Week 07: Mobile Navigation Patterns

In my opinion the design of the app is what makes it stand out compared to other apps out there.  From the link that was provided to us for our assignment this week http://www.mobiledesignpatterngallery.com I found 3 of them that I sort of really liked.  2 of the patterns that I found were from the Tab Menu and the last pattern that I really liked was from the Spring Board.

Tab Menu:

Spring Board:

The reason why I picked these patterns is because, thinking for my own mobile app, Im trying to figure out which one of these patterns would match my mobile app.  All of these patterns seem very simple and clean, everything is perfectly spaced out, the colors match each other and the text is very readable.  My mobile app doesn't have that much content and much buttons and Im thinking of possible redesigning my layout to one of these patterns.

Week 07: Heuristic Evaluations VIA SKYPE

I have never really used Skype before and wow this thing came in handy.  I got in touch via Skype with two of my peers Chris Wheeler and Allison Diller within the same day and I was able to conduct Heurustic Evaluations of their Apps and they also did one for mine.  *** I will post the video of their feedback for me when I get their videos a little later.***  here is the videos from Chris:

and here is the video for Allison:

**EDIT**
Allison from Allison Unzipped just sent me the link for her conducting the Heuristic Evaluation of my app here is a link to her blog and video: http://allisonunzipped.blogspot.com

Week 07: Effective Blogging

Blogging is somewhat of a new territory for me and explaining my self could seem quite difficult and confusing.  One of the assignments this week was to read an article about effective blogging:  http://michaelhyatt.com/anatomy-of-an-effective-blog-post.html and then blog about another blog.  The blog that I viewed was from http://idevblogaday.com/ and the article that I chose was called Got Buttermilk?.  From what I have learned from the effective blogging article is that blogs should be really straight to the point with the important information explained.  Blogs also explain the writers personal experience, this makes sense to me because it gives the readers insight on the writers point of view.  Michael Hyatt's article has a list of what makes a 500-word blog and you can click on the link to the page to see what I am talking about.  I think that the article Got Buttermilk? is an effective blog post because the writer executed if not all of the main points that Michael Hyatt explained, which is why I think that that blog post is an effective one.

WEEK 6: Balsamiq

One of the changes that I have made in my prototype was that I took out the Social Media option....for now anyways, I just don't think that I want to complicate the app.  Another thing that I changed in this app was that for the Events I did make the decision to go with a calendar look instead of it just a list of the different upcoming apps.  I would also like the events to have a symbol of some sort so the users know when exactly the dates are and when the date is selected you could have the choice to set a reminder of the event.

WEEK 5: EVALUATION

With my work schedule I am pretty busy but since I don't have any free time to myself I asked my girlfriend and her mom to help me out with my evaluation of my prototype.  I tried to make my prototype as simple as possible so here is what I came up with.

• In the events page, I think in the future I would rather have a calendar instead of just a list of upcoming events.  I noticed that when my testers tried to tap on the event dates listed, it occurred to me that it wouldn't lead the user anywhere further.
• Another thing that I noticed was that maybe for the social media page it would open up the built in social media app such as (facebook, twitter, instagram)

I mainly want this app to serve the students at Hawaiian Kajukenbo Association.  

WEEK 4: Prototyping

1. Point of View:Most people tend to forget certain dates that may be important, like a concert coming up or a presentation that they need to prepare for.  Even though you could use your default smartphones calendar app, an app that could have updated events or dates into your news feed

2. Storyboard:

3. Paper Prototype
                                               

WEEK 3: HPU 4702 MOBILE DESIGN ASSIGNMENT

Week 3:  HPU 4702 Mobile Design Assignment

Step 1: Observe

I chose to observe my family members in some of the daily activities around the house as well as some new projects.  This will help my girlfriend and me in the future because when we get a place of our own we can use these new skills in our own place. 

Girlfriend: painting the guest room so she can have room to do her makeup. 

Successes:

Finished painting the room in less than 3 hours.

Managed not to break her nails or to get any interior paint on them.

Learned how to paint a room

Breakdowns:

Room previously had dark blue paint on walls and mixed with graffiti

The walls had some dents and needed to be leveled out with wall spackle

Newspaper needed to be put down lining the edges of the floor

Walls have to be wiped down and then; primer needs to be applied.

Opportunities:

First chance for her to do a DIY (do-it-yourself) project

Apply the painting techniques she learned from YouTube as well as asking other people who have painted an interior before. 

Aunty (girlfriends mom): organizing appliance cabinet, so she can find things easier when she wants to cook.

Successes:

Took out all unused appliances so there is more room in the cabinets for more useful appliances.  

Arranged the appliances according to their size, the bigger appliances such as cooking pots, rice cooker

Breakdowns:

Some appliances are not often used and are taking a lot of room

Different types of appliances are out of place, which makes finding them hard in the future

Smaller appliances are hidden behind bigger appliances.

Opportunities:

A chance to organize all of the cabinets and get rid of unused appliances