Android Design Growing Up
I remember when I first saw the YouTube video introducing Android 3.0 Honeycomb in early 2011:
I thought it looked amazing. But at that time apps for Android was generally not pretty. There were exceptions, of course. Little did I know Matias Duarte & co at Google was hard at work with Holo and all the guidelines that eventually ended up on the Android Developer site, and finally released with Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich:
Maybe I just didn’t know where to look, didn’t pay enough attention or was not clever enough to understand what the design/UI/UX guys was talking about back then, but for me it’s pretty damn cool to look at how much focus these things get today compared to back then. How well Google has succeeding in allowing developers to build awesome apps.
Communities
What I really like is Google+ Communities. Take a look at a place like Android Designers where designers talk about and show GUI details of their current projects.
I LOVE THIS!
Screenshots and discussions on improvements; it has really inspired me to think about the UI/UX. And for once I feel comfortable with the APIs to actually implement things.
Android Design in Action
Run by Roman Nurik — with friends — Android Design in Action (ADiA) is a live show focusing on designing Android, with each show having a different theme. One good video is this one, as Paul Burke said:
Every aspiring/novice Android designer should watch this video.
If you missed yesterday’s “Android Design in Action,” you missed, what I would consider, the single-most useful beginners’ guide to Android app design.
Watch as a stale, Gingerbread-era app is transformed to a clean, responsive, guideline-inspired Holo beauty, with just a few fundamental changes. You don’t need an eye for design to implement these, and it can make a world of difference.
For Future Design
I have always loved good design and well thought out user experiences. And it’s fascinating to see how we’ve moved from ugly apps and bad user experiences to Holo and an almost minimalistic (dare I say Swedish/Japanese) approach to design. Things will only get better.
(Originally published 2013–01–16)
