The document discusses the development and testing of distinct interface architectures for washing machine interfaces in order to improve usability and comply with standards. It describes mapping user pathways and possible interfaces that range from traditional physical buttons to touchscreen-only. Prototypes were created and tested with users to evaluate different levels of physical and touch-based interactions. The goal was to design simpler and more intuitive interfaces by combining approaches and prioritizing user requirements.

1. The care and feeding of buttons
Daniel Stillman
@dastillman

2. It’s difficult to have an epiphany if all
you want revealed is what you
already know.

3. Things I’ll talk about:

4. Buttons cost money
Share your toys
Mix up your fidelity
Suspension of disbelief
Lather, rinse, repeat

5. A bit about me

6. One thing I do

7. My origin story.

8. My graduate thesis: it’s not easy to
get a bike on a train.

9. Bikes take up too much room on the
subway.

10. Scooters are awesome but uncool.

11. Prototype one: size and shape.

12. Prototype two: deeper function.

13. Yeah.

14. Finally, mixed fidelity.

15. The users behind the process.

16. Where this work happened.

17. Buttons cost money

18. So do LEDs

19. $0.02 extra adds up fast
A: SLIDER B: ONE BUTTON C: TWO ZONE BAR D: BUTTON BAR

20. $0.02 = how much awesome?

21. Share your toys

22. Touch screen e-ink tablet

23. Touch screen e-ink tablet

24. What can we leverage or cram into
the existing space we have?

25. We made some toys…

26. And had a party…

27. And most of it sucked.
Overall favorite
Button favorite

28. And most of it sucked.
Maximum score is 35
5 tasks X max. score of 7 per task

29. And most of it sucked.

30. Why did they like what they liked?
too segmented
Sweet Spot:
Balanced Layering
well segmented
and Segmentation
not segmented enough
not layered enough well layered too layered

31. Can we do better?
too segmented
Surface ErgoTouch ClickTouch
well segmented
not segmented enough
ThreeWheel TouchWheel PearlTouch
not layered enough well layered too layered

32. Thankfully, the touch screen option
worked out.

33. Mix up your fidelity.

34. The pieces of the puzzle.

35. Step one – explore.

36. Flesh it out.

37. A lot of fast and cheap is good.

38. Suspension of disbelief
Mix up your fidelity.

39. If you change everything…

40. Try a few things.

41. Prioritizing the requirements

42. Creating the primary workflows
In order to provide better usability and comply with FDA HE75 Human Factors
standards, we developed and tested distinct architectures.

43. Then gut-checking them

44. The pieces of the puzzle.

45. Washing Machine Interfaces.

46. Mapping user pathways

47. Mapping possible interfaces.
Pure Physical Focus Hybrid Pure Touch Screen
Ordinal: traditional UI Screen with physical buttons Screen with touch buttons grid
Screen with knob
carousel
Screen with knob
Cover flow
bulls eye
breadcrumbs

48. Can we make it simpler?
1 2 3 4 5

49. Then we play with it, in place.

50. The pieces of the puzzle.

51. Get some pieces into place

52. Then put them in context.

53. The pieces of the puzzle.

54. Things I talked about:

55. Buttons cost money
Share your toys
Mix up your fidelity.
Suspension of disbelief
Lather, rinse, repeat.

56. Thanks!
Daniel Stillman
@dastillman

57. Buttons cost money
Share your toys
Mix up your fidelity.
Suspension of disbelief
Lather, rinse, repeat.