If we find ourselves drowning in our own interface, unable to distinguish heads from tails, we may have a slight problem. Techniques that seem complex to us as the app's interface designer are definitely going to be too difficult to manage for the average or novice user.
Often, the cause behind clutter is the inclusion of too many features. We try too hard to make sure that we fit in every last need for every user and in doing so, we create something that no one can use properly.
Let's take a look at minimalism inside of our application design, so that we'll know when it's time to start making interface cuts for a better user experience.
For this recipe, we should have an understanding of what our application interface will look like. It may also be useful to have several beta testers available to offer input on user features, if we do decide something needs to be cut.
Let's get this bit straight upfront—the most easily avoidable mistake made in application development is the inclusion of too many features. Long feature lists are an archaic remnant of desktop applications, where we can expect a user to easily spend 30 or 40 minutes inside of the app at a time. The mobile app space is different though, and users will expect to quickly get in and use our application.
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The mobile environment almost requires that we tackle one or two tasks to perfection, offering concise instruction, and clear direction. A lack of space limits the number of interface elements that can appear on screen at any given time, so the inclusion of more than two or three tools often involves confusing menus or multiple steps.
When designing our interface, we'll often find ourselves running into a wall. In some situations, it will simply be impossible to cram in every single feature that we desire to include without creating a complicated and convoluted design. Eventually, we'll reach a point at which there will be no more space with which to include interface buttons, and that's when we'll begin to get desperate and attempt to be creative with our design work.
If we find ourselves at this junction, we should take a moment to seriously sit and contemplate the consequences of adding features to an already overloaded interface. As crazy as it may sound, when we start finding it difficult to create screen space for one feature or another, it may be best to look at features we could possibly cut instead.
While it may sound a bit counter-productive, running out of space on screen is often an early warning sign of an overdesigned interface. Navigation Bars, Tab Bars, and Toolbars offer more than enough space to offer simple button interactions for whatever we might need. If we find ourselves needing more, we're probably trying too hard.
iOS was designed from the ground up to be a simple operating system that performed well on the go. A need for more than a few simple tasks from any application may be asking too much, and we should hit the drawing board when we find ourselves with nowhere else to go. More likely than not, our application would be better off with fewer features if possible.
So how do we decide what should stay and what should go? The best way to go about making this tough decision is through application beta testing with a sample app audience. Friends or family work well as a test group and often offer valuable insight into what they feel is most valuable inside of the application.
Another route we can take is to perform a bit of market research on other available applications in the App Store in an effort to gauge what applications currently exist with a similar feature set, and where we can step in and create an application that is unique.
Once we have a grip on what features may be excessive or inessential, we can consider finding ways to decrease their prevalence in the interface, or remove them from our app completely.
Stripping down inessential features isn't a skill set, so much as it is an alternative design philosophy that has become quite prevalent as iOS and other mobile platforms have grown in market share. Traditional desktop software was often a "how much" game, while new mobile apps have become a "how quick and elegant" game instead. Complex interfaces take time to learn and have become a relic of a past computing era. If we want our iPhone or iPad app to succeed, it must be simple, intuitive, and feature focused.
Users will be using our apps everywhere. At train stations, on bus seats, in their office, or at home; there is no guaranteed use case that we can assume will be prevalent with our app.
Desktop software developers have the luxury of knowing that a high percentage of users will be sitting on a desk and planning to use their application for an extended period of time, allowing for deep feature sets with complex interfaces. But word processors or photo editing tools don't work well while walking down the street and typing on a phone, so traditional software interfaces or features won't work well on our iOS app.
If we find our application difficult to use or overly complex, new interface elements may not solve the problem. Sometimes, we're going to need to make the tough decision and cut features from inside of our application.
It's never easy to decide what's best to cut, but hopefully we've devised a few strategies that will help us pick out what's first to go. It may seem tough to cut something that we worked so hard on, but in the end, we may be left with a better application.
Cutting features is never a fun task, but we shouldn't toss our ideas totally by the wayside. Here's a suggestion for when to cut something.
If we do decide to cut out a feature inside of our application, we should do our best to leave the function commented out in code or kept in notes somewhere so that we can refer back to the feature and possibly use it in the future.
While somewhat in contradiction to this recipe, it's important to know that there may be a time in the future where it makes sense to throw the feature back into our app. Over time, users are becoming more comfortable in a mobile computing environment and users easily understand more complex applications.
Spend a few minutes observing newer Apple created applications such as iMovie or Garageband for iPad, and compare these applications to offerings that launched with the iPhone in 2007 such as Photos, Stocks, or Weather. As users become more comfortable with an operating system, we can throw a bit more at them without fear of confusion. So while our features may not work inside of our application today, they may fit perfectly six months or a year from now. Likewise, we may also find spinning a feature that doesn't quite into an app into it's own separate app could be a successful venture as well.