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The first practical guide for designing touch based interfaces... at your fingertips

Table of Contents

Part I: Introduction



Introduction
The Natural User Interface
Ecological Niche: Computing and the Social Environment & Ways of Working
Part II: Design Ethos of NUI

Less is More
Contextual Environments
Spatial
Social
Seamless
Super Real
Scaffolding
User Differentiation
Part III: New Technologies: Understanding & Technological Artefacts

The State-Model of Input Devices
Fat Fingers
No Touch Left Behind
Touch vs. In-Air Gestures
Part IV: Creating an Interaction Language

MDA Revisited
New Primitives
Anatomy of a Gesture
Makes a good Gesture Language
Self-Revealing Gestures
Mode and Flow of a Gesture System
Part V: No such thing as Touch

Know your platform: Vision, Resistive, Capacitive, etc.
The Fundamentals Have to Work
Number of Contacts
Contact Data: Shape, Pressure, and Hover
Vertical/Horizontal/Mobile
Part VI: Process: How do You Get There?

NUI UDI (User Defined Interface) and the Myth of the ‘Natural Gesture Set’.
False Recognition
RITE With a Purpose
Part VII: Conclusion

Conclusion: A word About Engineering

About the Author

Daniel Wigdor is an Assistant Professor of computer science at the University of Toronto. Before joining U of T, he worked at Microsoft in nearly a dozen different roles, among them serving as the User Experience Architect of the Microsoft Surface product, and as a cross company expert in the creation of Natural User Interfaces. Before joining Microsoft, he previously conducted research in advanced user interfaces and devices at Mitsubishi Electric Research Labs, and at the Initiative in Innovative Computing at Harvard University. He is also co-founder of Iota Wireless, a company dedicated to the commercialization of NUI technologies for mobile phones. Daniel’s work has been described in dozens of publications in leading international conferences, journals, and books. His is the recipient of a Wolfond Fellowship and an ACM Best Paper Award. Dennis Wixon is currently Discipline Lead for Microsoft US BPD. Prior to this role he was the head of research for Microsoft Surface, and has also managed research teams at Microsoft Game Studies, and MSN/Home Products. Before joining Microsoft, Dennis managed the usability team at Digital Equipment Corporation, where a number of important usability methods such as Usability Engineering and Contextual Inquiry were developed. Dennis has been an active member of the user-research community for over 25 years. He co-chaired CHI 2002 served as Vice President for Conferences for ACM SIGCHI. Dennis has co-authored over sixty articles, book chapters and presentations on research methods and theory. He is an adjunct Full Professor in the Human Centered Design and Engineering Department at University of Washington and co-edited with Dr. Judy Ramey the book Field Methods Case Book for Software Design. Dennis holds a Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Clark University.

Reviews

"Brave Nui World by Daniel Wigdor and Dennis Wixon is a must read for anyone involved in creating compelling user interfaces using modern technology and who, after testing, say 'Why didn't that design work the way it was intended?' To novices in the field, it will read as a how-to guide. For seasoned designers, it reads like a novel where you suspect the outcome but there is usually a twist in the plot, giving you that extra idea to think again. I genuinely enjoyed it and I am not likely to put it away soon."-Paul Neervoort, Lead User Experience Design, Philips Design "A good grounding framework that immediately kindles ideas of how best to use NUI. Based on the developments of the past few decades, it provides solid foundations of NUI and develops these with the use of specific examples.While this isn't a cookbook, it does provide clear thematic guidance on how to make your NUI experience excel. The book covers basic through to advanced concepts in a very clear way. Good for reference, but even better if you read it cover to cover - you will grow immeasurably."--Dylan Evans, Principal Usability Consultant, Veluuria "Interfaces are moving beyond our usual computers and into many facets of our lives. The way we design these interfaces is changing too. Brave NUI World helps highlight the new considerations you will need when designing for NUIs."--Daniel Naumann, User Experience Designer "Wigdor and Wixon, both researchers working on the Microsoft Surface project, present this conceptual design guide for creating natural user interfaces (NUI) for next generation computer hardware. Covering technologies such as the Surface and other multi-touch and gestural devices, the authors discuss a variety of interface techniques and problems noting each issue's compliance with NUI guiding principles and recommending ways in which new development could more closely adhere to the NUI standards. The work includes numerous illustrations and tables."--Reference and Research Book News "From a User Experience design perspective, touch and gestural interfaces are relatively new and there is a lot to be learnt. A good book to get your feet wet is Brave NUI World: Designing Natural User Interfaces for Touch and Gesture by Daniel Wigdor, Dennis Wixon.The style is more text-bookish, but this book promises to be a valuable reference guide for those designing for touch and gestures."--The Great Remix.com