFECTS OF THE UNIVERSAL GUI ON HANDSET PRODUCERS BUSINESS MODELS:

The short term growth in the telephone market is fairly difficult to predict, because of the highly competitive and

secretive corporate environment fuelled by rapidly changing technology and operators business strategies.

However few predictions can be made, based on the economic principles, technology and User preference trends.

If the user’s learning curve and the ‘brand loyalty will not be as strong as in the current months, Symbian’s position as a

top OS vendor may start to slip in the first half of 2009 at earliest. (WirelessWatch 2008) Until then, the all major

Operating System vendors including Symbian Microsoft, Apple will face competition from Linux minimal integration

costs and ‘time-to-market’ development

Liberalization of the development community, is often caused by corporate strategy.

Willing to tap on the value of the vibrant and active development communities often

promises very low costs. This ratio of development output/value creation to actual

cost of support is often significantly lower than domestic/internal development

teams.

Another reason for the OS companies to compete for developers is that the open

development communities often have different perspective on the software and

grow in a organic fashion, rather than corporate resource scalability (proof: benefits

of open development communities) therefore often create more compelling content

and are more lucrative business.

Such initiatives have been demonstrated in recent weeks by two significant players.

Firstly, publication of the iPhone Software Development Kit by Apple, which has been

downloaded over 100.000 times in the first week.(Apple 2008-06)This has been

released 8 months after introduction of the iPhone in the USA and only 4 months

after UK and other major markets. (Apple, 2008)

This is said to significantly improve the ecosystem and should provide developers

with most favourable terms of distributing content through recognized online

channel – iTunes with generous revenue share (Apple iTunes, 2008)

Second major move, came from Google and it hot Android platform. Not only SDK was released on December 2007, but

parallel the competition with prizes of U$10.000.000 has been established to boost rapidly market for development of

the application for the platform. (Google Android, 2008)

Decrease in price of OS,

introduction of new standards catering touchscreens.

Figure 15 Microsoft windows SBS Skin

p. 25/78

C. THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE MOBILE PHONE USER

USAGE OF THE MOBILE PHONE PHONES

//The users awareness

of differences, and negative impact of the fragmentation on the User’s Experience and Satisfaction

2007 Nokia celebrated 10 years of its mobile phone content industry, which transformed

USERS AS INDIVIDUALS: UNIQUELY COMPLEX AND CONTRADICTORY

Customers cannot be defined by numbers or segments or demographics. Every user is uniquely complex and

contradictory. If we are to design experiences which recognize customers as individuals, we must develop research tools

and analysis techniques which allow us to live and breath the world as users see it.

and call waiting to texting to decline calls, which are failing because of poor user experience.

(reference http://www.pmn.co.uk/mex/agenda08.shtml )

// Price

Price still a dominant factor in purchases of mobile phone handsets (evidence)

Development of custom UIs etc ...

// smoothing learning curve for the new handset

evidence: interview with sales people in the retail outlets (London, 2007q4) Learning the new GUI

Users purchasing new handsets often have to learn new Operating System procedures, same applies to the Software.

“Choosing the right functionality is difficult. Novices are best served by constrained, simple set of actions, but users’

experience increases, so does their desire for more extensive functionality and rapid performance. A layered or level-

structured design is one approach to graceful evolution from novice to expert usage. Users can move up to higher layers

when they need additional features or have time to learn. A simple example is the design of search engines, which

almost always have a basic and advanced interface. Another approach to winning novice users is to carefully trim the

features to make simple device, such as the highly successful Palm Pilot. Low cost is another important goal because of

lively competition.” (Schneiderman, Designing the User Interface p.18 Usability Motivations)

“The rapid expansion of office , home and entertainment applications is the third source of interest in usability.

Personal-computing applications include e-mail, bank machines, games, educational packages, search engines, cell

phones and other mobile devices. For these interface, ease of learning, low error rates and subjective satisfaction are

paramount, because use is frequently discretionary and competition is fierce. If the users cannot succeed quickly, they

will abandon the use of a computer or try competing package. In case where use is intermittent, clear easy –to-

remember procedures are important and if retention is still faulty, comprehensible online help becomes important.”

(Schneiderman, Designing the User Interface p.18 Usability Motivations)

//External support

“users almost never know everything there is to know about the applications they use, and when they need to do

something new, they look to the extended interface for help”

p. 26/78

// Unified User Interface

The positive impact unified platform has on the User’s Satisfaction, based on the example of the iPhone and other Apple

products …

Development of ‘UI awareness’, through guidelines and marketing

terminology.

//Surveys 21%: More than a fifth of US consumers

who purchased smartphones over the

holiday season (2007-12) subsequently

returned the products, with 16% citing

the 'poor setup experience' as their

primary reason.

(Opinion Research Corporation, 2007)

p. 27/78

QUANTITVE RESEARCH (D1-D3)

‘Quantitative research’ section of this document focuses on the design, methodology and

results of the three User centred surveys. Data is collected primarily in order to

understand the User, specify magnitude of technical awareness and foremost, to

measure Users’ Experience and Sentiment towards mobile phone Graphical User

Interface.

The main three themes are allocated to the following surveys:

• Survey 2008-02 D1 – Users’ Experience and Satisfaction

• Survey 2008-02 D2 – Users’ Attitude

• Survey 2008-02 D3 – Users’ GUI sentiment/preference

Each of the surveys has a main theme, however, the circumstances of data collection

demanded core variables to feature in all three surveys. Therefore the character of

the study, places it closer to a commercial customer research, rather than a full

scale, detailed Product’s Usability test.

Quantitative studies in total, targeted over ninety random customers of the retail

outlets in the central London, primarily in the Apple Store – flagship retail outlet of

major producer of personal computers and mobile devices – iPod and iPhone. Its

10,000 sq foot floor space, hundreds of visitors at any given moment, has been

chosen as a suitable place to question customers with relative ‘electronic gadget’

awareness in February 2008, several months after UK’s iPhone handset premiere. Survey D2 has been also conducted in

the Carphone Warehouse – Oxford St, mobile phone handset/service resellers premises. (Apple, 2008)

The survey data and statistical features (mean and deviation ratios) of the surveys are published online, and were

calculated during the process of online data gathering Using Google’s Docs – Spreadsheet application (2008-02) and can

be viewed online. (references)

Figure 16 London Apple Store

– iPhone stand 2008-02

Quantitative data is collected

in primarily in order to

understand the User, specify

level of technical awareness

and foremost Users’

Experience and Sentiment

towards mobile phone

Graphical User Interface.

p. 28/78

METHODS: OPERATIONAL VARIABLES, CONCEPTS FOR THE FURTHER STUDY

To deliver research data, several mobile phone user surveys have been designed, largely based on the prior scientific

studies of the User’s Experience and Satisfaction papers. Literature analysis identified several Operational concepts

which were later transformed into coded variables in the user surveys, of which, User’s Satisfaction and User’s

Experience were the key variables

The qualitative research has identified areas, parts of which should be followed by more conclusive quantitative studies,

i.e. in case of addressing users with new Graphical User Interface designs. (Schneidermann, 2004)

The quantitative and qualitative data collection methods employed similar descriptive concepts i.e. both methods use

‘User Experience’ and ‘Graphical User Interface’ as an abstract idea and as a real model, which can be described and

compared, however those concepts might not be known to the users. (Ryu, 2006). .

VARIABLES

The concepts identification methodology of has loosely based on the

paper by Ryu Young Sam, Smith-Jackson, T.L. (2006-11)Reliability

and Validity of the Mobile Phone Usability Questionnaire – MPUQ

at the Virginia Polytechnic, USA. This study determined the

psychometric qualities of the usability questionnaires and items

derived from a authors previous studies (Ryu and Smith-Jackson,

2005). The revision also attempted to find a subset of items, that

represent a higher measure of reliability and validity.

Findings revealed a factor/concepts structure, which grouped

abstract items constituting mobile phone GUI into six categories:

(1) Ease of learning and use,

(2) Assistance with operation and problem solving,

(3) Emotional aspect and multimedia capabilities,

(4)Commands and minimal memory load,

(5) Efficiency and control, and

(6) Typical tasks for mobile phones.

For the purpose of this study, only three of those categories were

used as a study framework.1. Ease of learning,3. emotional

attitude, as a part of the User concept, and 5. Efficiency as a part

of the e assessment.

Research itself, was sourced from the ‘Usability Questionnaire

design’ paper by Dong-Han Ham,et al. in 2007, titled “Model-

Based Approaches to Quantifying the Usability of Mobile Phones” published by Springer, Berlin.

The paper stated that “Several factors make it difficult to quantify the usability of mobile phones. Nevertheless, a

quantified value of the usability could be used for several purposes, such as design innovation and benchmarking.” The

paper proposed three qualification approaches to quantifying the usability of mobile phones, on the basis of a

hierarchical model of usability factors: task centred, usability indicator-based, design area-based.

Each of models provides process and rules for calculating the usability score of a mobile phone, by applying and

weighting value assignment methods. “Through two case studies, we could obtain empirical data to be used for

determining the weighting value for quantification and confirm the usefulness of the proposed approaches.”(Dong-

Figure 17 Comparison of subjective usability criteria MPUQ

with the existing usability questionnaires modified from

Keinonen (1999) by Ryu, SmithJackson (2007)

p. 29/78

Han Ham,et al 2007). Analysis of the paper in the subdivision ‘Qualitative Research B – Academic and analyst research’

explains in detail also other studies of the User- GUI relationship, academic base of the following research.

p. 30/78

D1 QUANTITIVE RESEARCH: USER EXPERIENCE

Survey 2008-02 D1 is the first survey from the cycle of 3, concerning Mobile User and his relation to the mobile GUI.

Survey consisted of 16 questions and was subjected to the 23 customers of the Carphone Warehouse, Oxford St, London

on 2008-02-20. Customers were asked to fill out was online survey and connected laptop.

METHODOLOGY

Prior Qualitative research defined the conceptual framework of the

research, however no grounding data has been at the disposal,

exclude 2008-01 Pilot study provided simple profile of the sample, and

this study is also focused upon profiling of the user.

The methodology of the first survey is operating on the following user-

centred variables: experience, attitude and satisfaction.

The questions are as follows:

A. Users’ demographics: experience, attitude, adaptability

1. What is your age ?

2. What is your gender

B. Handset ownership, User Experience

3. How many phones do you currently own ? -User(experience)

4. How long have you been using mobile phones ? -User(experience)

5. How many phones have you been using so far ? -User(experience)

10. Did you ever experiment with new features ? -User(experience)

11. Have you ever been confused by the differences in mobile's User Interface? -

Phone(GUI)

12. Did you read handset's manual ? -User(experience)

13. Did you ever try to customize your phone ? -User(experience)

C. User Satisfaction

6. Are you satisfied with your current handset ? -User(satisfaction.)

7. What is your current mobile handset's brand ? -Phone(model)

8. Is navigating your handset functional ? -User(attitude)

9. Did you encounter any problems while adapting to the different brand of phone ? -User(adaptability)

14. Are you satisfied with the amount of time required to: type and send text message ? -User(satisfaction)

15. Are you satisfied with the amount of time required to: access internet search engine ? -User(satisfaction)

16. Are you satisfied with the amount of time required to: find desired media file ? -User(satisfaction)

Out of 16 questions, User Experience appears in 6 questions, User Satisfaction in 4, making it leading theme of this

preparation survey. Questions are simple and require respondents to return simple answer, value of the variable.

Identification and interpretation of the answers in this case, is fairly straight forward. The survey delivered following

results, which concluding findings can be drawn from. The order of the survey is later repeated in two remaining surveys.

p. 31/78

FINDINGS

USERS DEMOGRAPHICS: EXPERIENCE, ATTITUDE, ADAPTABILITY

Survey demographics were not disproportionate in terms of

respondents’ gender and age. Majority of respondents represented

the age of 18-25 (57%) and 25-60 (35%) respectively.

87% of the respondents owned 1 handset only. Handset ownership,

in terms of the handsets’ brand, displayed majority handsets

produced by Finnish producer, Nokia with 43% of the sample

market share. 13% owned Sony-Ericsson, 9% LG. The samples

remainder - 35% did not specify brand of their handset.

The model, and respectively version of the OS and technical

capabilities of the device were not specified.

USERS’ EXPERIENCE

65 % of the respondents experienced phones for over 6 years, started to use phones before 2002. This means that

respondents used at least several handsets: 3 mobiles (45%), 2 headphones (45%). However, 77% were confused by the

differences in the mobile phone GUI on different devices. Among them however, 65% were puzzled at some stage with

the transfer to another handset (presumably with different Operating system or GUI, Question 9). Only 9% stated that

their present mobile is their first mobile phone.

3 out of 10 answerer experienced problems with their handset, however nature of the difficulty was not specified. Half

did not read handset’s manual, prior to the first usage of their handset.

73% experimented with the unknown hardware/software features and nearly half of Users tried to customize their

phone’s GUI. ( Survey did not explain the term ‘customization’ to respondents, however it was assumed, that it is known

to the public, as the process of changing default settings of the Interface, like order of the icons in the menu, or change

to the graphical them, whether in graphical them, or by replacing it with 3rd party content, like ringtones, or graphical

images.)

p. 32/78

USER SATISFACTION

User Satisfaction results have been assessed in 6 questions., where majority of the respondents were satisfied, both with

the handsets and with the navigation systems (74% in both cases).

Basic functions of the handsets, like sending text messages or browsing/finding desired media files using phone

navigation, proved to be functional on all of the handsets. Efficiency however, did not apply to the Internet browsing

experience, where only 26% satisfied with the speed required to access their homepage or search engine (study did not

specify, whether Users were accustomed to accessing the internet).

NB In the UK, major operators used to utilize extra button in the physical mobile phone interface to bind it with the

branded, operators website. Since 2005 it has been main channel of third party content distribution, including news,

mobile phone games, ringtones or multimedia downloads. The direct access to those websites as a default, earned them

term ‘walled gardens’ as it proved to be great source of revenues for the Operators and limited partners. Since 2007

proliferation of robust data plans (offered by T-Mobile UK, Three Hutchinson-Whampoa UK and Vodafone UK) enabled

users to access other websites and to download content from third parties, however browsing functionality remained

below the level of expectations. This has been addressed, i.e. by Google Search Mobile application shortening access to

the internet on Nokia Symbian Phones to merely 14 seconds. (Google, 2008-02)

p. 33/78

D2 QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH: USER ATTITUDE SURVEY (2008-02)

The seconds quantitative study was conducted in the two mobile phone retail

outlets, in London January 2008. Survey subjected 35 shoppers of the Apple

Store - Regents St and Phones4u - Oxford St. The survey was aiming to gather

data on mobile Graphical User Interface user preferences and attitude required it

to be brief and consume very little time.

The only criteria, was respondent’s minimum age of 18 and prior experience of at

least two different mobile phones. In previous survey D1, majority of

respondents had lengthy previous experience with different models of mobile

phones.

METHODOLOGY OF THE SURVEY

Survey tried to establish the state of users’ attitude towards Graphical User Interface.

Secondary task, was to asses User’s awareness, in the field of the GUI. The subject did not measure marketing campaign

effectiveness, however it did relate to the wide advertising campaign by the US electronic device and online service

vendor Apple, marketing its first mobile phone – the iPhone.

The survey took place in the Apple Retails store, which consequently affects the User Sample. The Users are therefore

drawn the store from several possible reasons, i.e. interest in the iPhone, interest in the other Apples’ products or

perhaps interest in the Store itself. Whatever the reasons might were, the Users were familiar with the concept of the

new, ground breaking phone, with large touchscreen and its characteristic Graphical User Interface, as it, at the time was

difficult to avoid.

Questions were assessing respondents’ subjective attitude positioned towards certain variables. Those values, mainly

elements of the GUI, were formed in the previous research, and grouped into two conceptual spheres.

First group was User centric and included: USER-GUI relation

(experience and attitude), USER-Phone relation (attitude), USER

(learning) ability. Second group of variables focused on PHONE’s

GUI and included learnability, structure of contents and concept

of GUI similarity.

The main objective was to examine relations, between User Experience, GUI, User.. with Users attitude. Orientation ...

Based on the previous experience with surveys in the busy retail spaces, it often happened that the respondents had

little time and patience at their disposal, so the surveys have been designed to accommodate short dichotomous

questions delivering concrete data. This is easy to process, however often cross-reference questions have to be

developed to receive full picture of the situation.

Figure 19 2008-02 User's Attitude Survey - Model

Figure 18 Apple Store – London Regent’s St

p. 34/78

QUESTIONS AND VARIABLES, ANALYSIS

The Survey properties of the User’s behaviour like personal preference and evolution or transfer to another GUI

environment. In questions were organized in the following groups:

Question A 1. Have you used different mobile phones ?) Based on the variable: USER.GUI (experience), simple

dichotomous yes/no question have been introduced. Relating to user’s prior experience, it aimed to eliminate users with

limited user experience. Such questions deliver crude data and are often suite for online internet survey, where

numerous questions can be asked in the short time span.

User Satisfaction

Question 2 - Question in which respondents can identify his/her attitude towards the general usability statement.

Question 3 - in which respondents can identify his/her attitude towards the general usability statement.

USER(Satisfaction) Problem in this case, is that the variable is not definitive, meaning that learn ability of the GUI, can

also mean high user’s learning talent. In this case it is assumed that the user with prior extensive experience poses

proficiency in adapting to similar looking interfaces.

User satisfaction

2 ‘Mobile Phones are easy to use … - USER-Phone (attitude)

3. I am satisfied with my mobile phone. - USER-Phone.model(attitude) 4. I have no difficulties with operating handsets

from different brands... - Phone.GUI(learn-ability)

User Handset relationship (attitude, experience, learnability)

4 I have no problems operating handsets from different brands?

5. I change mobile phone handset every 12, 18 months. – USER(experience)

6. It takes days to learn how to operate new handset. -Phone.GUI(learn-ability),USER (learning)

7. I think, every phone works in the same way. - USER-GUI(attitude)

GUI awareness

9. I like graphical effects while using mobile phone. variable: USER-GUI (attitude)

11. ‘I like Apple’s iPhone User Interface’ –USER

13. I am eager to see more innovations in mobile GUI

Content similarities

8. “Every program I have downloaded i.e. game looked similar.” -CONTENT(GUI)

10. “I’d like mobile 'Graphical User Interface' to look similar on every phone.”-Phone.GUI(similarity)

12. I would like my mobile phone to resemble other electronic devices... -Phone.GUI(similarity)

Content organization

14. I would like to customize as much elements as possible on my mobile phone handset. Phone.GUI()

15. I like the way, in information and contents are organised on my handset. -Phone.GUI(contents structure)

p. 35/78

FINDINGS

USER HANDSET RELATIONSHIP

Questions 4, 5, 6, 7 aimed to examine User-Handset relationship through their attitude, experience, learnability, in a

situation of regular swapping of handsets and consequently GUI environments.

Question 7 delivered straight forward data, confirming belief of the Users, that phones do not vary significantly in their

functionality, with 59% agreeing with ‘phones working the same way’ and over a half of respondents do not experience

difficulties(Question 4) while operating handsets from different producers. Over half of the respondents agreed with the

statement.

To establish another important variable, belonging to ‘user group’, explaining whether User is adapt in learning new GUI

environments and can operate device of a different GUI question. 5 was asked. Nearly 70% agreed to swapping mobile

phone handset regularly, every 12, 18 months. This might be connected with the nature of UK’s mobile phone service

contracts, offered for that time periods. This might also have an effect on the tech-savvy user, of which 54% agrees, that

“it only takes days to learn, how to operate new handset”(Question 6). 14% strongly agrees with the statement, while

less than 15% disagrees or have no opinion.

is indicating established that, majority of the mobile phone users is having little or no trouble with switching the

handsets (models or brand). Therefore User’s ‘ loyalty to given brand’ or User’s habit need further examination,

especially for products designers and marketing specialists, to examine this valuable relationships further.

p. 36/78

USER SATISFACTION & GUI AWARENESS

Positive relationship between the Phone User and the handset, resulted in support of the ‘Mobile Phones are easy to

use’ statement, supported by 43% and strongly by 14%. This attitude was also confirmed by Question 3, in which 40%

agreed and 9% agreed strongly. However 23% respondents did not have an opinion and 26% are dissatisfied.. -

Several conclusions can be drawn from both basic questions, i.e. possibility of relationship between ‘ease-of-use’ and

User Satisfaction. However it is important to analyse results of other questions, barring that the respondents of this

survey are content with their handsets, and consequently with their functionality. This requires more direct references to

the User Interface, i.e. implemented in survey D3.

Unknown levels of User awareness, limited survey time and significance of the survey setting – Apple Store, lead to

indirect questions, through the following statements:

9. I like graphical effects while using mobile phone, and

13. I am eager to see more innovations in the mobile phone space.

Both questions assessing direct Users’ attitude and awareness of the GUI concepts. 49% respondents agree to liking

graphical effects (animations, non-default colour themes etc...) with 37% which could not agree or did not fully

understand the concept.

Second question revealed surprising curiosity towards the innovation in the field of the GUI design. 47% strongly agreed,

followed by 37% support of the statement.

11. ‘I like Apple’s iPhone User Interface’

Direct data gathering, conditioned by the presence in the London flagship of iPhone producer –Apple.

63% percent strongly agreed, followed by 16% agreement and 19% left without taking a stand on the issue.

p. 37/78

CONTENT

8. “Every program I have downloaded i.e. game looked similar.” -CONTENT(GUI)

10. “I’d like mobile 'Graphical User Interface' to look similar on every phone.”-Phone.GUI(similarity)

12. I would like my mobile phone to resemble other electronic devices... -Phone.GUI(similarity)

Question 12 - aims at the assess the importance of the UI similarity on different electronic handheld Such connection

was suggested in the Nokia Handsets Poster from the year 2006. Also, correlation between devices might prove the

fundamental ideas behind the theory of Ben Schneiderman.

14. I would like to customize as much elements as possible on my mobile phone handset. Phone.GUI()

15. I like the way, in information and contents are organised on my handset. -Phone.GUI(contents structure)

Data received from the queries, may lead to a numerous conclusions, i.e.:

User reaching outside of the handset to acquire content from third party sources are more adapt to the user interface

variations. This may lead to another conclusion, that adapt in operating third party GUI user, is more likely to browse the

internet and possibly spend money online, using mobile phone. of the mobile phone User Experience.

p. 38/78

D3 QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH USER SENTIMENT (2008-02)

METHODOLOGY OF THE SURVEY

During previous studies, a need has been realized for questionnaires tailored to the evaluation of electronic mobile

phone Graphical User Interface , wherein usability is dependent on variables like: hardware and software reliability, as

well as, the emotional appeal and aesthetic integrity of the UI design. However, several factors make it difficult to

quantify the usability of mobile phones. Nevertheless, a quantified value of the usability could be used for several

purposes, such as design innovation and benchmarking.

Research D3 is based on the research lead by Mr. Dong Ham “Model-Based Approaches to Quantifying the Usability of

Mobile”. It proposed three approaches: task centred, usability indicator-based, and design area-based quantification/ to

quantifying the usability of mobile phones on the basis of a hierarchical model of usability factors.

Each of them provides process and rules for calculating the usability score of a mobile phone by applying weighting value

assignment methods. “Through two case studies, we could obtain empirical data to be used for determining the

weighting value for quantification and confirm the usefulness of the proposed approaches. Furthermore, we developed a

hierarchical model which organizes usability factors in terms of goal-means relations. Lastly, we developed a set of

checklists that are helpful to measure the usability of mobile phones, thereby increasing the practicality of the

framework and model. Usability questionnaires can play, even more significant role, during the development life cycle by

diagnosing usability problems and providing metrics for making comparative decisions.”(Dong Han-Ham et al, 2007)

Proposed conceptual framework which has five views to reflect different aspect of interactions between users and

mobile phones, and from which various usability impact factor models can be derived. Five views include: user view,

product view, interaction view, dynamic view, and execution view.

Survey was answered by the 30 respondents, using online survey. 10 questions and additional material, were accessed

through a portable laptop computer inside the London Apple Store and CarphoneWarehouse retail outlet. .

Questionnaire aimed to deliver crude data with accordance to the model by Dong Han Ham and recommendations, from

Young Sam Ryu and Smith-Jackson (Young Sam Ryu and Smith-Jackson, T.L., 2005) supporting the idea of direct

consumer indicator-based surveys. Additionally, visual aid consisting of 4 slides aiming to compare users sentiment

towards presented phones were used.

p. 39/78

QUESTIONS

10 questions have been organised into three sections.

I. First section, relates to the Users experience satisfaction and handset functionality, with the following questions:

1. How would you describe your experience with mobile phones ? variable: User(experience)

2. Is your mobile phone easy to use ? User(satisfaction)

3. Do you have problems with task accomplishment on your mobile phone ? Phone(functionality)

II. Second section focuses on the Users’ attitude towards Apple iPhone product. It was assumed, that the Users are

aware of the features, as the survey was taking place in the Apple Retail outlet, with a marketing and retail focused on

promotion of that product. Users’ attitude and sentiment is a vital part of the GUI appraisal, as it often results in a vital

purchase decisions of the handsets. Importance of the GUI has also been assessed in the prior research D2.

4. Are you familiar with the Apple's iPhone ?

5. Which of the iPhone’s physical features do you like the most ?

6. Which element of the iPhone GUI do you value the most ?

III. The third section consisted of four questions aided by the graphical aides. To enhance the ability to identify usability

problems, specific features or interface elements, graphical aid has been used, depicting 12 mobile phone Graphical User

Interfaces. The visual material featured in the 4 comparison questions. Adding external information of corresponding

design features and interface elements to each questionnaire, proved to increase interest and GUI awareness among the

surveyed UK customer. Moreover, questions 9 & 10 tried to mix GUI elements with different GUI layout proprietary to

competitive Operating systems, i.e. iPhone theme on Windows Mobile 6 and vice versa (Q. 10)

7. Which ‘Menu GUI’ you like the most? (A. Nokia N-series,B. iPhone theme on Symbian, C.

8. Which menu you like the most ? (A.iPhone theme on Windows Mobile 6, B Windows Vista Mobile theme on iPhone)

9. Which dialpad you like the most ? (A. iPhone, B HTC Touch, C. LG Viewty)

10. Which ‘idle screen’ you like the most? (A. HTC Touch, B. NEO 1973, C.Apple iPhone,D LG Viewty)

Figure 20 D3 Questions Visual aid - 7, 8, 9, 10

p. 40/78

FINDINGS

USER AWARENESS

Questions concerning Users’ awareness, delivered following results:

47% respondents strongly agreed, with having a positive experience of mobile phones. (D3,Question 1)

50% respondents acknowledged also ‘ease of use of their mobile phone’ (D3, Question 2), however majority of users

experienced problems with the phone. (D3, question 3). Nature of the problem, have not been specified, allowing

problems like malfunctioning OS functions, problems with content or User actions and difficulties with the manipulating

the GUI.

The Users GUI awareness study results revealed positive experience of the users with their mobile phone handsets.

Yet it also revealed degree of problems Users are having with Interaction and design of the mobile phones. This might be

attributed to the survey taking place inside the Apple retail store, and its high-tech oriented, curious customers. Perhaps,

the design and usability are values of equal importance to the technical capabilities, hidden inside and useless without a

proper interface.

Figure 21. D3 Questions 1, 2, 3

p. 41/78

IPHONE

Questions 4, 5 and 6 were focused entirely on the Apple iPhone, of which majority respondents inside Apple Store was

aware of, as proved in Question 4. Users value iPhone for its features in the following order: touchscreen (54%), size of

the display(27%) and overall concept of ‘design’, referring to physical handset and its GUI (believed).

In question 6, referring entirely to iPhone’s GUI, (survey did not established whether the users actually owned the

iPhone) Users were asked also to rate importance of several visual features, like: virtual keyboard, multitouch capability,

clarity of icons and menu, intuitiveness of the interface and ease of use. Of those features, ‘GUI clarity’ and general

‘easer of use’ was chosen as the most important one, both by 33% of respondents.

‘Intuitive interface’ and ‘multitouch’, chosen by 19% and 15% respectively, were secondary to the need of a clear GUI

and functionality.

Figure 22 D3 Question 4,5,6 - results

p. 42/78

GUI

Question 7. “Which ‘Menu GUI’ you like the most? (A. Nokia N-series,B. iPhone theme on Symbian, C.)”, and question 8.

“Which menu you like the most ? ( A.iPhone theme on Windows Mobile 6, B Windows Vista Mobile theme on iPhone)”

delivered results favouring design and integrity of the iPhone’s graphical User Interface.

Both n question 7, where 73% of users preferred ‘iPhone stylised’ graphical theme on Nokia Symbian Powered devices

and in question 8, where PC stylized Microsoft’s Vista graphical style was put on top of the layout of MacOs powered

iPhone (Q8 B). Characteristic default icon layout consisted of three rows of application icons and main functions placed

at the bottom, of the idle screen and corresponded with the layout of Windows Mobile 6, stylized on Apple’s iPhone.(A)

Deliberate stylization confused Users, of which 57% opted for Windows version of iPhone, proving the shapes and layout

is relatively similar to the ‘look’ and character of the icons content.

This can also prove the thesis that, Users strive for similarities, rather than differentiation.

Figure 23 D3 Questions 7 & 8

Figure 24 D3 Questions 7, 8 - results

p. 43/78

Questions 9, 10 specified Users’ Preference of the examples of mobile phones GUI.

9. Which dialpad you like the most ? (A. iPhone, B HTC Touch, C. LG Viewty) 77% of respondents preferred iPhone’s

dialpad. Both HTC with Windows Mobile OS and LG Viewty were rated by 13% and 10% respectively

10. Which ‘idle screen’ you like the most? (A. HTC Touch, B. NEO 1973, C.Apple iPhone,D LG Viewty).

40% of the respondents chose HTC Touch and 37% chose ‘iconic’ iPhone idle screen. Users did not find Neo 1973 and LG

Viewty attractive in terms of their menu. The importance of the attractive menu. Is even more important in the larger

screens, with bigger display space and more visible elements of the GUI elements like icons and tabs.

Three out of four displays were based on the dark background limiting energy consumption. Handsets offered limited

personalization capability, compared with the older keypad phones and Operating systems.

Figure 26 Graphical aid - Questions 9 & 10

Figure 25 D3 Questions 9,10 - results

p. 44/78

FINDINGS, INTERPRETATION AND RECCOMENDATIONS

FINDINGS DERRIVED FROM THE QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

B View from the perspective of the Operating System

C Academics

D Users

Does User care about User Interface ?

How User sees GUI ? What is his attitude towards the UI ?

How Graphical User Interface differentiation affects the User’s attitude and satisfaction ?

‘How’ and ‘if’ we can improve User’s satisfaction through standardizing the UI ?

Will common GUI library improve customer satisfaction and increase service’s usage ?

Qualitative studies confirmed, that the GUI is on the forefront of the mobile phone User Experience, and is an internal

part of all the mobile phone content service environments. GUI has to be functional.

In brief, research concluded:

The rapid growth of the mobile phone handset production and software development, has led to exponential

diversification of the Graphical User Interface on the mobile phone devices. However, positive aspects of differentiation

for Handset Manufacturers have been suppressed by the negative implications for the global User Base, as well as

Content Developers. (reference)

A VIEW FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE CONTENT DEVELOPERS

F r a g m entation

Mobile Phone Devices reached the level where it is possible to deliver similar user experience as the Personal Computers

compelling user experiences and build profitable businesses?

Is Unified GUI across platforms helping to deliver better products faster ?

Is there a need for a open source GUI framework/software libraries ?

B OS/ HANDSET PRODUCERS

B1. How Operating Systems and Network Operators are affecting diversification in the mobile phone GUI ?

B2. What are the strategies and technologies of handset manufacturers and operating systems companies?

iPhone sets out the standard, expected to be followed by the like of Google android and competitive Operating systems

Data transmission infrastructure (3G, EDGE, WiFi) has enabled growth in the consumption of Digital Media, as well as

inter devices. Advancement in the hardware department enabled software and content to be delivered as they are,

without resource consuming porting process.

p. 45/78

Unified User Interface has a positive impact on the Content consumption (iPhone, istore)

Emerging hardware platforms i.e. special interfaces, touchscreens, voice input, text input;

Development of the unified platforms: content (software) platforms and User Interfaces

- Contacts management (connection with facebook)

- Technology: Touchscreens,

- Mobile payments, local information, Search

C-onnectivity and data synchronization with other devices and network services

Visual style aspects of the mobile phone GUI;

Mobile Phone Operating Systems, GUI developers and content developers perspectives.

C ACADEMICS

C1. What are the current mobile phone Graphical User Interfaces and trends on the platform ?

C2. What is the academic/analyst stance on the GUI Unification ?

C3. What we can expect in terms of GUI designs for the mobile phone web and new roles ?

Importance of Unified User Interface, known set of paradigms, open for unexpected use cases ….

1. iPhone sets out the standard, expected to be followed by the like of Google android and competitive Operating

systems

2. The developing world is the new frontier for mobile user experience

The developing world is the new frontier for mobile user experience. It is the industry's responsibility to deliver voice

communication and internet connectivity to the disconnected in ways which are locally relevant, useable and cost-

effective.

• How can position add-on services alongside voice and SMS as a core service in the mind of the consumer? What is

the best way to provide them with access to the widest choice of third party content, applications and services?

D USERS

Price

Awareness

Preference from trend

Learning

Coherence

p. 46/78

FINDINGS FROM THE QUANTITATIVE

// Focus on the User – Anthropological approach

D1 users experience, satisfaction

USERS DEMOGRAPHICS: EXPERIENCE, ATTITUDE, ADAPTABILITY

Survey demographics were not disproportionate in terms of respondents’ gender and age. Majority of respondents

represented the age of 18-25 (57%) and 25-60 (35%) respectively.

87% of the respondents owned 1 handset only. Handset ownership, in terms of the handsets’ brand, displayed majority

handsets produced by Finnish producer, Nokia with 43% of the sample market share. 13% owned Sony-Ericsson, 9% LG.

The samples remainder - 35% did not specify brand of their handset.

The model, and respectively version of the OS and technical capabilities of the device were not specified.

USERS’ EXPERIENCE

65 % of the respondents experienced phones for over 6 years, started to use phones before 2002. This means that

respondents used at least several handsets: 3 mobiles (45%), 2 headphones (45%). However, 77% were confused by the

differences in the mobile phone GUI on different devices. Among them however, 65% were puzzled at some stage with

the transfer to another handset (presumably with different Operating system or GUI, Question 9). Only 9% stated that

their present mobile is their first mobile phone.

3 out of 10 answerer experienced problems with their handset, however nature of the difficulty was not specified. Half

did not read handset’s manual, prior to the first usage of their handset.

73% experimented with the unknown hardware/software features and nearly half of Users tried to customize their

phone’s GUI. ( Survey did not explain the term ‘customization’ to respondents, however it was assumed, that it is known

to the public, as the process of changing default settings of the Interface, like order of the icons in the menu, or change

to the graphical them, whether in graphical them, or by replacing it with 3rd party content, like ringtones, or graphical

images.)

USER SATISFACTION

User Satisfaction results have been assessed in 6 questions., where majority of the respondents were satisfied, both with

the handsets and with the navigation systems (74% in both cases).

Basic functions of the handsets, like sending text messages or browsing/finding desired media files using phone

navigation, proved to be functional on all of the handsets. Efficiency however, did not apply to the Internet browsing

experience, where only 26% satisfied with the speed required to access their homepage or search engine (study did not

specify, whether Users were accustomed to accessing the internet).

NB In the UK, major operators used to utilize extra button in the physical mobile phone interface to bind it with the

branded, operators website. Since 2005 it has been main channel of third party content distribution, including news,

mobile phone games, ringtones or multimedia downloads. The direct access to those websites as a default, earned them

term ‘walled gardens’ as it proved to be great source of revenues for the Operators and limited partners. Since 2007

proliferation of robust data plans (offered by T-Mobile UK, Three Hutchinson-Whampoa UK and Vodafone UK) enabled

users to access other websites and to download content from third parties, however browsing functionality remained

p. 47/78

below the level of expectations. This has been addressed, i.e. by Google Search Mobile application shortening access to

the internet on Nokia Symbian Phones to merely 14 seconds. (Google, 2008-02)

D2 USERS EXPERIENCE, CONTENT SIMILARITIES

People do not care about UI, but would prefer some sort of similarity, similitude, but they also like unconventional

gadgets,

NB. “21%: Households without children were considerably more confused by mobile video, with 21% frustrated by the

complexity of services. This falls to an average of 12% for households where the kids are there to help out!”

(Source: Bamboo Media Casting/Synovate)

People have no problem adapting to the new UI., but Smoother UI enhances the usage of the services.

Users have no problem adapting to the new UI.

Reliable UI boost the usage of the data services. (photos, etc … )

Innovation plays a great role in luring the customers.

So far, User satisfaction was of a little value for the Handset Producers and Network Operators, as it provided little

material consequence. However, as the industry is becoming more intertwined, i.e. Nokia becoming ‘software Company’

the long-term User Satisfaction is becoming a paramount

i.e. that user is adapt in operating third party software, as well as, the Graphical User Interface is of a low importance.

Perhaps the wealth of different interfaces on

USER HANDSET RELATIONSHIP

Questions 4, 5, 6, 7 aimed to examine User-Handset relationship through their attitude, experience, learnability, in a

situation of regular swapping of handsets and consequently GUI environments.

Question 7 delivered straight forward data, confirming belief of the Users, that phones do not vary significantly in their

functionality, with 59% agreeing with ‘phones working the same way’ and over a half of respondents do not experience

difficulties(Question 4) while operating handsets from different producers. Over half of the respondents agreed with the

statement.

To establish another important variable, belonging to ‘user group’, explaining whether User is adapt in learning new GUI

environments and can operate device of a different GUI question. 5 was asked. Nearly 70% agreed to swapping mobile

phone handset regularly, every 12, 18 months. This might be connected with the nature of UK’s mobile phone service

contracts, offered for that time periods. This might also have an effect on the tech-savvy user, of which 54% agrees, that

“it only takes days to learn, how to operate new handset”(Question 6). 14% strongly agrees with the statement, while

less than 15% disagrees or have no opinion.

is indicating established that, majority of the mobile phone users is having little or no trouble with switching the

handsets (models or brand). Therefore User’s ‘ loyalty to given brand’ or User’s habit need further examination,

especially for products designers and marketing specialists, to examine this valuable relationships further.

USER SATISFACTION & GUI AWARENESS

p. 48/78

Positive relationship between the Phone User and the handset, resulted in support of the ‘Mobile Phones are easy to

use’ statement, supported by 43% and strongly by 14%. This attitude was also confirmed by Question 3, in which 40%

agreed and 9% agreed strongly. However 23% respondents did not have an opinion and 26% are dissatisfied.. -

‘ease-of-use’ and User Satisfaction. However it is important to analyse results of other questions, barring that the

respondents of this survey are content with their handsets, and consequently with their functionality. This requires more

direct references to the User Interface, i.e. implemented in survey D3.

Unknown levels of User awareness, limited survey time and significance of the survey setting – Apple Store, lead to

indirect questions, through the following statements:

Both questions assessing direct Users’ attitude and awareness of the GUI concepts. 49% respondents agree to liking

graphical effects (animations, non-default colour themes etc...) with 37% which could not agree or did not fully

understand the concept.

Second question revealed surprising curiosity towards the innovation in the field of the GUI design. 47% strongly agreed,

followed by 37% support of the statement.

Direct data gathering, conditioned by the presence in the London flagship of iPhone producer –Apple.

63% percent strongly agreed, followed by 16% agreement and 19% left without taking a stand on the issue.

CONTENT

User reaching outside of the handset to acquire content from third party sources are more adapt to the user interface

variations. This may lead to another conclusion, that adapt in operating third party GUI user, is more likely to browse the

internet and possibly spend money online, using mobile phone. of the mobile phone User Experience.

p. 49/78

D3 USERS SENTIMENT, USERS PREFERENCE

USER AWARENESS

Overall, the Users are relatively content with functionality of their handsets.

Despite the high satisfaction levels, users experience problems and often they are related with the inconsistent GUI.

Users are curious and aware of the technology around them, enhancing social and professional activities.

47% respondents strongly agreed, with having a positive experience of mobile phones. (D3,Question 1)

50% respondents acknowledged also ‘ease of use of their mobile phone’ (D3, Question 2), however majority of users

experienced problems with the phone. (D3, question 3) However nature of the problem, have not been specified,

allowing problems like malfunctioning OS functions, problems with content or User actions and difficulties with the

manipulating the GUI.

Yet it also revealed degree of problems Users are having with Interaction and design of the mobile phones. This might be

attributed to the survey taking place inside the Apple retail store, and its high-tech oriented, curious customers. Perhaps,

the design and usability are values of equal importance to the technical capabilities, hidden inside and useless without a

proper interface.

usability are related with clarity and speed of task execution. This is best represented by the iPhone and its highly

regarded GUI features.

IPHONE

iPhone, present on the market for over half a year (March 2008) has dominated the market. All aspects of the GUI are

dominating older, less robust solutions.

Users value iPhone for its features in the following order: touchscreen (54%), size of the display(27%) and overall concept

of ‘design’, features, ‘GUI clarity’ and general ‘ease of use’ was chosen as the most important one, both by 33% of

respondents. ‘Intuitive interface’ and ‘multitouch’,

GUI

results favouring design and integrity of the iPhone’s graphical User Interface.

users preferred ‘iPhone stylised’ graphical theme on Nokia and Windows Mobile touchscreen handsets

Characteristic default icon

The importance of the attractive menu. Is even more important in the larger screens, with bigger display space and more

visible elements of the GUI elements like icons and tabs.

Three out of four displays were based on the dark background limiting energy consumption.

Handsets offered limited personalization capability, compared with the older keypad phones and Operating systems.

40% of the respondents chose HTC Touch and 37% chose ‘iconic’ iPhone idle screen. Users did not find Neo 1973 and LG

Viewty attractive in terms of their menu

p. 50/78

THE QNT RESEARCH CONFIRMED THE FOLLOWING:

• close relation between mobile phone users and the ‘product feel’ of the handsets GUI

• potential of the unified User Interface framework, both as a theoretical heuristics model/specification guidelines

and as a open source software library, available freely to the content developers, to provide a unified and

consistent environment for creation and delivery of the mobile phone content and services.

• relation between Usability and increased consumption of the Internet and data, services.

• cognitive demands of the mobile phone platform fragmentation, can be solved by implementation of the similar

look and functionality of the User Interface.

• confused Users, Users strive for similarities, rather than differentiation, or maybe a cycle ...

p. 51/78

EFFECTS

User experience and satisfaction has not been measured yet,

and therefore second part of that study is concerned about

probing the Users. However, in 2007 we observe increasingly

vibrant research in User experience related concepts, i.e.

quantitative satisfaction research.

The problems are discussed and debated both on the open

forums, like annual User Experience conferences, non-profit

organisations as well as commercial and academic research.

This paper examined academic and commercial research

industry dedicated to the improvement and implementation of the positive User Experience.

Findings hopefully will help develop solutions improving User Experience and Satisfaction through all stages of the

content production.

There are many opportunities for innovation in automatic user interface adaption based on sensing the current

environment (location, noise, time of day etc). These may also involve transparent device-to-device or device-to-server

communication.

• Customization and interconnectivity with other services – ‘Web 2.0’ principles

• Transformation of future business models, i.e. increased competition in cheaper handsets group.

• Mobile functionality, i.e. payments herald the next generational shift

Mobile payment applications will lead the next major leap in wireless communications, when our interactions with

machines start to outnumber our interactions with people. Using our mobile phones to pay for goods and services in the

physical world requires an interaction model and user interface of breath-taking simplicity. Cash and credit cards

represent a singularly impressive benchmark - only when we deliver unique benefit above and beyond these existing

solutions will mobile payments explode.

Cross platform deployment to Android, Java ME, Windows Mobile and Blackberry.

Cross platform development is a solution for large software vendors (games, email clients, mapping, web browsers etc )

“There is a tidal wave of innovative content

and services waiting to be unleashed, if we can

build a business environment which enables

new companies to make money from mobile.”

(Pawlowski,2008)

p. 52/78

RESOURCES [6000 WORDS]

INDEX

Application Programming Interface

[API] 12

battery state 12

buttons 12

components 12

containers 12

Desktop UI 69

discovering content See content

discovery

External support 35

forms 12

Graphical User Interface 12

handset functionality 69

high-level UI 70

kernel 70

layout manager 13

notification 12

platform fragmentation 19

Proprietary Graphical User Interface

19

runtime 13

widget behaviour 13

p. 53/78

REFERENCES

CORREPOSNDING RESEARCH PAPERS

Sakwerda, Bart (2008-02 )User Survey

http://issuu.com/echosowa/docs/2008-02_iphone_user_sentiment?mode=embed&documentId=080428210955-

1fc3716412d34dd7b77e29695c0ef608&layout=grey

CORPORATE INFORMATION

Nokia (2008-02) Nokia Research & Development.

Retrieved from http://research.nokia.com

Access(2008) Palm OS Application Design

Available from: < http://www.access-company.com/developers/documents/docs/ui/UI_Design.html >

Digital Airwaves (2008) TWUIK

Available from: < ttp://www.digitalairways.com/ >

Google (2008) Google Android

Google Mobile (2008-02) Google Mobile Blog

Available from: < http://googlemobile.blogspot.com >

Windows Mobile 6 UI\

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-gb/windowsmobile/default.aspx

Lack of UI specific department

> Windows Mobile Shells Windows Mobile 6 - Point UI

http://www.pointui.com/Home.aspx

Windows Mobile 6 - SPB

http://www.spbsoftwarehouse.com/products/mobileshell/?en

Windows Mobile 5 & 6 – Microsoft Zumobi

Nokia (2008-02) Research Projects

Available from: < http://research.nokia.com/research/index.html >

Nokia (2004)Series 60 Developer Platform

Nokia (2008-02) Morph

Available from: < http://www.nokia.com/A4852062 >

p. 54/78

Nokia Developer Community (2008)

Available from: < http://forum.nokia.com >

Nokia Research Centre (2008) research.nokia.com

NTT Docomo (2008) The Future Society imaged by DoCoMo's R&D, Tokyo, Japan [Internet], Available from: <

http://www.nttdocomo.co.jp/english/corporate/technology/future >

NTT DoCoMo (2008-02) Research & Development Tokyo, Japan http://www.nttdocomo.com/rd/index.html

NTT DoCoMo Capital (2008-02) Research & Development Centres, Palo Alto, CA,USA <http://www.docomo-

capital.com/abo_rscdev.html#yrp >

Small Surfaces (2008)Small Surfaces < http://www.smallsurfaces.com >

p. 55/78

Amal Sirisena (2002-11)Mobile Text Entry,Univeristy of Canterbury, NZ;

Available from: < http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/research/reports/HonsReps/2002/hons_0201.pdf >.

ChinaNews (2008-02-28) Fastap Keypad Technology Receives Chinese Certification, Hong Kong;

Available from < http://www.chinatechnews.com/2008/02/28/6429-fastap-keypad-technology-receives-chinese-

certification >

Company: Zi Corp (2008-02 ) ezitext input methods; Internet,

Available from: < http://www.zicorp.com/eZiText.htm >

Eatoni Ergonomics (2008) Eatoni - Research, User Studies New York

Available from: < http://www.eatoni.com/wiki/index.php/User_Studies >

Google android(2008-01)Android – Implementing User Interface, Internet,

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CONFERENCE & ANALYSTS

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Mace Michael – Rubicon Consulting (2008) Mobile Opportunity, CA, USA; Internet;

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(200)Interaction Design : Beyond HCI, Adison-Wesley

Marti, Stefan (2002) How does the User Interface Design of Mobile Devices Influence the Social Impact of Mobile

Communication?

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MOBILE PHONE RELATED REFERENCES

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Linuxfordevices.com (2008-03-04) Ubuntu founder predicts Linux dominance in devices

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Mark Shuttleworth /Ubuntu (2008-02) Linux Foundation – podcast

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Christian Lindholm and Turkka Keinonen (2003-06-19) Mobile Usability: How Nokia Changed the Face of the Mobile

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(Paperback -)

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little spring design (2008-01) Mobile UI design resources, patterns, devices, and so forth.

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Love, Steve (2005-10) Understanding Mobile Human-Computer Interaction

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Systems/dp/0750663529/ref=pd_sim_b_title_5 >

Matt Jones and Gary Marsden (2006-02-10) Mobile Interaction Design; Wiley

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Understanding …, 2001 - cs.colorado.edu

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Pawlowski, Marek (MEX/PMN)(2008-03-03) Defining the mobile user experience Intent Media - Mobile

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Scott Weiss(2002-07)Handheld Usability; Wiley; 1st edition

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USABILITY, GUI, USABILITY TESTING

Doug Overton of WDSGlobal (2006-07-17) ‘No Fault Found’ returns cost the mobile industry $4.5 billion per year

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Dong-Han Ham 1 , Jeongyun Heo 2 , Peter Fossick, 3 , William Wong 1 , Sanghyun Park 2 , Chiwon Song 2 , Mike Bradley

Conceptual framework and models for identifying and organizing usability impact factors of mobile … MC R&D Centre,

Seoul, Korea; Middlesex University, Bramley Road, London, UK

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Model-Based Approaches to Quantifying the Usability of Mobile Phones,Springer, Berlin

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Model-Based Approaches to Quantifying the Usability of Mobile Phones Internet,

available from: < http://www.springerlink.com/content/6499v1167230311n/ >

//emails: d.ham@mdx.ac.uk, jy_heo@lge.com; p.fossick@mdx.ac.uk; w.wong@mdx.ac.uk, sanghyun@lge.com,

chiwon@lge.com, m.d.bradley@mdx.ac.uk

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from: < http://www.jdpower.co.jp/press/pdf2007/2007JapanMobileHandset_E.pdf >

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organizing usability impact factors of mobile phones

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electronic products

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5&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid

=10&md5=70dd91e580cdd30cf5f314ef14699a70 >

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mobile phone usage variety

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International Communication Association, Dresden International Congress Centre, Dresden, Germany Online,

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Miranda G. Capra (2006-03) Usability Problem Description and the Evaluator Effect in Usability Testing vtech

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Ronggang Zhou (200x) How to Quantify User Experience: Fuzzy Comprehensive Evaluation Model Based on Summative

Usability Testing, Department of Industrial Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

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Ryu, Young Sam; Tonya L. Smith-Jackson 2005-07 Development of Usability Questionnaire Items for Mobile Products

and Content Validity

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Ryu, Young Sam (2005) Development of Usability Questionnaires for Electronic Mobile Products and Decision Making

Method

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experience of smartphones; University of York, England

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Ting Zhang (2006) Developing Instrument for Handset Usability Evaluation: A Survey Study

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van Biljon, Judith Arnolidne (2006-11)Model representing the motivational, cultural factors that influence mobile phone

usage

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Marti, Stefan (2002)How does the user interface design of mobile devices influence the social impact of mobile

communication?, MIT Media Lab, USA, Internet

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p. 61/78

APPENDIX A - TRENDS IN RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT OF THE MOBILE PHONE USER INTERFACE

TWUIK CASE STUDY

"TWUIK’s cross-platform capabilities bridge the gap between different makes

and models of handsets, making it possible for wireless operators and handset OEMs to enrich service offerings,

maximizes expressiveness, and creates a customized, branded user experience that is uniform across all devices. This in

turn simplifies the user experience, enables easy discovery of content & services, encourages consumption, promotes

brand identity, and creates service/device differentiation. By providing rich and visually appealing UI and more

compelling mobile consumer experience, TWUIK™ dramatically boosts the consumption and stickiness of mobile content

and applications."

ACRODEA

KALEIDO

Thanks to Kaleido (by digital

Airways), innovative mobile phones have already been introduced to the market in record

time. Kaleido is a user interface solution that enables the creation and implementation of

customized mobile experiences ‘quickly and cost effectively’( )

It allows handset producers and Network Operators to pre-integrate Kaleido on their platform ,to reduce their

customers' development period.

Kaleido powers millions of devices worldwide, and it includes ‘Kaleido Animator’, which facilitates the creation of

animated backgrounds, moving objects (buttons, indicators…), splash screens, wizards (help, notification of events),

dynamic menus, transition between contexts (sliding, fading in and out, torsion…), management of layers (alpha

blending), etc.

Kaleido's architecture makes it easy to allow for partial or complete over-the-air (OTA) reconfiguration of the user

experience. Digital Airways and Red Bend, a leading specialist of Over-The-Air[OTA] solutions, have partnered to

integrate Red Bend’s Mobile Handset Update solution, with Kaleido for wireless operators and manufacturers to create

OTA-customizable UI solutions. Benefits of that, include:

• reduced costs - Kaleido significantly reduces the cost of creating and updating the UI in various ways. With Kaleido,

phones become more generic, and significant changes can be made to the UI without changing code.

• Shorter time to market - What used to take weeks of C programming is now done by a few drag & drop actions in

minutes with Kaleido. Kaleido includes generic UI functions such as event management, screen transitions, lists,

graphic display, etc. that reduce the need for programming.

Image 2 Kaleido GUI by Digital airways

p. 62/78

• Increased flexibility - With Kaleido, vendors quickly and easily adapt their phones for specific market requirements

(operators' UI, branded phones, niche segments, etc.)

• Easy integration of third party components - Thanks to Kaleido's specific plug-in architecture, third party

components such as browsers, MMS, vector graphic engines, 3D, video, predictive text engines, etc. can be added to

a platform with reduced engineering time.

p. 63/78

COMMUNICATION WITH SPECIALISTS – UNIFIED GUI (2008-02) 2/4

Topic 2 out of 4 sent to over 40 professional authors, researchers and developers with 20% response rate

“Dear Sir / Madame,

I am currently in the process of preparing my BA dissertation and I would be extremely grateful, if I could request some

information of interest to my research. I am writing Pilot study about feasibility of the 'Unified User Interface' for the

Mobile Phone Devices. The study takes into account three perspectives: User, Content Developer and handset

Producers/OS vendors.

I would be most grateful if you would take the time to answer some brief questions.

1. From the perspective of the Users and Independent Content Developers,

is there a need to introduce shared, unified library ( 'design patterns') of the Graphical User Interface for the new

hardware features, like touch-screens and what implications it has on the handset's functionality ?

2. In your opinion, what is the direction, followed by major handset producers in terms of:

- device hardware features (touch-screens)

- Content Developers (Community) and

- device Graphical User Interface ?

Do you agree that, unifying GUI would and therefore won't be a priority for handset producers (Will 'commoditize the

handset' ) ?

3. What is the most practical method of implementing consistent GUI on the mobile phone device: UI design library (open

source) , public guidelines, …?

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Yours sincerely, Bart Sakwerda, b.sakwerda1@lcc.arts.ac.uk

BA Digital Media Production, London College of Communication“

p. 64/78

APPENDIX B - DESKTOP UIS

Another solution based on Mobile Phone Operating System/ Application Content layer are Internet/Content Discovery

Platforms from Google Mobile, Opera Mobile, Nokia (Content Discoverer, MOSH), Access Netfront Dynamic Menu and

yahoo! Mobile.

Desktop UI products are fundamentally different to ODPs (On Device Portals ). Desktop UIs (DUI) are technically complex

(hint: handsets are not designed to have their home screen replaced) Feature-wise, Desktop UIs are about discovering

content, not browsing or selling it.

DUIs can also be used to discover common handset functionality (e.g. type R-I-N-G-T from a Qix-like application and you

have the options for changing the ringtone or buying a new one. Same applies to Bluetooth,etc…).

“Abaxia’s Mobile portal, Celltick’s LiveScreen and Zi’s Qix are the incumbent desktop UI products, helping the user (and

the operator) discover handset features and operator services from the idle screen. But as of the last 3GSM (3GSM

Barcelona, 2008-01), you can add several more products to this list: Abaxia and Tegic separately announced solutions for

finding content and features from the home screen through(similar to T9 text input) predictive matching.Then you have

Korean IntroMobile’s IntroPad, Vocel, Aditon (a PA Consulting spinoff that shows adds on your mobile) and of course

FlashHome, the reincarnation of FlashCast with home screen replacement features.

You can naturally add the usual suspects to this list - ODP players who also provide home screen replacement features i.e.

Cibenix, SurfKitchen, uiOne, MobiComp, et al).“ Naturally, manufacturers are not staying out of the game; Nokia has

Active Idle, Motorola has Screen 3 and Sony Ericsson is rumoured to be baking it’s own Screen 3 variant." (A.

Constantinou–Vision Mobile, 2008-02)

“Last and certainly not least, Desktop UIs are about controlling the most valuable real-estate that ever has and ever will

exist on mobile handsets. It’s the primary shelf space (advertisers call it ‘inventory’) that content providers, are keen to

get their hands on. Inventory is the reason, why Google valued YouTube at such levels.”

p. 65/78

APPENDIX C - CONTENT DEVELOPMENT PLATFORMS

“Today there are tens of different tools technologies for opening up handset software to developers and generally those

who want to customize the handset GUI in some shape or form. These range from skins designers, to games developers,

to operators who want to create a ’signature’ look & feel spanning the entire user interface. I would argue that

application environments include not only Java, as well as environments for creating skins, desktop UIs (a.k.a. idle

screens) and core applications (dialler, menu system, email, messaging applications, etc which are entirely different to

downloadable applications).

Contrary to popular understanding, openness is not an exclusive privilege of open operating systems….”

(Andreas Constantinou, VisionMobile.com, 2007)

There are several development platforms, which provide language and UI/ GUI libraries to create applications on the

mobile phone devices. The most popular are Sun’s Java Micro edition with market ; Symbian (language: C++) has the rich

UI library and support of major Smartphone developer in the world Nokia. (Nokia, 2007)

Microsoft with its Windows Mobile is well placed in the Enterprise Market with its Windows Mobile and Windows Vista

Mobile products on handheld PCs. (Windows Mobile, 2007)

Each of them provides varying levels of access to Operating System’s kernel (kernel explanation), providing different level

of visual consistency and performance for the third party software, as well as, native applications.

The high-level UI classes allow application developers to access some of the common components on the devices

Growing number of applications released on the expanding mobile handset base,

across different mobile phone Operating Systems,

However, mentioned libraries seem to target most common development platform – Sun’s Java Micro edition.

JME has the biggest number of implementations worldwide ….you to create simple forms and lists with components

Given that some J2ME implementations and some non-J2ME mobile Java runtimes lack threads, and many phones lack

multitasking, this will make writing sophisticated apps for Android far easier.

C predates Java. Where Java attempts to enable the developer to "write once and run anywhere", C took a different

approach of "write once and compile everywhere". Both the Symbian and Microsoft platforms support a native 'C' run

time enabling existing applications to be quickly moved between platforms.

p. 66/78

SYMBIAN OS GUI

There is also a large volume of 'User Interface (UI) Code'. For the most part actual user interfaces are maintained by third

parties. However the base classes and substructure are contained within the Symbian OS. This component is known as

UIKON. The Symbian OS also contains the graphics, text layout, and font rendering libraries.

All Symbian applications are built up from three classes defined by the Application Architecture: an application class, a

document class, and an application user interface class. These classes create the fundamental application behaviour. The

remaining required functions, the application view, data model, and data interface, are created independently and

interact solely through their APIs with the other classes. UIQ and S60 both extend this approach, in two different ways.

“Having used several s60 phones I feel that although the phones have got faster and equipped with more memory etc,

the user interface hasn't kept pace with these developments. Furthermore bear in mind the guts of Symbian stretch way

back to the Psion series 5 and it's Epoc 32 OS. It is some seriously old technology. I recently saw a demo of the touch

screen version of Nokia's series 60 OS, and it was shockingly bad. They have literally just added a touch screen the

existing UI, no attention appears to have been paid to how to better optimize the interface for touch.

Having tried the iPhone on several occasions, it is incredible how from purely a UI perspective, the other handset makers

have dropped the ball. Ultimately I loved the design of the UI so much I bought an iPod Touch. The best thing the iPhone

will do is to force the other mobile companies to refocus their attention on good UI design. Judging by the demos of the

next generation of Windows Mobile, Microsoft have been paying attention.” Giovani Coia

p. 67/78

JAVA MICRO EDITION GUI

Java platform, Micro edition (JME), develop by Sun Corporation, provides a robust, flexible environment for applications

running on mobile and other embedded devices—mobile phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), TV set-top boxes,

and printers. Java ME includes flexible user interfaces, robust security, built-in network protocols, and support for

networked and offline applications that can be downloaded dynamically. Applications based on Java ME are portable

across many devices, yet leverage each device's native capabilities.

The Java ME technology is based on three elements;

- a configuration provides the most basic set of libraries and virtual machine capabilities for a broad range of devices,

- a profile is a set of APIs that support a narrower range of devices, and

- an optional package is a set of technology-specific APIs.

The central abstraction of the MIDP UI API is a canvas class, which is an object that encapsulates device-specific graphics

rendering user input. Only one screen can be visible at a time, and the user can traverse only through the items on that

screen. The main reason for the screen-based design is that mobile information devices have different display and

keypad solutions. If an application has to be aware of component layout, scrolling, and focus traversal it compromises

portability.

Screens that encapsulate a complex user interface component that involves a List or TextBox component. The structure

of these screens is predefined, and the application cannot add other components to these screens. Generic screens that

use a Form component. The application can add text, images, and a simple set of related UI components to the form.

Screens used within the context of the low-level API, such as a subclass of the Canvas class.

The Display class is the display manager that is instantiated for each active MIDlet and provides methods to retrieve

information about the device's display capabilities. A screen is made visible by calling the Display.setCurrent() method.”

Sun’s Java Mobile Edition – Java Virtual Machine

Developers not satisfied with the GUI libraries, available as a basic

API to let you code once and let J2ME handle the layout for each device leaves your code very disconnected from what’s

actually happening on the screen (won’t load, or runs terribly slowly, or looks awful, or simply doesn’t do the things that

the API)

Lack of control of the user interface: hardware details such as how many buttons you have, whether there’s a stylus, etc.

differ from phone to phone developer experience is quite disappointing, and as a result, the user experience is also quite

disappointing. (sorts of trade-offs)

“In the high-level API, Screen is the base class for screen displays and has four subclasses - Alert, Form, List, and TextBox.

Other than a title and a ticker (a string that continuously scrolls across a part of the screen), which are available to all

Screen subclasses, List and TextBox each provide only a single visual element on the screen - that is, the structures of List

and TextBox are fixed and other components can't be added to them. List displays a list of choices, with each choice

consisting of a string and an optional image. TextBox displays and allows the entry and editing of text. The Alert class

supports the display of both a string and an image. Form can contain and display any mix of Item objects - one or more

ChoiceGroup (containing radio buttons and check boxes), DateField, Gauge, ImageItem, StringItem, and/or TextField

objects.

The high-level API targets applications for which portability is essential and relegates look and feel issues to the platforms

that the application is deployed on. One price of this portability is that you have minimal control over layout and display

attributes such as text fonts and colour. In addition, with the high-level API, you can't intercept key events and therefore

can't provide contextual filtering of data input.”

p. 68/78

ADOBE’S FLASH LITE

Adobe Flash Lite has been present on the cell

phones since 2001.One of the widest

implementation is Japanese NTT DoCoMo’s i-

mode, on device content portal platform in

FOMA phones, which serve over 70 million

Japanese users, with highest internet usage and

content consumption levels in the world. (NTT

Docomo i-mode, 2006)

In 2005 the SDK, part of the Flash 8 has been

released for the developers worldwide. Since

then, sophisticated information services using

Flash Lite have characterized the first wave of

innovation. However, Flash Lite extends readily

to the critical task of developing dynamic, highly customizable user interfaces. With an animated graphic user interface,

complex search operations can be simplified, eliminating the need to navigate through a series of hierarchical text

menus. Animated graphics can help navigate through maps or complex graphical representations of data and

information that are unwieldy on a standard 2.4-inch display. (Adobe, 2008)

A well-known example is the weather forecasting application that uses an animated graphical user interface to select the

target area. In earlier versions of the service, users had to navigate through multiple levels of text menus. The data for

the service continued to be displayed in unremarkable standard text. This stands in stark contrast to the appeal and ease

of use offered by the smooth Flash animation of the improved user interface.” (Yankee Group, 2004)

In the case of complex information services on a small (i.e. 320x200 pixels) display, animated user interfaces enhance

user service quality and experience. As mobile phones morph into indispensable and ubiquitous appliances, the user

interface will become an increasingly important differentiator.

“We expect that the work of the Open Mobile Terminal Platform alliance in Western Europe will seek standardization at

the applications layer with a view toward concentrating differentiation at the user interface. The concept of the highly

utilitarian, differentiated user interface extends well beyond the mobile terminal. Flash Lite can be used in a number of

devices, including digital cameras, car navigation systems and set-top boxes. Graphic and animated user interfaces with

low-response latency can be used in every device that has a graphic display, including office machinery such as copy

machines. In addition, providers can easily implement Flash as a GUI layer on embedded operating systems.” (Yankee

Group, 2004)

“Equally important, Flash and Flash Lite help customers develop sophisticated GUIs for embedded applications in a much

more straightforward fashion than currently available alternatives. As a technology that was originally developed for

designers (rather than software engineers), Flash Lite also offers important advantages over Java virtual machine

technology. Notably, using Flash or Flash Lite, designers can develop the user interface by themselves and need not rely

upon engineers for the implementation. Consequently, companies will be able to streamline the development process

and reduce development time for GUIs. Eventually, this will help companies develop better and more attractive products

in less time.” (Yankee Group, 2004)

Adobe’s Flash Lite has been rejected by Apple, as an option for iPhone’s Safari Browser ( )

p. 69/78

However, the strength of Adobe’s platform lays in its interface building capabilities and in the multimedia streaming

capabilities. With its popular SDK – Adobe Creative Suite software – we might expect, that Unified GUI would found a

compliant ground for its implementation.

MICROSOFT’S SILVERLIGHT

Microsoft, well known desktop Operating System company, is rapidly expanding in the areas of the internet and mobile.

It’s mobile phone Operating System is described in this paper from the angle of the GUI and opportunities for developers

to use that platform. To serve application developers and content producers, and to compete with runtime

environments form competition, namely Sun and Adobe, Microsoft introduced in 2007 platform called Silverlight.

Silverlight provides a ‘retained mode graphics system’, which integrates multimedia content and interactivity into a

single runtime. It is being designed to work in concert with (XAML) open data format and is scriptable with JavaScript.

This can be use to mark/tag the graphics (both vector and bitmaps). Textual content created with Silverlight would be

more searchable and index able than that created with Flash as it is not compiled, but represented as text (XAML).

Silverlight also includes classes for data access over XML-based format to control the cross-domain resource access

policy. It can be used by site administrators to control which resources a Silverlight application can access. In addition,

Silverlight also supports the Adobe Flash cross domain policy file format, which accommodates mainly in the online

streaming content, however usage of open vector graphic standard SVG has not yet been supported (Microsoft

Silverlight, 2008-02)

Among Handset Producers supporting Windows Mobile, only Nokia is implementing this platform on their Symbian OS

based handsets supporting other platforms, like Sun’s Java Micro edition, Adobe Flash Lite. Such wide support can enable

users to enjoy vast spectrum of content, however this strategy can lead to further format confusion, which may benefit

rapidly growing unified iPhone platform, which neither supports Java ME, nor does it support Adobe’s Flash. ( )

“Nokia’s software strategy is based on cross-platform development environments, enabling the creation of rich

applications across the Nokia device range. Nokia aims to support market leading and content rich internet application

environments and to embrace and encourage open innovation. By working with Microsoft, we are creating terrific

opportunities and additional choices for the development community, S60 licensees and the industry as a whole,”

(Lee Williams, Senior Vice President in Nokia’s Devices )

p. 70/78

APPENDIX D - MAJOR HANDSET PRODUCERS

Currently, technical features in the design of mobile phone’s User Interface are being realized by many competing

manufacturers globally, thus efficient and simple interaction platform is of a great importance to all the parties involved.

One of the reasons might be the fact, that consistent and simple GUI may have a decisive feature in the “new markets”.

In 2008, fast growing economies of countries like India and China, with hug potential customer base, value price and

‘ease of use’ . (reference)

Resourceful Graphical User Interface, may also prove to be driving the usage of telecom services. In the last quarter of

2007 we have witnessed rapid growth of the mobile internet, which certainly will dominate telecom corporations efforts

to shift weight form the traditional sources of income (voice, messaging, handset sales) to revenues from the ‘data

plans’.(reference)

Therefore, under-researched functions of Graphical User Interface on the mobile phone devices may have great

commercial and social potential for the research studies and further, practical implementation.

Market of handsets is divided into three categories by the capabilities/price criteria:

low-end phones, under 50 U$D

mid range handsets, 50-100 U$D

smartphones, 100+ U$D

Global handset sales rose 16 per cent in 2007, to 1.2bn devices, but Gartner estimates the market will grow by 10 per

cent in 2008. Currently, the major smartphone producers, as follows in the order of sales:

Nokia (NYSE:NOK),

Research in Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM) and since last year

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL )

In terms of innovation:

FOMA

Apple

Google Android

With production facilities placed in China, it is a matter of time, when we will see cheaper 'alternatives' flooding the

market ... With smartphones as a spearhead, of the telecom industry

HTC

ZTE

Mobile Phone market dominated by few producers, established in electronics and telecommunication industries for over

a decade, including: Nokia (NYSE:NOK),Sony-Ericsson, Samsung, LG Electronics, Motorola, Panasonic…

Decline in Pocket PC i.e. PALM (NASDAQ:PALM) acquired by Japanese software company ACCESS,

The commercial research & development of the User Interface

Major handset producers could be classified by:

- the volume of the handsets worldwide,

- their R&D expenditure head counts or patents implementation,

- support for the developers (if offered solution is open for external development)

p. 71/78

INNOVATIVE HANDSET PRODUCERS (WORLDWIDE)

Complex industry, interrelationships between handset producer interact as a ... intermediary between hardware

companies i.e. graphical electronic chipsets, displays, etc ...

NOKIA

Nokia is known, to provide excellent support for the developers.

Since it’s created its Developer Network Portal - forum.nokia.com in early 2002, after

releasing its first Sun’s Java enabled telephone, it allowed third party developers to run

software on the new platform. However, behind developer community, there is also a

vibrant ‘Nokia Research Centre’.

Nokia's continuous high investment in R&D, including User Interaction place it.

“As of April 1, 2007, Nokia had R&D centres in 11 countries and employed 14,500 people in research and development,

representing approximately 32% of Nokia’s total workforce. “R&D expenses totaled EUR 3,9 billion in 2006, representing

9,5% of Nokia’s net sales in 2006, compared to 11.2% of net sales in 2005 and 12.9% of net sales in 2004” (Nokia, 2008)

Nokia Research Centre supports product development units to master key technologies and their evolution, short-term

(few years ahead), as well as, ‘challenges the present’ in product development

long-term.

“NRC stands for open innovation for human mobility systems of the fused

physical and digital world

Our mission is to explore and develop technologies that will be available in the

marketplace in five to ten years - not just novelties, but technologies that will

see mass market demand from consumers and enterprises.”

(research.nokia.com,

From the vast array of projects, there is a couple of particular importance in

the field of User Interface, including

Nokia

There are also two new programs, which have been introduced at the

beginning of 2008.

(One can assume that these new projects are being developed in a response to

emerging new interfaces on the mobile platform.)

Both latest projects:

Future User Interfaces and Interaction Solutions

Innovative User Interfaces and User Experience

p. 72/78

NTT DOCOMO AND FOMA PARTNERS

NTT DoCoMo has a long history of and deep commitment to the research and development of

mobile communication technologies. NTT DoCoMo is not only Japan's premier mobile

communications company, but also an influential force in advancing mobile communications

technology on a global scale.

NTT DoCoMo's third-generation (3G) FOMA (Freedom Of Mobile multimedia Access) service, based on W-CDMA, not

only provides voice transmission quality on a par with fixed-line communications, it also supports diverse multimedia

content. Major handset producers include Sony-Ericsson, Fujitsu, Panasonic, Sharp and NEC.

Worldwide Developer Centre network, UI Development

NTT DoCoMo has four R&D sites around the world: headquarter in Yokosuka (Japan), US Laboratory in Palo Alto

(California, USA), European Labs in Munich (Germany) and Chinese Labs in Shanghai (China).

The Future Society imaged by DoCoMo's R&D - the society that all things are connected with network and people can

access information at any time and any place. Information will be spread among our lives as the life infrastructure, just

like air that is invisible but indispensable. We recommend that you view the Future Society imaged by DoCoMo's R&D in

order to realize more affluent and comfortable life.

Features:

• support for limo Androcea

• Foma 904i, Sensors, accelerometers

• Payment

p. 73/78

APPENDIX E - MOBILE PHONE, GUI - DEFINITIONS AND CLASSIFICATION

Mobile phones can be divided into three main categories according to the capabilities and price criteria:

a) basic phones, (price: ~1-20 GBP)

b) low feature phones, (price: ~20-100 GBP

c) feature rich phones: (price: ~100+ GBP)

-non-smartphone,

- smartphone

A) While basic phones are generally inexpensive handsets that offer voice and basic data services, B) low feature phones

offer sufficient additional features to encourage basic phone users to seek these devices when they are looking for a new

handset. C) Feature rich phones generally offer a combination of several advanced features in one device. Due to the

increasing complexity of building these handsets, they were divided into two parts: non-Smartphone and Smartphone.

C1) Non-smartphones are generally powered by proprietary Operating Systems and topped by advanced User Interfaces

and application platforms. (i.e. iPhone) C2) Feature rich smartphones are also powered by proprietary OS, but can be

extended by third party software Environments, i.e. Nokia’ S60, Microsoft’s Windows Mobile

Graphical User Interface in this research papers has been defined, as an abstract layer of a programmable interactive

elements of the Operating System and applications. GUI is dependent on the

Operating System and Software Platform runtime environment, in which given GUI

is deployed. This typically adhere, to a unified design specification, including

aesthetics and possibly an application framework to lend a sense of overall

cohesion both for the program's designer and its users.

Content Developers can access GUI of the a) Operating Systems, b) Software

Platform or c) Content’s proprietary GUI libraries through Application

Programming Interface [API]. API provide abstract code, that specifies an

interface - software libraries organized as a tree of widgets, some of them

supporting interaction with the user (labels, buttons, check box, ...), others being

containers that group the other widgets (windows, panels). Components, like

buttons, forms etc) available to the Content Developers and destined to deliver

rich experience to the Users, are often hierarchically (tree) structured under

containers, i.e.. windows, panels grouping other elements button, alert boxes,

checkboxes or animations i.e. easing. The content of the UI API tree, and the

properties of the widgets, can often be modified at runtime (widgets can be added

or removed from the tree). User Interface layer accommodates device capabilities

of the device i.e. data input mechanisms, output screen, and device state. In case of the mobile phone, this could be

represented by the battery state, network connection etc…

Although GUI APIs are structured, free and unified, their physical look and

functionality is often suppressed by the proprietary GUI build on top of the embedded platform or differences in

particular runtimes, i.e. Java applications build using same MIDP 2.0 GUI. (Sun, 2007) API identifiers often relate to

specific platform features and are designed to use specific programming language i.e. Sun’s Java Micro Edition UI classes

is accessible through Java CLDC API, similarly Symbian OS and its GUI libraries accessible using both Java and C++, Apple

iPhone UI API etc...

The UI API toolkit handles the user events, as for example when clicking on a button. The action following the detection

of the event is not the responsibility of the toolkit, but of the application. For example, if the user selects a file in a ‘file

Figure 27 Mobile Phone Abstraction Layer

p. 74/78

dialog container’, the widget behaviour and the detection of the user event are managed by the widget toolkit, but the

actual action to perform on the file after selection must be performed by the application.

UI API toolkits must have a means to position the widgets in their containers. The simplest way to define their positions

is by defining their absolute (on the screen) or relative (to the parent) position in pixels or common distance units, but it

is also often possible to lay out the elements by setting their relative positions without using distance units (i.e. Content

Development tools - ‘layout manager’).Also, the look and feel of the widgets can be hardcoded in the toolkit, but some

widget toolkit APIs decouple the look and feel from the definition of the widgets, allowing the developer to define them

at the initialisation of the application or even at runtime (see pluggable look and feel). (Ballard, B., 2006)

p. 75/78

APPENDIX F - ACADEMIC AND ANALYST RESEARCH

USER INTERFACE STUDIES

Academic research in the area of mobile phone user is mostly concentrated on Human-Computer Interaction

departments in the technical Universities around the world. Close ties with the industry prove to be the best way to earn

revenues and to supply commercial institutions with data and research.

Nokia Research – University of Helsinki, Finland;

Nokia Research – University of Cambridge, UK;

NTT DoCoMo Research & Development – Tokyo University, Japan;

LG Electronics Research – Seoul University, South Korea;

Google – Stanford University, USA…

These relationships delivered series of artefacts and studies.

“While Researchers and developers are steadily increasing the scope of applications for mobile devices, framework for

thinking about the range of actions may be helpful. Whether the application is financial-, medical-, or travel-related the

following five pairs of actions should be considered: (1) monitor dynamic information sources and then alert when

appropriate; (2) gather information from many sources and the spread out information to many destinations; (3)

participate in a group and relate to individuals; (4) locate services or items that are not visible (for example, the nearest

gas station) and identify objects that are seen (for example , the name of a person or flower); and (5) capture

information from local resources and share your information with future users.” (Schneiderman, 2006)

MOBILE USER INTERFACE/INTERACTION CONFERENCES

There are few conferences dedicated to mobile phone User Interface or user experience related industry. In 2007 there

have been two major events in London: British Information Companies - Informa TM PLC organized 'Mobile Usability &

Application Design ' in December 2007 and MNF Ltd organized ‘MEX Mobile User Experience conference’ in May 2007.

User experience related issues rarely had been exposed on the annual conferences are like Symbian Smartphone show or

GSM World Expo.

Great opportunities to network and to fulfil commercial make Handset producers , developers and other related parties

also to discus the matters of UI and exhibit their latest products on number of Content and Technology events, i.e.

annual 3GSM Barcelona, Symbian World etc. The new opportunities for software/UI product companies is signalled by

creation of yet another industry conference. London based company PMN, is organizing conference 'Mobile User

Experience' in May 2008 in London.

p. 76/78

PMN’S MOBILE USER EXPERIENCE 2008 (UPDATED 2008-05)

MEX is the two day strategy forum for the leading minds in mobile telecoms. This year’s event took place London Euston

on 27th and 28th May 2008. The Mobile User Experience Conference session addressed the fragmentation in the

following questions:

FRAGMENTATION IS THE ENEMY OF INNOVATION

• 0.25%: Users of Nokia's mobile browser account for 0.25% of all web pages viewed globally, compared with 0.06%

for the iPhone. Blackberry accounts for 0.02% and Sony Ericsson 0.01%. However, in the US market specifically the

iPhone is the clear leader, account | (Source: StatCounter)

• 200,000: 200,000 developers had registered for the iPhone SDK at the end of its fiscal Q2 2008 | (Source: Apple)

• ~40%: About 40% of page views recorded by US mobile publisher Crisp Wireless came from 'off-deck' browsing in

February 2008 | (Source: Crisp Wireless)

“The structure of the mobile industry is killing application developers. There is a tidal wave of innovative content and

services waiting to be unleashed if we can build a business environment which enables new companies to make money

from mobile.

INTELLIGENT CONTACT LISTS ARE THE FUTURE CANTERS OF THE USER INTERFACE

Presence and IP-based messaging change the dynamics of mobile communication. “The natural focal point for next

generation user interfaces is an intelligent, presence-enabled contact list. Enhancing the information and services which

can be shared through people-centric networks is the best way to encourage usage of voice, messaging and data.”

What combination of handset design, mobile services and customer support would represent your ideal user

experience?

“I break this into three distinct, but highly inter-related components.

Firstly, the phone must be what Telstra refers to as “walk out working” - that is, it works first time, as expected, without

any manual intervention.

Secondly I, as the customer, intuitively understand everything I can do with the device and the network services that add

value to my life.

Thirdly, the device and network services understand my life priorities and needs - in other words my experience is one of

seamlessly available, contextually relevant, value adding interactions with people, events and information that make my

life easier, more enjoyable and more fluid than if I was managing my life with a fixed phone, pen and paper.”

Cyrus Allen, Director of Customer Experience, Telstra

“Like everyone else, I use a number of different tools to communicate with people: IM, SMS, voice, email, social

networking sites and others. On each occasion I consider my context and the context of the person I am communicating

with and make decisions based around that. I am a member of LinkedIn for business networking, but Facebook for social

interaction. These are not exclusive nor should they be. They are examples of different communities. This human

behaviour will not change, so the challenge within the mobile environment is first to make it as easy as possible for

people to access their communities from one place within the mobile phone, and secondly to make it as simple as

possible for people to communicate within and between communities. When you have PC access, it is simple to move

from one application to another. I can message in MSN, move to Facebook, check my emails and video conference with a

buddy at the touch of a button.” (Allen Scott, General Manager, NeuStar)

p. 77/78

JoEllen Kames, Manager for User Experience Planning, Motorola

“However, in the mobile environment, the user cannot toggle between applications so easily. The unique nature of the

mobile environment requires different solutions. Just as mobile TV needs to be filmed in a different way for a mobile

audience so the mobile social networking experience will need to be different too.”

USABILITY TRENDS ACROSS THE MOBILE INDUSTRY

Responding to Usability Trends Across the Mobile Industry

-Usability driven open standards

-Live open standards based solutions - case studies

-Advantages and challenges with using open standards.

(Samuel Sweet,2007-12 Vice President, Ikivo, Europe)

-Balancing user experience and usability with device

segmentation and purpose

-The evolution of UI creation, understanding a user’s mission to

explore, by finding identity and context

-Getting into devices, mobile usability as a driver for handset

hardware evolution (Fredrik Ademar,2007-12, Chief Technical

Officer, TAT)

PATTERN-BASED APPROACH TO DEVELOPMENT FOR

GREATER USABILITY

The Z8: Taking a More Agile, Pattern-Based Approach to Development for Greater Usability

Examining the development decisions and processes in creating the first motorola smartphone

-The principals for pattern-based UE - user interface as a manifestation of sets of repeating patterns

-Approaching multi-interaction points

-Achieving a lighter touch in specification - lessening the load of complicated style guides(Matthew Menz, Head of

Interaction, Motorola, USA)

ACHIEVING TRUE "OUT OF THE BOX" USABILITY

Achieving True "Out of the Box" Usability

Dr. Pekka Ketola, Senior User Experience Manager, Multimedia Computers, Nokia, Finland

Current status & case studies: Where are we now with out-of-box experiences?

Standards, guidelines & accessibility - Is there an easier way?

Future possibilities for advanced set-up of mobile handsets

Best practice procedures which may easily be integrated into your device strategy

SHARED STRATEGIES FOR APPLICATION AND PLATFORM PARTNERS

How Shared Strategies for Application and Platform Partners Can Take One Platform to a Variety of Great Experiences

Mikko-Pekka Hanski, Head of Research and Consulting, Co-Founder, Idean, Finland

Designing platform strategy from the user experience perspective - key tools for joined up thinking

Create guidelines for the platform partners to create seamless user experience

Dealing with platform variation

p. 78/78

Creating user experience "hooks" to the platform, enabling the experience to be tailored to different primary

functionalities

Case study - evolving the s60 platform to enterprise, then music