I posted the other day about a multi-touch gesture for duplicating an object, and Debra linked me to this Gesture Reference Guide. There’s a duplicate gesture described in the PDF but I’m not sure I understand or agree with the way it would work. Here it is:
My issues with this idea are that a) it doesn’t seem natural and b) it sounds like it would interfere with other gestures, like selecting more than one object, or even tapping two things sequentially — the tapper shouldn’t have to worry about releasing her first finger before tapping something else. I don’t see it listed as being implemented on any of the devices, so I guess it’s just Luke’s idea for the gesture.
Are there any standards out there for creating a copy (eg. duplicating) of an object using multi-touch? I couldn’t find any with a quick search, so I mocked up a possibility.
The first one is for when you simply want to create a copy of an object. This is analogous to right clicking and choosing “Duplicate” (in OS X).
The second is the same as dragging and object and holding the option key, which creates a duplicate in the drag location (either elsewhere on the desktop, or into a new folder). The first steps are the same (press for a second to get the plus circle), but then instead of tapping the circle, the user drags it and it morphs into a shadow of the object.
Is this natural? Discoverable? Unobtrusive? Does it conflict with other gestures?
Next?
3 years ago
Made this the other week. Maybe you can help me complete it?
I’ve been reading through Search Patterns and was reminded of 37signals’ “E-commerce Search Report” (now a free download), way back from 2003.
Now I’m wondering what the next book in this style is going to be. Information Architecture was published in 1998 and then 2002, Ambient Findability in 2005, and now Search Patterns in 2010. My best guess is Ubiquitous Computing (the bumblebee book) which discusses everything as location-aware, embedded systems (in cars, houses, people), constant inter-device communication, the “always-on” mentality, and zero-effort computing (results before or without asking for them).
Now of course books like this have been written, but my guess is that the concept will become more popular and public and that O’Reilly will publish a book about it.
What do you think is next?
I went to a Google info session today and we talked about calendars for part of it. Specifically, we talked about getting people to switch from a paper calendar to an online one (like Google Calendar but the exact variant isn’t really important). While my main calendar is online, there are some affordances of a physical calendar that I miss.
One is being able to track things on a calendar, simply by making little marks in the corners. Maybe I’ll put a “W” in the corner for days I work out, or jot my weight next to days I weigh myself, or put stars on days that were really good. My calendar becomes a sort of personal history for me. This also works for days in the future; sometimes I don’t need an entire rectangle and text to remind myself of something, I just want to draw a red box around the day or highlight days that I’m excited for.
Speaking of excitement: I can’t express any sort of emotion or priority in my events online. My personal events are green and my classes are blue, but that’s as much as a difference as I can have. On paper I can make things bold or big or draw stars around them; I can express and embed myself in the calendar. Then I can see at a glance what is important to me alongside my recurring and less exciting events simply pencilled in each square.
But what about things that don’t fit in a single square? My friend is visiting for a few days, or even a few weeks. Should I make an event that spans the whole period and be reminded that it’s happening at the top of each box every day? On my physical calendar I can write on the day he’s coming and draw a thin line at the bottom until the day he leaves. It’s my custom solution that doesn’t fit neatly into the boxes and text fields of my web browser.
I imagine that these shortcomings of online calendars are limiting their usefulness and preventing those who use paper from making the switch.
Do you calendar online? On paper? What differences do you see?
