Started going through the iPhone Human Interface Guidelines lately on the 40 minutes bus ride to work in the morning. It’s really well written and reading it word for word is actually quite enjoyable. Here are a few parts I’ve highlighted from the first part:
- When in doubt, make it simple.
- … apply the 80-20 rule to the design of your application. Estimate that the largest percentage of users (at least 80 percent) will use a very limited number of features in an application, while only a small percentage (no more than 20 percent) will use all the features.
- Note how elements at the top of each screen make it easy for users to know both their current and previous location in the application.(a very important cue that I find missing in a lot of custom interface applications)
- A great user interface follows human interface design principles that are based on the way people—users—think and work, not on the capabilities of the device.
- … a good product definition statement doesn’t just focus on features, it also describes the intended audience
- It’s especially important to eliminate those elements that don’t support the product definition statement, because iPhone applications have no room to spare for functionality that isn’t focused on the main task.
