I’ve been playing around with a closed beta version of Mouseflow during the last week. It tracks visitors’ movements on a website and lets you play them back, exactly as they were performed.

Think of it as a think aloud test without the sound.

My real-world problem
I wondered if people actually read the text paragraphs in my previous blog post comparing  iPhone and Windows Phone – or if they were just looking at the photos (they read it, thankfully).

A few highlights from this 21 mins session with a user from India, 5 timezones away follows after the video

• 0:03 The user quickly scans the full article
• 0:15 Goes on reading the second paragraph from the bottom
• 0:37 Finds it interesting enough to scroll to the top
• 0:46 Begins “reading” with with the mouse pointer. This is an interesting and very frequent pattern. I guess we all do this; use the mouse for no particular reason while reading text.
• 2:42 The user has now finished reading the article.
• 4:05 Begins clicking words. I’m not sure if this is in hoping they’re links, but I don’t think so rather than merely keeping the hands busy. Also, there’s a chance that this might be because they’re selecting and copying text.

And another surprising fact? This user didn’t even as much as take a glimpse of the comments. It’s as if the blog metadata section says “nothing more to see here”.

Giving away 100 invites
The good people at Mouseflow gave me 100 invites to give to whomever comes first. The invite is good for 10,000 free recordings, and you will be asked to complete an online survey at one point.

Create your account here and use this invite token: 3RUS4E

Inspired by this post about information density in the interfaces of the two phones, I decided to compare the two in more detail. I may do a similar 360 phone comparison, as it is, in some points, similar to the Windows one.

The lock screen is up first, and a first example of the elimination of what Tufte would call interface debris. No controls here.

To get unlock a Windows phone, simply slide the screensaver upwards with your thumb. The phone is in there, sitting behind the screensaver image.

I remember when I first saw the iPhone and thought “oh, finally, no more remembering obscure keyboard patterns to open a phone”. Seeing the Windows unlock mechanism, well, caused a similar response.

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To see the latest version of the below tips, jump on this Wave.

First impressions

• It’s thin and light
• The screen is crispier than I hoped
• Page turns are quicker than on my Sony Reader
• The cursor’s ghost-like effect compensates for the display’s low responsiveness

Non-US issues

• Kindle store checks for country before completing purchase. Users who change their address to a US one, will not be able to purchase without contacting the Kindle customer service.
• There are more items in the US store.
• (the browser now works with a Danish account!)

Kindle-friendly websites

• Most mobile-optimized sites are Kindle-friendly.
• For a start page linking to longer, Kindle-friendly articles, try www.mortenjust.com/kindle
• To detect a kindle, look for “Kindle” in the user_agent (full string is Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; Linux 2.6.22) NetFront/3.4 Kinde/2.1 (screen 600×800)

Feeds

• KRead accepts a feed URL and displays that feed, Kindle optimised
• Feedbooks creates an actual Kindle book with the contents of the feed(s), and even allows updating from within the book
• Instapaper offers sending directly by email to your Kindle when you add to Instapaper. Downside is that Amazon charges 1 USD for non-US transfers.

Desktop software

• Calibre converts almost everything to Kindle (and Sony, etc) format. It also transfers and enrich with meta data.
• Mobipocket Desktop 6.0 (and not older) also recognises the Kindle, however, Calibre is generally recommended
• Books can be transferred simply by dragging into the Documents folder when the Kindle is mounted.
• Rumors today (Oct 23) have it that Amazon is readying a desktop reader for the Mac

Free books

• Some books in the Kindle store are free. However, there’s a transfer fee outside of the US.
• Feedbooks offer a Kindle book with links to actually download and install free ebooks over the air.
• More free books to be found at Munseys
• Munseys also have a kindle-friendly mobile site with direct downloads

Paid books

• The amount of titles in Kindle store varies from country to country
• Users can download from other Mobipocket-compatible sites and read those books on Kindle. How and why.

Digitising paper books

• FineReader is quite impressive.
• An easy way to do this is with a digital camera, one spread at a time.
• Approximately 1 page per second.
• Some cameras can shoot in intervals.
• Combine that fact with a tripod and you’ll have a home digitising studio.

Amazon Web resources

• Media library. This is for all Amazon downloadable media, including Kindle
• kindle.amazon.com. Supposedly a place to manage bookmaks and notes (mine don’t show up)
• Manage my kindle. Lets users send media to other (owned) Kindles and iPhones.

iPhone app

• Not available yet in some countries, including Denmark
• Personal documents, magazines, newspapers and manually transferred books can not be sent to the iPhone app

Screensavers

• So far I haven’t seen two of the same. Are they stored online?
• Now I have. Don’t think they are.
• I’ve seen a custom screensaver extension

Emailing documents directly to the Kindle

• 1 USD. Emailing documents to (your.name)@kindle.com will send the converted document directly to the Kindle through Whispernet
• Free. Emailing them to (your.name)@free.kindle.com will reply to your email with the document. Use USB to transfer to Kindle.

Third party extensions

• Savory lets users convert from PDF to Kindle format on the device. It’s using the conversion engine from Calibre
• I read about one that allows changes tothe screensaver. URL?

Other web sites

• Kindle forums on Mobile Read
• Hacks and easter eggs
• Beginner’s guide to Kindle content

Speech

• I find the female voice sounds more natural

Troubleshooting

• If you get no connectivity bars, try resetting (switch and hold power slider until screen blanks, then turn on again)

I’ve had November’s US Wired for almost a week now. Here it is. I haven’t been able to find time to unwrap it.

However, I have been reading a lot on my Kindle. Obviously, it’s not about finding time more than finding convenience.

So maybe moving Wired into the Kindle would help? Strangely, Wired is not in the Kindle Store yet, so let’s take a look at their feed.

As expected, the magazine only provides excerpts in the feed. You’ll have to go to the site to see the full text. And the ads that pay for it.

But wait. I pay, too. There must be some way of getting the full articles into the feed, and then read that on the Kindle?

Yes. This is what the Pipe looks like.

Or, in short,

1. Take the feed

2. Change all links to point to the full article (instead of the paged ones)

3. Scrape the article

4. Add the full article to a new node in the feed

Voila:

With a feed holding all full articles, the only thing left is finding a convenient way to read it on the Kindle. I quickly hacked together a PHP script that parses the JSON from Pipes.

Not bad. But as with any digital body of text, I find myself thinking: “What am I looking at here? Two minutes? Twenty?”

This is where the magazine wins (again). By glancing, I get an impression of how long this article is. I can tell this one is long if they spend a full page on a portrait.

What would a size indicator look like on the Kindle?

The bar just below the headline gives a glance-friendly impression of how long this article is. The book overview on the Kindle’s home screen has something similar to this.

• Yahoo Pipes
• Wired Magazine, US
• Amazon Kindle, international edition (contains affiliate ID, so please buy!)

I just threw out several piles of letters, printouts, statements and bills. They’re now safe and searchable in the part of the cloud that is managed by Evernote

This means I can search, print and send them, from anywhere, from my Mac, my iPhone, or any computer with an internet connection.

It also means I got rid of the piles.

The printer

The “HP OfficeJet J4680 All-in-One Wireless Printer” is just 800 Danish Kroner (107 EUR or 160 USD, probably less in the US). It has fax (you know you want it), a brilliant inkjet printer and a scanner.

Scan to Evernote

When an organisation is old skool enough to send me something on paper, I remove the envelope, insert it into the printer depicted above, choose “Scan”, “Morten’s Mac Mini” (which is also serving as a media center, but that’s another story), then choose “Evernote”. It then eats the paper and adds it to my Evernote account. I didn’t touch a keyboard (unless I want to add tags or other meta data later on).

You can of course use your Macbook

The good

It’s easy and simple once set up. The device uses my wi-fi network, so I can hide it in a 220V equipped closet. It’s also a color printer. The feeder lets me scan multiple sheets in one go.

The bad

It can’t scan both sides at once. The feeder sometimes messes up. Evernote leaves the note open once added.

When adding a PDF, Evernote creates a new note for every page. I’m expecting Evernote to fix this bug anytime soon, and until then, I’m fine with just deleting the extra notes.

What you’ll need

a) An “HP OfficeJet J4680 All-in-One Wireless Printer”, but I guess most OfficeJets with scanners will come with the same software.

b) An Evernote account. You can make do with the free account, but if you want to search PDFs and get almost unlimited uploads, consider going premium .

c) A wireless network

d) A Mac, maybe your media server, but your laptop works, too. I read somewhere that this doesn’t work on Windows. If it does let me know.

How to set it up

1. Install the software and get the device up and running 2. launch the “HP Scan destinations” app3. untick any items you know you don’t want to skip through on your device4. Click the ‘+’ icon. Choose “Picture editing application”

6. The first entry we’ll create is for when you have a stack of individual sheets you want to add to Evernote in one go. Use the name “Evernote – Single sheets”, pick Evernote app from the Applications folder, and choose JPEG as your file type. Click Finish to save the item.

7. Add another for when you have a multi-page document you want to add to a single Evernote note. Name: Evernote – multiple sheets, Evernote.app, and choose PDF as the file type. Click Finish to save.
8. Drag your evernote items to the top of the list so they’ll appear as the first choices in your printer’s menu.

9. Click the Settings tab and choose the “Front panel”. This will change the settings for when you initiate scans from the printer. Choose Black and White, and a resolution of 200 for a setting that is sufficient for Evernote’s OCR to kick in, and still maintain a file size well below the 25 Mb maximum per note.

10. Close the dialog window.

That’s it. You’re ready to scan directly to Evernote.

Dispute settlement. Highest number wins.

Lotto. Print out, play.

Restaurant menu picker. Your VPN token has taste.

Drinking game.

Bingo.

To quote Steve Jobs

When you start looking at a problem and it seems really simple, you don’t really understand the complexity of the problem.

Then you get into the problem, and you see that it’s really complicated, and you come up with all these convoluted solutions. That’s sort of the middle, and that’s where most people stop…

But the really great person will keep on going and find the key, the underlying principle of the problem – and come up with an elegant, really beautiful solution that works. That’s what we wanted to do with Mac.

Steve Jobs, 1984, taken from Peter Merholz’ book “Subject to Change”

Two sides of one feature:

That was Locale for Android.

And this is Mobot.

Users of both applications can build scripts that react to the situation their phone is in. Switch to silent when in a court room. Deny calls, reply with a standard SMS when in a disco.

This is what phones do in the future. The interesting thing will be how to set up the scripts, and to which extent we’ll share them.

Locale for Android

Mobots

My sister just sent me this photo in celebrating that she got her mobile data plan working on her MTN phone.

The ad shows what an estimated 17 million people do almost every day – transfer money from mobile phone to mobile phone, mostly from a major city to family members in a village. The currency is airtime, and it can be sold for cash.

In the Western world we’ve had mobile phones and banks for ages. We can’t transfer money with our mobile phones.

We had a lively and inspiring session at the IT University Thursday. Here are some of the links and book titles i promised to pass on to you.

Links

• Programmableweb.com has thousands of mashups as well as a long list of available APIs for your mashup pleasure – another list here
• Google’s app platform, App Engine could be very suitable for mashups. I haven’t gotten around to trying it yet
• Yahoo Pipes is an interesting early step into the non-code heaven in the near future. You simply connect feeds with feeds using a direct interface
• Google Maps is particularly easy to mash up

Getting started, the reading way
I highly recommend these tutorials in this order

1. HTML
2. CSS
3. PHP
4. SQL

If you prefer books, take a look at the not-so-boring Head First series written keep your brain active as you learn(!) (PHP and MySQL, HTML and CSS.

The viewing way (or monkey see, monkey do)

If you’re the TV kind of person, make sure you check out Lynda.com. Here’s a PHP and MySQL video tutorial. It’s not free, but once you’ve paid the monthly fee of 25 dollars (three pizzas), you get access to more than 500 tutorials including Flash, Photoshop, and the list goes on.

Slides and cards

Printable mashup cards (PDF)

I use this when I get that “quick, show me something cool” feeling. Since this actually works, I should warn you that it is addictive.

1. Add your Delicious network to your Google Reader

2. Give it a name
Could be anything as long as you’re able to remember it for 45 seconds.

3. Go to settings > Goodies > Put reader in a bookmark
Pick the second option that allows you to create a next bookmark for a specific tag. Find the tag you made. Select it.

4. Drag the link to your browser’s toolbar

5. Click it when you want to see something your friends think is cool.

If your friends are boring, try the popular links or Digg. Or put them all in one folder.

A few weeks ago signed up Denmark’s biggest radio station, P3, for Last.fm. That mans every time the old Danish Broadcasting Corporation’s pop music channel plays a song, Last.fm will make a note in its database.

That opens up for a few interesting activities.

1 Take the P3 compatibility test

Mine is high. Log in to last.fm, then go to P3′s profile to check yours.

2 Like the song? See them live

Have the visual track displayer running on an idle screen near you and look out for the next concert tag. Note that it defaults to my account, so click the person icon to change the current user to “drp3″

3 Listen to P3 – without the hosts, the spots and the news

Go to the personal station player for uninterrupted music.

4 See what’s hot on up-to-the-minute charts

For the full top 400, go to the charts page

Done? Try the other channels
DR Electronica, DR Jazz and DR Barometer are currently under surveillance by my little Last.fm robots.

What do you do?

“I figure out what a web site or application needs to do, and why, and then design how people will perform those tasks.”
Robert Hoekman

“Remember the last time you were yelling at your insert device here? Interaction Designers are being brought in to make sure that doesn’t happen again.”
Shaun Bergman

“UX folks create the underlying framework and skeleton and logic of a site, and work very closely with the designers, to make it not only beautiful, but usable, too.”
Joanne Weaver

it’s like a normal architect, but instead of buildings, I plan websites.
Jane Mountain

I just pull out my iPhone. Seriously. Works every time!
Uday Gajendar

“I design software and websites that people don’t hate.”
Michael Micheletti

“I make computers more human so that humans can act less like computers.”
Michael Williamson

Find more social introductions in this IxDA thread      

A few posts ago I argued that users should not be the only ones profiled by persona archetypes.

Philip wrote an interesting comment. He has been designing telephone voice interfaces (“press the # sign..”) for more than ten years, and has in fact used personas for his applications. Look for his experience based advice in his comment.

Amazon: Voice user interface (look inside – Google Books)

Here it is!
Googling a bit further I found exactly what I was talking about. In a four years old discussion thread on IxDA, Ben Hunt describes his process, with the “conversation” between the user persona and the site persona.

I have a pet SP called Pierre, who’s a concierge in a high-class hotel. There are several aspects of Pierre’s style that I find really useful in designing web sites, including:

His brevity: he only communicates the minimum information required to communicate what needs to be communicated.

His low demand: he only asks for the minimum of input and information; he makes up the rest through intelligence, memory, note-taking and experience.

His modesty: he doesn’t draw glory to himself; his satisfaction comes solely from helping his clients achieve their goals.

His proactivity: he’s always anticipating what customers may want next even before they’ve thought of it themselves.

Good stuff. Another point coming across in both the voice and site parts mentioned here, is that the application (or site) persona would be able to act as a proxy for the sometimes abstract brand values.

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