Iphone Interface

For this weeks’ blog post, we examined a critique of the iPhone interface by Edward Tufte. He discusses the many successes and occasional flaws of the interface. I’ll start with the many successes. Initially, the iPhone interface design allows for easy comprehension and manipulation of large amounts of information. For example, the photo album on the iPhone presents a large quantity of photos in a very organized and easily navigable format. The touchscreen allows for quick searching and selection of particular photos. Once the photo is selected, the photo fills the screen with what Tufte calls minimal computer generated debris. This would include any external navigation provided by the interface itself. Having a screen as small as the iPhone requires carefully thought out debris to maximize usability and UX. The mobile operating system they created has truly revolutionized the way we think about user interfaces. They created a design that is amazingly intuitive and simple to use.

The user interface isn’t perfect, and can always be improved, which is why Apple updates it frequently. One of Tuftes’ complaints deals with the standard applications that don’t utilize the impressive image-level resolution.  He uses the stocks application to show the cartoony look of it, whereas using image-level resolution would greatly increase user experience.  The design is simple, but might just be too simple. The app doesn’t utilize the interfaces’ ability to convey vast amounts of information. The implementation of charts and tables could be utilized to improve the interface. Even with it’s occasional flaws, the iOS on the iPhone is truly a revolutionary product, and I think it doesn’t really have a competitor when it comes to usability.