Designing Gestural Interfaces: Touchscreens and Interactive Devices

This review is from: Designing Gestural Interfaces: Touchscreens and Interactive Devices (Paperback)


There is not one line of code in this book. This text is about how gestures in the air and on surfaces can replace or augment the commands given by mice, keypads, and stylii. It is a broad overview, and contains few concrete details about how you would actually implement such systems in detail. For example, there is no "start to finish" design that is so common in O'Reilly books of this type. The author mainly just goes through what it takes to get your thoughts organized in such a way to design such systems. Each chapter has some very good "further reading" recommendations. You'll come away from this book knowing the issues involved in designing gestural interfaces, but not much more. I guess I was just expecting something meatier. For something meatier but a bit older I would recommend Physical Computing: Sensing and Controlling the Physical World with Computers. The table of contents for this book is not yet included in the product description, so I do that next:



Chapter 1. Introducing Interactive Gestures

Section 1.1. TAP IS THE NEW CLICK

Section 1.2. DIRECT VERSUS INDIRECT MANIPULATION

Section 1.3. A BRIEF HISTORY OF GESTURAL INTERFACES

Section 1.4. THE MECHANICS OF TOUCHSCREENS AND GESTURAL CONTROLLERS

Section 1.5. DESIGNING INTERACTIVE GESTURES: THE BASICS

Section 1.6. DETERMINING THE APPROPRIATE GESTURE

Section 1.7. FOR FURTHER READING

Chapter 2. Designing for the Human Body

Section 2.1. BASIC KINESIOLOGY

Section 2.2. THE ERGONOMICS OF INTERACTIVE GESTURES

Section 2.3. THE ERGONOMICS OF MOTION

Section 2.4. DESIGNING TOUCH TARGETS

Section 2.5. FOR FURTHER READING

Chapter 3. Patterns for Touchscreens and Interactive Surfaces

Section 3.1. HOW TO USE PATTERNS

Section 3.2. TAP TO OPEN/ACTIVATE

Section 3.3. TAP TO SELECT

Section 3.4. DRAG TO MOVE OBJECT

Section 3.5. SLIDE TO SCROLL

Section 3.6. SPIN TO SCROLL

Section 3.7. SLIDE AND HOLD FOR CONTINUOUS SCROLL

Section 3.8. FLICK TO NUDGE

Section 3.9. FLING TO SCROLL

Section 3.10. TAP TO STOP

Section 3.11. PINCH TO SHRINK AND SPREAD TO ENLARGE

Section 3.12. TWO FINGERS TO SCROLL

Section 3.13. GHOST FINGERS

Chapter 4. Patterns for Free-Form Interactive Gestures

Section 4.1. PROXIMITY ACTIVATES/DEACTIVATES

Section 4.2. MOVE BODY TO ACTIVATE

Section 4.3. POINT TO SELECT/ACTIVATE

Section 4.4. WAVE TO ACTIVATE

Section 4.5. PLACE HANDS INSIDE TO ACTIVATE

Section 4.6. ROTATE TO CHANGE STATE

Section 4.7. STEP TO ACTIVATE

Section 4.8. SHAKE TO CHANGE

Section 4.9. TILT TO MOVE

Chapter 5. Documenting Interactive Gestures

Section 5.1. WHY DOCUMENT ANYTHING?

Section 5.2. EXISTING MOVEMENT NOTATION SYSTEMS

Section 5.3. DOCUMENTING GESTURES IN INTERACTIVE SYSTEMS

Section 5.4. FOR FURTHER READING

Chapter 6. Prototyping Interactive Gestures

Section 6.1. FAKING IT: LOW-FIDELITY PROTOTYPES

Section 6.2. HIGH-FIDELITY PROTOTYPES

Section 6.3. TESTING PROTOTYPES

Section 6.4. PROTOTYPING RESOURCES

Section 6.5. FOR FURTHER READING

Chapter 7. Communicating Interactive Gestures

Section 7.1. THREE ZONES OF ENGAGEMENT

Section 7.2. METHODS OF COMMUNICATING INTERACTIVE GESTURES

Section 7.3. FOR FURTHER READING

Chapter 8. THE FUTURE OF INTERACTIVE GESTURES

Section 8.1. FUTURE TRENDS

Section 8.2. TOWARD STANDARDS

Section 8.3. THE ETHICS OF GESTURES

Section 8.4. FOR FURTHER READING

Appendix A. A Palette of Human Gestures and Movements

Section A.1. GESTURES FOR TOUCHSCREENS

Section A.2. GESTURES FOR FREE-FORM SYSTEMS

Section A.3. FOR FURTHER READING