Latest trends in User Interfaces
When I say User Interfaces, I think you are expecting me to talk about web interfaces or mobile interfaces. But truth is, user interfaces is a broader concept than that.
User Interfaces are mechanisms that humans can effectively interact with machines.
Most common ones we see is a mouse click or keyboard input. But the time of mouse and keyboard will be long gone by the next decade. So we will today talk about the emerging new technologies of user interfaces such as,
- Motion Sense
- Voice User Interfaces
- Virtual Reality
- Augmented Reality
- Mixed Reality
So are you interested? (You should be!) This whole discussion will sound like straight out of the movie Iron Man :P
Motion Sense
One of the most recent talks or trends in UI & UX world is the gesture-based input. With the launch of new Google Pixel 4, which has a tiny radar chip inside it, gesture interfaces become the talk of the time. Google Pixel 4 allows you to swipe or wave your hand in front of it, to get many things done. Nevertheless, most importantly, Motion Sense is designed to detect your presence. It knows if you’re there.
Of course, is the same technology that has been used for decades to detect planes and other large objects. We’ve developed a miniature version located at the top of Pixel 4 that senses small motions around the phone, combining unique software algorithms with the advanced hardware sensor, so it can recognize gestures and detect when you’re nearby. — Google
Motion Sense features to allow you to skip songs, snooze alarms, and silence phone calls, just by waving your hand.
Motion Sense has essentially three types of interactions, according to Brandon Barbello, Pixel product manager at Google such as,
Presence - The Project Soli radar chip inside the Pixel 4 creates a small bubble of awareness around the phone when it’s sitting on a table. It just keeps an eye out to ensure we’re nearby and turns off the always-on display if you’re not.
Reach - The phone just pays attention to see if We’re reaching for it and then quickly turns on the screen and activates the face unlock sensors. If an alarm or ringtone is going, the phone automatically quiets down a bit when it seems we’re reaching for it.
Gestures - This is were actual gestures are coming. There are more things we can do. For example, We can give it a quick wave to dismiss those calls or snooze alarms. We can also swipe left or right if music is playing to go forward or back.
Google is limiting what Motion Sense can do because it is creating an entirely new interaction language, and it needs to limit the vocabulary at the beginning. Otherwise, it would be overwhelming — or at least super annoying.
Google even learned that we don’t actually have a common language for what “swipe left” and “swipe right” mean. Different people move their hands in different directions depending on their mental model of whether the direction refers to their hand or the thing they’re virtually interacting with. Google ended up having to put a preference setting in for those who wanted to flip the defaults.
If you talk about usability provided by this new chip can be simply answered by asking one question
Do i need my phone to wake up a half-second before I touch it, saving me a tap on the screen.?
Clearly people want to remove a small amount of friction when they move forward with technology. So It’s a clear winner.
And besides, you can always use your phone with dirty or wet hands, because you are not going to touch the phone physically.
Even though I took the Google Pixel 4 as the best example. There are also many other motion-based systems for various different use cases like smart homes, automatic photo taking etc. Many other use cases are being explored by the research which is carried out all over the world.
AI integrated VOICE User Interfaces
In the years to come, AI technology will continue towards perfection. This should lead to a smooth and consistent interaction, Surveys saying voice will perform an expected 50% of all search engine queries.
Chatbots and communicating interfaces have also trending now. Machine learning has improved, making chatbots smarter. Now, many websites and apps have started using voice communication for enhanced user experience. This includes Google’s autosuggestion, smart home voice user interfaces like Google Home or Amazon’s Alexa, virtual assistants such as Apple’s Siri, and Microsoft’s Cortona.
Researches include speech to text, text to speech, QnA and some researches on knowledge graph and more NLP stuff. Many Research papers for the domain can be accessed here.
Looking at the usability aspects, voice interfaces are way easier to use than gesture or other interfaces. (Traditional interfaces can’t even come to compete). You will be wondering why is that. The reason is, voice or the talking is the most prefered human interaction methodology. We can do it even without paying much attention to it, while doing other work. Also unlike most of the Extended Reality applications, you don’t need wearable devices for this.
Now moving on to the next topic, let's talk about an Extended Reality variation, Virtual Reality.
Virtual Reality
Virtual reality plays a strong role in UI trends and it’s not going away. We could call it the internet of experiences because of the effect that it has on users.
Recently New Virtual Reality Interface Enables “Touch” Across Long Distances. The Lightweight, flexible patch conveys a tactile sensation directly to the skin
Research says
A woman sits at a computer, video chatting with her young son while she gently pats an interface on a separate screen. In response, a wireless patch on the child’s back vibrates in a pattern that matches his mother’s fingers, allowing him to “feel” her physical touch.
The skin machine consists of a soft, lightweight sheet of electronics that sticks to the body. It uses a combination of pressure, vibration and motion to simulate the sense of touch for users.
Another trend VR mostly famous for is Gaming. It enhances much experience.
There are many more applications of VR in different sorts of domains like education, medicine, military, gaming, etc. and various researches were carried out with respect to those domains.
Talking about the usability aspect, there are pluses and minuses both for these interfaces. Plus points include the immersive experience they provide, high discoverability (Sometimes it may depend on the complexity of the application.), and active feedback. On the minus side, we need to use appropriate gadgets and we need to concentrate on it fully unlike voice interfaces. (Maybe in future these may change). Another major point to notice is the motion sickness aspect of VR usability. Developers should be extra careful to stick to standards while developing VR applications because of this reason.
Let’s move on to another aspect of Extended Reality, that is Augmented Reality.
Augmented Reality
Designers will need to go beyond screen-only interfaces to include physical interactions. Augmented Reality has ushered in a new era in user interface design, a new way of thinking.
In 2019, web design trends will all involve thinking outside the box, or rather, the grid. We need to forget UI fixed to screens. Instead, we should emphasize interactions which feel like they take place within the real-world environment.
Google and Apple have already introduced their own AR development platforms, ARCore and AEKit, that blend the physical and digital worlds.
AR UI can have different approaches:
- Object-related, real-world objects that have tethered interaction;
- Fixed to screen space, where the user has to position the camera in a specific way;
- Real-world related, which uses the surrounding physical world.
Therefore, we must carefully think through the context and function of AR experience.
Some of the famous implementations of Augmented Reality includes, Pokémon Game, FaceApp, Instagram/Facebook/SnapChat filters, etc. The researches are carried out to exploit possibilities of AR applications in all main domains like education, medicine, military, etc. and those research are lead by USA, Japan, China and Europe.
Looking at the usability aspects, similar to the VR interfaces, AR also have the impressive capability to provide immersive applications. On the other hand, there is no motion sickness like VR.
Now let's move on to the final aspect of Extended Reality.
MIXED Reality
A mixed-reality environment goes a step beyond augmented reality because users can interact in real-time with virtual objects that are placed within the real world. These virtual items will respond and react to users as if they were actual objects.
In order to experience mixed reality, an MR headset is used. MR headsets offer a holographic experience through translucent glasses or an immersive experience. Some mixed reality products that are currently available include Microsoft’s HoloLens, Acer Windows Mixed Reality, Lenovo Explorer, and Samsung Odyssey.
It’s the gesture/gaze/voice recognition technology through a pair of motion controllers or through the MR headset that helps deliver a believable mixed-reality experience. It takes a lot more processing power to enable a mixed-reality experience than it does for a virtual or augmented reality experience. But it’s experience is also a few steps ahead of the others.
In my opinion, Mixed reality is the real future of user interfaces. Why I said that is because it can exploit many human activities, like speaking, looking, gesture and some systems can even simulate touch. Maybe in future, they may be able to simulate smell as well.
If you are mixed up about different between VR, AR and MR, check out the bellow video:
So that’s it for today. I hope it is an interesting discussion. In the next decade, don’t be surprised if you see Iron Man’s J.A.R.V.I.S in one of the offices you step into, because that is where the technology is leading us into.
Leave a comment below, if you have new additions to this trend list! All criticisms and arguments are warmly welcome!
See you in another article! Chao!!
