Day 38 - 10 Mobile Interaction Design Tips

Taking complexity and making it easy is hard. Focus, iteration, testing, and polish is required for good app design. Keep these mobile tips in mind when designing an app.

1. Stay focused on the goal.
2. Start with sketching, not a computer. It's not about drawing it's about design.
3. Match the interactions and affordances to your platform. Pay attention to developer design guides, conventions, and patterns.
4. Less is more so keep it simple. Limit and consolidate the number of elements for a clean design.
5. Provide the user with cues and meaningful feedback about their interaction whether the user makes mistakes or not.
6. Create hints for users so you can lead them through a design.
7. Build a visual and approachable hierarchy.
8. Sliders should convey movement or progress.
9. Remember to consider international users. Great icons don't require text. Just be careful of cultural bias.
10. Empower your user with mobile interfaces that accommodate to their skills.  Your app should adapt with a learning process progression so that users can do things faster once they understand the basics. Let go of the hand holding and give them shortcuts so that the app alters itself to a user's comfortable experience.

Take notice of some of the best mobile interactions you've experienced as wells as the poor ones.  Think about the apps you interact with daily on your device and how you engage with them.  As a writing exercise list them out.