Oct 12, 2015
Apple Watch Complications and Zero States
Like most Apple Watch users I was inclined about the possibilites of new app complications in watchOS 2. A few new complications have already found their way onto my watch and are really starting to change the way I use my watch. For example Omnifocus has a useful widget that shows me how many of my todo items are currently due, which makes the Apple Watch my primary device to see upcoming tasks for today.
However the more complications I try out, the more one problem becomes apparent. What happens, when you reach an “complication zero state”, when a complication stops showing any data, as there is no more data to show for today, maybe even longer. For example Fantastical, similar to the built in calendar complication, shows upcoming events for today, but as soon as the last event is finished, only displays a meaningless message, that today I have no more events and can start to have fun. Although a fair approach to this state, it sometimes is also misleading. Just because I have no events in my calendar anymore, doesn’t mean I don’t have appointments, which I don’t keep track off, for example a regular workday. Another example for the “complication zero state” happens, when I have no due items in Omnifocus. In this case Omnifocus just shows a 0, which is quite a waste of screen estate. Even the famous activity circles, loose their value as soon as you close the last of them.
There are of course ways to make a complication meaningful, even after such events occur however I think their might be an even better approach for the watch. I call this feature stacked complications for now, although somebody might come up with a better name. What I would envision is the possibilty for the user to choose multiple complications, that share the same area on the watchface. As a user you could prioritise these complications and so, whenever one complication reaches it’s “zero state”, the next complication could take over.
Let’s say for example I have three complications that I would like to circle through: Scores of my favourite sports team, my daily calendar and my activity stats, sorted in this order. Whenever a game is coming up of my team, my complication would show me the start of the game a few hours in advance, the game stats while the game is going on and the results for a few hours afterwards. After the game stops, the calendar complication takes over and shows me my upcoming events. And whenever I have no upcoming events on a given day, the activity complication takes over and shows me, how far I’m away from reaching my daily activity goal. Maybe the calendar could be even smarter and only come up, if I have an event in the next few hours. It’s more than enough that I know I have tickets for a theater play 3 hours in advance, I don’t need to know about this, immediately after I put on my watch in the morning. Of course the recently introduced time travel feature could be adapted to this as well and get even more useful, than it is right now.
For developers this would mean that they have to design explicit “zero states”, but I think most developers have a fairly good Idea of when a complication is useful, and when it is not (apart of course from being a quick launcher into the app). Users would of course need a good way to choose these complications, but I think if you just add additional complication screens in the watchface setup, you already have a decently working solution.
Of course Apple is famously known for keeping things as simple as possible. However I think with a feature similar to the one I proposed here many users would get even more use out of their new gadget.
