The secrets of mobile applications.Dayna Lawlor 13128108Aisling O’Shea 13160109Shanon Lyons 13124633Ciara Beresford 13127764Digital Media Design

Introduction The topic we have chosen to speak about is

the Secrets of Designing Mobile Applications. We picked this topic as we found it relates to

our everyday lives. As we use these applications everyday, we

found it interesting to research different aspects of mobile applications such as usability, development, comparison of markets and excessive use of application technologies.

Main Developers Android Apple BlackBerry Nokia Ovi Windows Phone

Make-up Language There are two main languages used

when developing applications. Wireless Make-up language. (WML) Compact Hypertext Make-up Language

(CHTML) Both use tags to mark sections with a

formatting command. <TITLE>TITLE OF APPLICATION<TITLE>

User Centred Design Study Goals User Needs Research Contextual Design Customer Usability Paper Prototype Testing and Prototype. Release Regular Updates

Issues with mobile application development Integration with the hardware device Performance, reliability and storage limitations. Issues of security. Sensor handling. Real and virtual keyboards A global positioning system Native and mobile web applications Open and closed platforms. User interface.

Case Study- Snapchat Snapchat was started by two Stanford

University students, Spiegel and Bobby Murphy as a project for one of Spiegel's classes.

It is designed around the User Centred Design strategy.

It was developed by using the two main makeup languages WML and CHTML

It was released in 2011. It is being updated frequently with its latest

update released on June 2013 named “Banquo”

References Hayes et al, Hayes.G(2004), System for and method of developing a

common user interface for mobile applications, US20040027326 A1, Application.

Wasserman, T. (2010) “Software Engineering Issues for Mobile Application Development” Available at: http://works.bepress.com/tony_wasserman/4 [accessed on 18th October 2013].

DCN,(2005), User Centred Design, available: http://www.dcndx.com/service-detail/user-centered-design , [accessed 28th Octoboer 2013].

Olsson,T,(2007), User-Centered Design of a Mobile Application for Sharing Life Memories, Mobility '07 Proceedings of the 4th international conference on mobile technology, applications, and systems and the 1st international symposium on Computer human interaction in mobile technology,Pages 524-531.

Wikipedia (2011), Snapchat, available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snapchat, [accessed 29th October 2013, 14hr18].

Mobile Websites Browser based HTML pages More compact than regular websites Neater and smaller for mobile devices Included text, data, images and video. Use of mobile-specific features. Eg:

“click-to-call” and location-based mapping.

Mobile Applications Built specifically for a handheld display Downloaded and installed onto

smartphone. Not rendered by a browser. Downloaded from device specific portals.

Eg: Apple App store and the Android Market.

Useful information already downloaded- allows user to work offline.

Android- First Credible threat to Apple Targeted same consumers and aimed to win hearts

of developers Gives consumers more choices as partnered with

multiple mobile manufacturers Also more choice in phone services. In USA android

smartphones available on 3 or more. iPhone only available on 1.

Android sales outnumbered iPhone sales- 200,000 per day vs. 80,000 per day (Sept 2010)

In 2010, Apple and Android sales grew by 61% Market share- Apple 27% vs. Android 39% (2010)

Applications & Developments iPhone’s success mainly due to number of apps

available. According to Apple (Oct 2010), users had access

to 250,000 apps. According to Android, Android Market expanding

by 15,000 per month for the 5 months previous. 2 billion downloads from the Android Market. New apps coming out at the same time for both

markets- developers seeing Android as equal to Apple.

Difference between App Stores Apple’s App Store is gated- developers submit apps for publication

& Apple decides what gets published. Developers self-publish to Android Market and Google allows an

open model- gives freedom to developers and more apps become available.

Disadvantage to this: low quality apps available, making finding high quality apps more difficult.

Android also safer than iPhone- the apps run in their own space & can’t access data from other apps without explicit user permission.

Android Market allows developers to create trojan horse applications, can be malicious and user must identify them first.

iPhone apps access many system resources by default but consumers know Apple has evaluated app.

Developers Preferences For every 10

apps made, approx 7 of them are for Apple App Store.

Can see the constant increase in number of apps made from 2011 to 2012.

Revenue Generated by Apps

References1. Apple | The Flurry Blog - Mobile Application

Analytics | iPhone Analytics | Android Analytics.” Accessed October 22, 2013. http://blog.flurry.com/?Tag=Apple.

2. Accessed October 22, 2013. http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/Xplore/cookiedetectresponse.jsp.

3. http://offers2.compuware.com/rs/compuware/images/Mobile_App_Survey_Report.pdf

What is usability? Usability can be defined as making a

certain product easier to use. The product can be a software application, a website, a book or even a machine.

Basically, anything a human interacts with.

Looking at usability in terms of mobile applications.

Qualities of a good app Easy to navigate Clear way of going back Text is clear and concise Font size is readable Allows the user to customize Instructions are easy to understand and

easily retrievable

Why is usability important? If an app is not easy to use, users will

become frustrated. This leads to the app not being used

and becoming a ‘bad app’ In today’s world, if a person cannot

learn how to use a new app within 30 seconds they’ll leave it

How do you measure usability? Effectiveness – Efficiency – Learnability There are many different ‘models’ that

usability can be based on e.g, the PACMAD model and the Nielsen model

Models are frames that you can build your app around that have more factors other than the basic 3 i.e, satisfaction factor

Snapchat! Fast and easy way to share photos and videos

with your friends instantly It’s simple and intuitive interface is made of 3

screens: your contact list, your activity feed, and the Snapchat camera

The camera allows you to toggle flash, front-facing camera and how long the receiver can see your photo e.g, 1 second – 10 seconds

References Wikipedia (2013) ‘Usability’, available:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/usability [accessed 18 Oct 2013, 11h43].

Keepitusable (2011) ‘Mobile app usability checklist’, available: http://www.keepitusable.com/keepitusable-mobile-app-usability-checklist.pdf [accessed 18 Oct 2013].

Lew, P. (2012) ‘Usability modeling and measurement’, 14 Jan, Slideshare.net, unpublished.

Zhang, D. And Adipat, B. (2005) ‘Challenges, methodologies, and issues in the usability of testing of mobile applications’, International Journal of Human Computer Interaction, 18(3), 293-308.

CBS Interactive Inc. (2013) ‘Snapchat review: Great for sharing secret photos and videos’, available: http://reviews.cnet.com/software/snapchat-android/4505-3513_7-35828364.html [accessed 18 Oct 2013].

What is an “App”? A mobile application is a software application

available to smartphones or tablets. Mobile applications first began simple, from

calendars to email. Today there is a vast range of “apps” such as

gaming, social, online shopping or GPS. Some apps are free while others must be

purchased. The objective of an app is basically to simplify a

website or game so that it is easy to use and extremely accessible.

What causes addiction to apps? Usability -easy to find & download. -extremely easy to use.

-login details. Design -text is clear. -font size is readable. -tasteful colouring yet distinctive to

the app. Updates –frequently updating features of an

app keeps the user interested in the app.

Technological Addiction We live in a place where technology is increasingly being

seen as too powerful, even addictive. Symptoms of addiction to applications would be withdrawal, life dysfunction and compulsion.

Studies have shown Facebook & Twitter to be more addictive than alcohol & cigarettes because there are no long-term or short-term costs for checking your facebook or sending a tweet.

Gaming apps are the most popular and most addictive apps there is. Many of these apps are free and accessible. They also consist of a number of different levels increasing with difficulty every time which contributes to the addictive aspects as nobody likes to loose.

Desiring or Irresistible Mobile apps are becoming more and more

sophisticated and multifunctional. Years ago we wouldn’t dare to share our personal login details with anybody, yet now we trust some random app to “remember you” purely for convenience sake.

A research aspect is to compare addicted users to average users. The increase in dependence of phone apps is evident in addicted users. *

Disadvantages of excessive use Many people suffer social problems from excessive

usage because the phone does not leave their site. Also economical issues are another disadvantage with

apps as they constantly ask for money. Sharon, mother of Danny (aged 5) was charged around

£1,300 as a result of the child purchasing a £69.99 item 19 times in ten minutes, before the bill went up to £1,700

81% of people under 25 sleep with their phone next to them on the bed.

74% reach for their smartphones immediately after waking up.

Stats! Over a quarter of adults (27%) and almost half of

teenagers (47%) now own a smartphone, according to Ofcom’s latest Communications Market Report.

95% teens text while driving when alone compared to 32% who text when a friend is in the car.

97% of teens & 91% of 20 year olds regularly use smartphones in the bathroom to check messages.

When it comes to mobile apps 37% of adults and 60% of teens admit they are ‘highly addicted’.

Case Study –Snapchat Using this app users cant take photos, record videos,

add text & drawings and send them to a controlled list of recipients.

These photos or videos are known as ‘snaps’ and the text is known as ‘chat’

The clever trick to snapchat is that you can set a certain time length between 1-10 seconds after which they will disappear from the recipients device forever.

Snapchats clever features contribute to the addictive aspect as it is so easy to use.

References Leung, L. (2008) ‘Linking Psychological

Attributes to Addiction and improper use of the mobile phone’, Journal of Children and Media, 2, 93-113. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17482790802078565#.UnGzV_lSiAh

Wikipedia (2013) ‘Mobile App’, 24 Oct 20.08pm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_app

Mobile Social Work (2013) ‘How Young People Use Mobiles’, 25 Jun. http://mobilesocialwork.wordpress.com/2013/07/25/how-young-people-use-mobiles-top-7-statistics-from-the-mobile-youth-report/

Working in a group I really enjoyed working with the other members of my

group. Each member was eager to work as we all felt strongly

about the topic and we relied on each other with our sub topics.

The labs on Mondays were very helpful and we also got a lot of guidance.

One downfall was the difficulty in finding time to meet up outside class time but we communicated using facebook, dropbox and text messaging.

I enjoyed getting to know my group members and also learning new and interesting facts about this topic.

Conclusion From our research of this topic we have

learned about the different aspects of designing mobile applications.

We discovered how each topic we researched contributes to the design of a mobile application.