Programming the iPhone User Experience

The High Bar

Progressive enhancement methods are ideal for providing supplemental functionality to users. Software developers can delight users by including supplemental features that add fun, novelty, or additional efficiency for task-oriented users.

The high bar anti-pattern is present in applications that limit the ability to accomplish tasks for users not meeting certain external criteria. Examples are applications that:

• Force users to shake their device to delete information.

• Require network connectivity for operations that could be accomplished offline.

• Require Multi-Touch input for essential operations and fail to provide secondary controls for users who are disabled or have only one free hand.

• Require precision input by presenting small input controls or small margins of error for touches and gestures.

The opportunities for the high bar anti-pattern are endless. When developing an application, designers and developers should try to empathize with mobile users, imagining themselves in various disparate scenarios: in the passenger seat of a car; carrying grocery bags; jogging on a treadmill; lying in bed; flying on an airplane; using the New York City subway system; having physical disabilities. Desktop and mobile applications differ primarily in their use cases. Accessibility is an important consideration in desktop software, but developers can rely on controlled environments and supportive technologies for the physically impaired. Mobile application developers should provide value ...