Anders Rosenquist, ZAAZ
Why is mobile important? About 2/3 people in the room have smartphone. Just a few years back, smartphone existed, but penetration was small. Apple introduced a simpler way to interact with the device: you could use your fingers instead of a stylus. Networks have become more powerful. Some companies pushing bandwidth limit. More and more people are using these devices to access the web. "Now somewhat enjoyable to go on a website." Ecosystems are growing; now have app stores for mobile platforms.
Recent industry trends
Increased data use. Voice minutes become more of a commodity, less of focus on mobile device. Apple changed experience of buying: Can go into Apple store, then go home and plug it into your computer and sign up from a plan. You never have to walk into a phone store.
Google's new phone, you have to go online to buy it. You can't buy it from any store.
Free an open operating systems are becoming more popular. 60,000 Android licenses being sold every day, according to Google.
Increased smartphone adoption. In U.S., smartphone and feature phones, the latter have 10-digit keypads. People who don't care about the phones themselves are jumping to smartphones. In U.S., about 17% smartphone sales. Samsung working to introduce new OS and bring low-cost smartphone devices to market.
What we are seeing
Companies are wanting mobile presence. There's also the "We need an app" notion.
Defining a mobile strategy
First have to step back and look at data, discovery phase. Talk to a range of stakeholders. What are business goals for the company as seen through the eyes of a lot of people.
Take business goals and user goals and run an alignment matrix. Look for correlations between the two. Sometimes business goals conflict, and sometimes user goals conflict. Some business goals enabled via mobile. Then look at what audiences might tap into that.
Mobile site vs. app
What does it mean to have a mobile site? What does it mean to have a mobile app? For mobile app, tapping in to a much richer experience. For example, Amazon app, you can take a photo of an item and add it to your Amazon Wish List. Location services are also useful. Problem with mobile app is that you have to target platforms. Tends to be a more expensive way to go.
If creating a mobile site, screen size is the primary factor. (Right way to do it is server detect device and serve up page for the right screen size. Can get away without device detection only if pages are very, very simple.) If creating a mobile app, the device OS is the primary factor.
40% of mobile screen traffic is on a 480 x 320 screen. Another 11% is on a 220 x 176 screen. Top 10 devices account for 60% of mobile browser traffic. 4 screen sizes in the top 10. Big ones: iPhone & iPod Touch.
480 x 320 hits not only iPhone, but Palm and Android devices, so design for that screen size, you'll hit a lot of devices. 320 x 240 hits BlackBerry and older Window Mobile devices.
UX for mobile
Core idea: focus user attention on core information. The content is the interface. Controls are at a minimum.
Desktop design doesn't work in mobile. So much breaks the experience, such as headers, navigation, footers, and more.
Among the mobile app UX principles, minimize user help and focus on the user experience.
Analytics, to track what users click on and where they go, as important on mobile as it is on desktop.
Upcoming
We know faster networks are coming, and more app stores. There will be a greater blending of social and mobile. We'll see even more location-based services.
We're considering iPad as "mobile."
Monday, March 22, 2010
Let's Look in the Mirror and See What We See
Starting right up with social innovation, this first session is interactive, where each attendee gets a small wireless keypad and Tony Self and Matthew Ellison will be getting responses from the audience to polling.
The Help button on the keypad does nothing, it's "no help at all."
Tony Self: In the U.S., for Toyota owners, "UA" means "unintended acceleration."
First out of the box: How do you plan to spend evenings in Seattle?
1. Checking conference topics on the internet
2. Sightseeing
3. Visiting bars
4. Falling asleep in front of the TV
5. Other
Lots of people picked "other" because they plan to work.
Most people thought TOCs for online user guides indispensable, very important, or moderately important. One person commented that many users in a usability study don't use it, but for those who do, it's very important. (I've long believed that the more ways users have to access and find information, the better the information is.)
A quarter of respondents don't telecommute, and another 54% telecommute less than 1 day or 1-2 days per week.
35% say they have no contact with users.
More than half think that DITA will be widely adopted in 5 years, or at least used widely in large companies. Tony: "HTML5 will be a competitor to Flash, not DITA."
iPhone gets the majority of smartphone users (22%, BlackBerry is next at 10%), but 57% of people don't have any kind of smartphone. (Surprising for a roomful of geeks and technical professionals.)
When using Help tools and need Help, 39% use Help, 30% search Google, and 31% ask or email a colleague or peer. One person commented that they "use Help out of bizarre loyalty, and then I search Google."
The Help button on the keypad does nothing, it's "no help at all."
Tony Self: In the U.S., for Toyota owners, "UA" means "unintended acceleration."
First out of the box: How do you plan to spend evenings in Seattle?
1. Checking conference topics on the internet
2. Sightseeing
3. Visiting bars
4. Falling asleep in front of the TV
5. Other
Lots of people picked "other" because they plan to work.
Most people thought TOCs for online user guides indispensable, very important, or moderately important. One person commented that many users in a usability study don't use it, but for those who do, it's very important. (I've long believed that the more ways users have to access and find information, the better the information is.)
A quarter of respondents don't telecommute, and another 54% telecommute less than 1 day or 1-2 days per week.
35% say they have no contact with users.
More than half think that DITA will be widely adopted in 5 years, or at least used widely in large companies. Tony: "HTML5 will be a competitor to Flash, not DITA."
iPhone gets the majority of smartphone users (22%, BlackBerry is next at 10%), but 57% of people don't have any kind of smartphone. (Surprising for a roomful of geeks and technical professionals.)
When using Help tools and need Help, 39% use Help, 30% search Google, and 31% ask or email a colleague or peer. One person commented that they "use Help out of bizarre loyalty, and then I search Google."
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Sunday starts
While the official conference doesn't really begin until Monday, the Sunday afternoon "supplemental" sessions are underway. I spent a little time already in a well-attended session on writing better help procedures, and am now in a session on Adobe Acrobat, which is really interesting.
Some of the stuff I caught in the help procedures session was about categories of mistakes that documentation falls into. They include procedures that miss information and procedures that bury information or don't have good entry points (indexes!) to useful information.
The Acrobat astuff is interesting. I came in as the presenter was demonstrating how to add and format buttons in Acrobat documents, showing off buttons that not only take users to different places, but that run multimedia, such as sound and video.
There are hands-on sessions too, which is far more useful than simply trying to absorb a bunch of slideware in a 60-minute main conference session. It's kind of too bad that more people don't take advantage of this useful learning opportunity.
Some of the stuff I caught in the help procedures session was about categories of mistakes that documentation falls into. They include procedures that miss information and procedures that bury information or don't have good entry points (indexes!) to useful information.
The Acrobat astuff is interesting. I came in as the presenter was demonstrating how to add and format buttons in Acrobat documents, showing off buttons that not only take users to different places, but that run multimedia, such as sound and video.
There are hands-on sessions too, which is far more useful than simply trying to absorb a bunch of slideware in a 60-minute main conference session. It's kind of too bad that more people don't take advantage of this useful learning opportunity.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Social and mobile
With just a few days left until the conference begins, organizer Joe Welinske is offering some new services to provide information to attendees and to help people connect. Click the Community tab on the conference home page to see what I mean.
You can see lists of attendees and speakers, you can have online conversations, you can set up your session schedule and more. But one of the most interesting features is one that's very undocumented.
A small On The Go section asks you to enter your mobile phone number and identify your carrier, with no information explaining what for or what the information would be used for. I was skeptical--I'm protective of information such as that--but Joe encouraged me to try it out.
Turns out when you sign up by entering your phone number, you get a text message with a URL, and at that URL is a mobile website of the community site that you can use with your smartphone. Click on that URL and your taken to the site and signed in.
Definitely worth trying.
You can see lists of attendees and speakers, you can have online conversations, you can set up your session schedule and more. But one of the most interesting features is one that's very undocumented.
A small On The Go section asks you to enter your mobile phone number and identify your carrier, with no information explaining what for or what the information would be used for. I was skeptical--I'm protective of information such as that--but Joe encouraged me to try it out.
Turns out when you sign up by entering your phone number, you get a text message with a URL, and at that URL is a mobile website of the community site that you can use with your smartphone. Click on that URL and your taken to the site and signed in.
Definitely worth trying.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
My conference plans
It's not unusual for me to list of my boss (as well as other co-workers who might be attending) the sessions that I plan to go to at the conference. But without a job this year, no audience exists for such content. So I'll do it here.
Fair warning: The sessions that I think are right for me might not be for you, and the opinions here are my own, not those of conference organizers. And I reserve the right to make last-minute changes to my planned conference itinerary.
Hopefully, this might help you make up your mind if you're having trouble deciding what to attend, especially for those times where you want to be in two or three places at once, such are the riches at this conference.
Sunday
Three all-afternoon supplemental sessions are on the Sunday calendar. I usually spend some time in all three to get some snippets for Monday's newsletter.
If I were to choose just one, I think I'd attend "Information Modeling in XML." To me, this looks like useful foundation for DITA-type work, and DITA is the in thing in management these days (even if it isn't a panacea).
The Acrobat sessions looks interesting. And the "Writing Help Procedures That Work" looks like the content that would be taught in the first course of a good technical communication curriculum, so if you've not had formal training in the field, here's something that you can hang your hat on.
Monday
9:00-10:00am: Opening panel
An experiment in participative social media. We'll see where this goes.
10:30-11:30am
This is going to be a tossup between ""The Mobile User Experience - Trends and Practices" and "Embedded User Assistance: Where Does It Belong." My thoughts on the latter's question is as close to the point of need as possible, but it'll be interesting to see where Rob Houser takes this. On the other hand, so many people are going mobile, that anything that improves the user experience is going to be vital. More than anything, the UI has to communicate its function. You can get away with a programmer creating an obtuse UI in a desktop app, or sometimes even a web app, but not with a mobile app, and this is a perfect fit for the "communication" part of "technical communication." Meanwhile, Matthew Ellison has something of interest: getting feedback on help. Perhaps more interesting will be the collaboration idea.
12:45-1:45pm
Another tough one. So many hiring managers seem to be under the notion that DITA will be their technical documentation savior, and as aresult are adding it to job requirements. So Tony Self's session on "An Update on DITA Features, Tools, and Best Practices" seems to be a no-brainer. But Dave Gash is holding his first session at the same time, on the topic of "The Power of Controlled Language in UA." While I'm not sure the topic will be as useful, Dave is one of the best speakers at the conference, even if his pre-presentation funny signs have been bowdlerized. The case studies on getting user feedback also looks to be tremendously useful.
So two session time slots, and already I'm wishing I could clone myself twice and be in three places at once. Par for the course for this conference.
2:05-3:05pm
I'd love to take part in the two-session hands-on session that introduces Adobe's Technical Communication Suite 2. But I don't think I can. Not only is Char James-Tanny really smart and a great speaker, her topic, "Structures, Semantics, Controls, and More: HTML 5 Is Here!" is an incredibly important one. HTML 5 is where everything on the web is going, and if you don't know it, you're going to be behind the curve.
3:25-4:25pm
Another DITA-based session rears its head: "Enhancing DITA Web Help with TOCJS and Zoon Search Engine." This may be aimed at folks who are fluent in DITA, so it might be over my head, but understanding the ideas about how to extend DITA-based docs could still be useful. Then there's Scott DeLoach talking about "Strategies for Web-Based User Assistance," ideas than I can definitely add to me repertoire. I have to say, though, that while I love Scott to death--he's smart, and one of the nicest people you'll ever meet--his speaking style is very, very dry. And late in the afternoon, if I go to this one, I will definitely need a jolt of something to keep my eyelids up. The XMl session also looks interesting.
That's a busy day, and it's only day one. The networking mixer goes until 6:00pm, and then I have to spend several hours putting together and printing Tuesday's newsletter.
Tuesday
8:30-9:30am
I hate Tuesday. It always starts early, after a long, busy, and very full Monday. And once again, I have choices to make. I'd love to do the two-session hands-on (again), this on on single-sourcing in Flare. But I also want to be at "Using DITA as a Content Delivery System fo Mobile Devices," "Think Simple - A Minimalist Approach to User Assistance," and "Introduction to eBook Devices and Formats." Right now, I'm leaning toward the last of these, but that might change once I get to see the sessions slides.
9:50-10:50am
Joe Welinske is talking on ""UA Design and Implementation for iPhone Apps." This one's a no-brainer.
11:10am-12:10pm
Blankety-blank hands-on sessions. Once again, I'd love to spend two session times on one, this time on "Building Your Own AIR Help Application." But I can't. I actually want to go to all 4 of the other sessions: ""Understanding Gestures in User Interfaces," Cultural Dimensions of Software Help Usage," "Microsoft Help Preview," and the double-scoop case study session on DITA. I'm wondering how the issue has changed over the years since I took my "International Technical Communication" class as a part of my TC curriculum. But I also want to learn about Microsoft Help, and I'm chomping at the bit to learn more about DITA. Again, I'll have to rely on slide review the night before to reach a final decision.
1:25-2:25pm
While I am intrigued by the double-scoop case study session on eLearning, I'm leaning toward the "Where User Experience and Software Engineering Meet" session.
2:45-3:45pm
This should be interesting. Conference attendees will be selecting--and some will be hosting--topics that they select and vote on. Stay tuned to this space to see what comes out of this experiment.
Wednesday
8:30-9:30am
Wednesday's early start is mitigated by the fact that Tuesday session package ended early with product demos. As usual, there are two sessions at this time that I am targeting. First, "eBook Conversions: A Tutorial for UA Professionals" looks really useful for learning how to convert content to eBook formats. But the double-scoop case study session on single sourcing, where one speaker is doing DITSA and another wikis looks really useful.
9:50-10:50am
While the double-scoop case study on agile looks useful, the ""The Psychology of User Interface Responsiveness" session looks really, really interesting.
1:05-2:05pm
This turns out to be one of the few time slots during the conference that is a pretty easy choice, at least for me. "Interaction Design Meets Expertise: Representation, Understanding, and Problem solving" is right up my alley. To be fair, a couple of other ones do look interesting. "Writing for Mobile Devices: An End-User Approach" looks tremendously useful to prepare for the ongoing explosion of mobile computing devices., even though this presentation is by someone from Microsoft and focuses on Windows Mobile, and I'm (now) an iPhone geek (although I've had multiple Windows Mobile devices in the past). And "Google Wave and User Assistance" could provide some interesting tidbits on making this often-puzzling service a bit clearer.
2:25-3:25pm
For me, this one's an easy call. Even if the topic didn't focus on DITA, I'd be going to ""Introduction to DITA Conditional Processing" for the speaker: Dave Gash. Even though Dave loves highly technical topics--and this is one--making it sometimes tough to muddle through, if you can't have the ever-entertaining Jared Spool ending the final day, a Dave Gash presentation is perhaps the next best thing.
3:45-4:45pm
This year, the conference ends with a panel that has in the past begun the proceedings: a group that looks at the future of user assistance. This year, some new faces will grace the stage, and it'll be interesting to see what they have to say as they send attendees on their way to prepare for next year.
Fair warning: The sessions that I think are right for me might not be for you, and the opinions here are my own, not those of conference organizers. And I reserve the right to make last-minute changes to my planned conference itinerary.
Hopefully, this might help you make up your mind if you're having trouble deciding what to attend, especially for those times where you want to be in two or three places at once, such are the riches at this conference.
Sunday
Three all-afternoon supplemental sessions are on the Sunday calendar. I usually spend some time in all three to get some snippets for Monday's newsletter.
If I were to choose just one, I think I'd attend "Information Modeling in XML." To me, this looks like useful foundation for DITA-type work, and DITA is the in thing in management these days (even if it isn't a panacea).
The Acrobat sessions looks interesting. And the "Writing Help Procedures That Work" looks like the content that would be taught in the first course of a good technical communication curriculum, so if you've not had formal training in the field, here's something that you can hang your hat on.
Monday
9:00-10:00am: Opening panel
An experiment in participative social media. We'll see where this goes.
10:30-11:30am
This is going to be a tossup between ""The Mobile User Experience - Trends and Practices" and "Embedded User Assistance: Where Does It Belong." My thoughts on the latter's question is as close to the point of need as possible, but it'll be interesting to see where Rob Houser takes this. On the other hand, so many people are going mobile, that anything that improves the user experience is going to be vital. More than anything, the UI has to communicate its function. You can get away with a programmer creating an obtuse UI in a desktop app, or sometimes even a web app, but not with a mobile app, and this is a perfect fit for the "communication" part of "technical communication." Meanwhile, Matthew Ellison has something of interest: getting feedback on help. Perhaps more interesting will be the collaboration idea.
12:45-1:45pm
Another tough one. So many hiring managers seem to be under the notion that DITA will be their technical documentation savior, and as aresult are adding it to job requirements. So Tony Self's session on "An Update on DITA Features, Tools, and Best Practices" seems to be a no-brainer. But Dave Gash is holding his first session at the same time, on the topic of "The Power of Controlled Language in UA." While I'm not sure the topic will be as useful, Dave is one of the best speakers at the conference, even if his pre-presentation funny signs have been bowdlerized. The case studies on getting user feedback also looks to be tremendously useful.
So two session time slots, and already I'm wishing I could clone myself twice and be in three places at once. Par for the course for this conference.
2:05-3:05pm
I'd love to take part in the two-session hands-on session that introduces Adobe's Technical Communication Suite 2. But I don't think I can. Not only is Char James-Tanny really smart and a great speaker, her topic, "Structures, Semantics, Controls, and More: HTML 5 Is Here!" is an incredibly important one. HTML 5 is where everything on the web is going, and if you don't know it, you're going to be behind the curve.
3:25-4:25pm
Another DITA-based session rears its head: "Enhancing DITA Web Help with TOCJS and Zoon Search Engine." This may be aimed at folks who are fluent in DITA, so it might be over my head, but understanding the ideas about how to extend DITA-based docs could still be useful. Then there's Scott DeLoach talking about "Strategies for Web-Based User Assistance," ideas than I can definitely add to me repertoire. I have to say, though, that while I love Scott to death--he's smart, and one of the nicest people you'll ever meet--his speaking style is very, very dry. And late in the afternoon, if I go to this one, I will definitely need a jolt of something to keep my eyelids up. The XMl session also looks interesting.
That's a busy day, and it's only day one. The networking mixer goes until 6:00pm, and then I have to spend several hours putting together and printing Tuesday's newsletter.
Tuesday
8:30-9:30am
I hate Tuesday. It always starts early, after a long, busy, and very full Monday. And once again, I have choices to make. I'd love to do the two-session hands-on (again), this on on single-sourcing in Flare. But I also want to be at "Using DITA as a Content Delivery System fo Mobile Devices," "Think Simple - A Minimalist Approach to User Assistance," and "Introduction to eBook Devices and Formats." Right now, I'm leaning toward the last of these, but that might change once I get to see the sessions slides.
9:50-10:50am
Joe Welinske is talking on ""UA Design and Implementation for iPhone Apps." This one's a no-brainer.
11:10am-12:10pm
Blankety-blank hands-on sessions. Once again, I'd love to spend two session times on one, this time on "Building Your Own AIR Help Application." But I can't. I actually want to go to all 4 of the other sessions: ""Understanding Gestures in User Interfaces," Cultural Dimensions of Software Help Usage," "Microsoft Help Preview," and the double-scoop case study session on DITA. I'm wondering how the issue has changed over the years since I took my "International Technical Communication" class as a part of my TC curriculum. But I also want to learn about Microsoft Help, and I'm chomping at the bit to learn more about DITA. Again, I'll have to rely on slide review the night before to reach a final decision.
1:25-2:25pm
While I am intrigued by the double-scoop case study session on eLearning, I'm leaning toward the "Where User Experience and Software Engineering Meet" session.
2:45-3:45pm
This should be interesting. Conference attendees will be selecting--and some will be hosting--topics that they select and vote on. Stay tuned to this space to see what comes out of this experiment.
Wednesday
8:30-9:30am
Wednesday's early start is mitigated by the fact that Tuesday session package ended early with product demos. As usual, there are two sessions at this time that I am targeting. First, "eBook Conversions: A Tutorial for UA Professionals" looks really useful for learning how to convert content to eBook formats. But the double-scoop case study session on single sourcing, where one speaker is doing DITSA and another wikis looks really useful.
9:50-10:50am
While the double-scoop case study on agile looks useful, the ""The Psychology of User Interface Responsiveness" session looks really, really interesting.
1:05-2:05pm
This turns out to be one of the few time slots during the conference that is a pretty easy choice, at least for me. "Interaction Design Meets Expertise: Representation, Understanding, and Problem solving" is right up my alley. To be fair, a couple of other ones do look interesting. "Writing for Mobile Devices: An End-User Approach" looks tremendously useful to prepare for the ongoing explosion of mobile computing devices., even though this presentation is by someone from Microsoft and focuses on Windows Mobile, and I'm (now) an iPhone geek (although I've had multiple Windows Mobile devices in the past). And "Google Wave and User Assistance" could provide some interesting tidbits on making this often-puzzling service a bit clearer.
2:25-3:25pm
For me, this one's an easy call. Even if the topic didn't focus on DITA, I'd be going to ""Introduction to DITA Conditional Processing" for the speaker: Dave Gash. Even though Dave loves highly technical topics--and this is one--making it sometimes tough to muddle through, if you can't have the ever-entertaining Jared Spool ending the final day, a Dave Gash presentation is perhaps the next best thing.
3:45-4:45pm
This year, the conference ends with a panel that has in the past begun the proceedings: a group that looks at the future of user assistance. This year, some new faces will grace the stage, and it'll be interesting to see what they have to say as they send attendees on their way to prepare for next year.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)