This post originally appeared on O’Reilly Radar (“Open Question: What needs to happen for tablets to replace laptops?“). It’s republished with permission.

By Mac Slocum

I’ve owned an iPad since you could own an iPad. I upgraded from iPad 1 to iPad 2 because the thinner form factor, faster response and Smart Cover were too hard to resist. So, I suppose you could say I’m a fan — both of the iPad itself and the overall tablet experience it provides.

But here’s the thing: I now often carry a tablet and a laptop and a smartphone. The dream of one device to rule them all has morphed into a hazy vision of three devices that are all somehow necessary (tablet for browsing/consuming, laptop for real work, phone for on-the-go updates/camera — how did it come to this?).

Now, I know there are people out there who can bend a tablet to their will. I don’t have that super power. “Inputting” on my tablet is an exercise in hunt-and-peck futility. More often than not I delay long email responses and other typing-intensive work until I’m stationed in front of a proper computer. This is why my tablet experience, in its current form, can never replace my laptop experience.

I bring all this up because participants in a recent back-channel email thread did something really interesting: They ignored the question of where tablets fit in now and instead examined the specific features they would need before tablets could replace their laptops. The focus was shifted from how tablets currently work to how they should work.

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This post originally appeared on O’Reilly Radar (“Visualization deconstructed: Why animated geospatial data works“). It’s republished with permission.

By Andy Kirk

In this, my first Visualization Deconstructed post, I’m expanding the scope to examine one of the most popular contemporary visualization techniques: animation of geospatial data over time.

The beauty of photo versus the wonder of film

In a previous post, Sebastien Pierre provided some excellent analysis about the illuminating visualization produced by Paul Butler, which examined the relationships between Facebook users around the world.

Here, we saw the intricate beauty that comes from a designer who finds the sweet spot of insightful effectiveness and aesthetic elegance. This accomplishment is all the more impressive when demonstrated through a static visualization.

Sebastien shared a great quote, attributed to Paul Butler, which read: “Visualizing data is like photography. Instead of starting with a blank canvas, you manipulate the lens used to present the data from a certain angle.”

A static visualization is a single shot from this metaphorical camera: a carefully conceived, arranged and executed vision which, at its best, manages to portray the motion of a story without the deployment of movement.

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This post originally appeared on O’Reilly Radar (“Why indoor navigation is so hard“). It’s republished with permission.

By Nick Farina

Remember the days before you could pull your smartphone out of your pocket and get instant directions from your current location to anywhere in the world? It’s kind of foggy for me, too.

In fact, I’m so used to relying on my smartphone that I feel increasingly flustered when wandering the aisles of Costco, locating the elephant house at the zoo, or searching for decent food at the airport. Shouldn’t my magical pocket computer help me with this, too?

The answer is “yes,” of course. But there are challenges to implementing indoor navigation today.

User interface

The maps app on your smartphone has one primary concern: getting you from 106 Main Street to 301 Sunny Lane, or from work to home, or from home to Taco Bell. Why are you going to Taco Bell and what percentage of your taco beef will be meat filler? The app doesn’t need to know. Thus, the typical interface for a smartphone maps app is a big map and a search box.

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This post originally appeared on O’Reilly Radar (“Linking in ebooks: How much is too much?“). It’s republished with permission.

By Peter Meyers

This is part of an ongoing series related to Peter Meyers’ project “Breaking the Page: Transforming Books and the Reading Experience.” We’ll be featuring additional material in the weeks ahead. (Note: This post originally appeared on A New Kind of Book. It’s republished with permission.)

Hyperlinks often get marquee billing as one of ebooks’ main advantages over print: an easy way to expand the scope and depth of any document, enriching it — and its readers — with targeted additions. I’ve participated in plenty of ebook development projects in which links are regarded as a kind of bare minimum, enhancement no-brainer. But do hyperlinks always help? Does their presence ever hurt the reading experience? No and sometimes. Let me take a crack at breaking down the downside of linking and review a few alternatives.

Defensive linking

Some links read, to me at least, like a kind of defensive gesture on the part of the writer. As proof that he really knows what he’s talking about and is ready to share notes and research to bolster the authority his writing aspires to. But consider how distracting a link-laden sentence like that is. Even when not followed, a link poses a concentration-disrupting challenge: Should I click it? I wonder where it leads to … I think writers (on the web, as much as in ebooks) need to do a careful cost/benefit analysis before adding any link. Is the journey you’re sending readers on really worth the destination and the disruption?

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This post originally appeared on O’Reilly Radar (“The making of a “minimum awesome product”“). It’s republished with permission.

By Joe Wikert

This post is part of the TOC podcast series, which we’ll be featuring here on Radar in the coming months. You can also subscribe to the free TOC podcast through iTunes.

When the Flipboard iPad app first arrived, it helped us to look at the tablet user interface in a whole new way. Suddenly, those ugly RSS feeds became beautiful, and they could be navigated alongside Twitter and Facebook streams. Flipboard’s co-founder, Evan Doll (@edog1203), recently sat down with me to talk about how the app was designed and where it might be heading. Key highlights from the full video interview (below) include:

• A key to design at Apple: Every time you present the user with a non-essential decision to make, you have failed as a designer. [Discussed at the 1:00 mark]
• Steve Jobs and user interface design: All those rumors are true. Steve Jobs has indeed played a significant role in even the tiniest of user interface design decisions. [Discussed at 1:20]
• Exceeding customer expectations: Focus less on producing a “minimum viable product” and more on making it a “minimum awesome product.” [Discussed at 2:28]

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