Skype, Remember The Milk, Interface Design That Makes You Smile
I’ve been using Skype more lately – aside from being the easiest way to turn long-distance conversations into podcasts it’s a decent instant messaging tool.
My favorite part of Skype’s IM tool is the smiley button. Its placement in the border between the chat pane and the compose box always makes it look like the person you’re talking to just smiled at you.
That’s nice.
Makes me smile back. Every time I glance at it. Whether or not there’s a smiley in the chat pane – I’m smiling, and I think that makes for a happier exchange. In the same way people can hear if you’re smiling on the phone.
This morning I signed up to check out Remember the Milk. Their sign-up process has persistent messaging for form field validation like email, password, username, etc. Though the powers of AJAX, it updates as you type. That real-time response made the annoyance of another login/pass form nearly a joy.
8 Comments
I signed up just to see the process. I like the check that shows up as you type, very slick.
Also, you have the link to rememberthemilk.com wrong. Google found it quick enough for me though
This reminds me of a “task list” pet peeve I have.. It would be nice if lists made an effort to understand priority levels. You can change the importance priority- but it doesn’t matter. Or more to the point, there are reminders that are kind of pointless to be reminded of if you miss it.. “Jessica Alba will be at the corner bar at 9:00 PM on Friday” does no good once Saturday rolls around. Why can’t we set an appointment to disappear or “go away” once the time has passed? I hate coming back from vacation and opening Outlook to find 32 messages of junk that I don’t care about any more “Reminder: Staff meeting! 2days overdue”
Thanks Eddie, I fixed the link.
I’m amazed at the simplicity, while perplexed at some of the execution. Error Messaging presenting itself before i’ve finished typing my verification of password saying it’s invalid seems awkward. People expect systems to be “intelligent”, this could be confusing for lesser experienced users.
Otherwise, I think uses of Ajax like this should be implimented more often. However, It will be a long time before major companies gain enough skills internally to impliment beautiful interaction like this.
Mark,
I felt the same way. I half wondered if there should be a slight pause before it starts sending feedback… even a second delay would be better.
I’m not sure the best way to do that though.
“Error Messaging presenting itself before i’ve finished typing my verification of password saying it’s invalid seems awkward. ”
It is. At first. But once you get the hang of it (like Firefox’s search pane) you realize how great it is.
But, remember, AJAX isn’t about better interaction…it’s about being Web 2.0 and getting bought by Yahoo or Google. ;o)
Darrel,
I think there is a fine granularity of difference here.. not much, but worth a quick mention.
The difference is that search panes help ween the choices down.. you go from everything down to few*.. where as with form validation, you are going from ERROR/INVALID to “Check”
In other words, even though you expect:
1)to have many items to search through AND
2)an empty field is invalid/unacceptable
One activity is a “hunt” while the other is a boolean, ok or not ok. I’m not sure how most people come up with passwords, but this would only flow nicely if you had a single “root” password that you built on to make it more complex (or acceptable)
That said.. I do agree with your AJAX take
*assuming Firefox search is like Opera’s quick find
I’ve got AJAX, Mr. Clean, and some Windex in my kitchen – when can I expect the call from Yahoo?
Garrick- You can expect a call from Yahoo as soon as you label it Web 3.0. Unfortunately I’ve already Panteted the system for combining ajax, DHTML, and Windex. You can start paying royalties whenever you’d like.
However the new Microsoft (Google) will sue me as they will have applied for the pantent after I have and win without prior art.