Designing Mobile Interfaces

Part III. Widgets

The word widget can mean a number of things, even within related Internet technologies. Even the savvy user may be confused by the lack of common terminology and the lack of any inherent meaning. The term may apply to bits of code, applets, engines, and GUI elements.

However, the scope of this book, and of this part of the book, is solely concerned with mobile GUI widgets. These widgets are display elements such as buttons, links, icons, indicators, tabs, and tooltips. Numerous additional elements (sometimes called GUI widgets), such as scroll bars, are discussed as components and functions in Part I.

The functionalities of the widgets discussed in this part of the book are to:

• Display a small amount of directly related information

• Provide an alternative view of the same information, in an organic manner

• Provide access to related controls or settings

• Display information about the current state of the device

• Provide quick access to indexed information

The widgets that we will discuss here are subdivided into the following chapters:

• Chapter 5

• Chapter 6

• Chapter 7

• Chapter 8

Types of Widgets

Widgets for Lateral Access

Whether your information architecture is organized hierarchically or laterally, its presentation and access are affected by the potentially small mobile display. One option to consider is to use lateral access widgets such as Tabs, Peel Away, Pagination, and Location Within to assist the user in quickly navigating through and selecting this content.

Widgets for Drilldown ...