Website optimization is more of an art than science. You will need tools, techniques and some patience to tweak & re-tweak things until everything is just about right. Today we’ll take a look at how Visual Website Optimizer can help you optimize your website using A/B and multivariate tests.

1. Subliminal Suggestion

Research shows that objects and images you see around you can prime you for certain behaviors. For example, a study on children showed that after being shown a Santa Claus cap, they were more likely to share candy with others. The cap embodied the concept of sharing and giving in their minds, and exposure to it primed them for regarding sharing more positively. The same study also exposed kids to a “Toys ‘R’ Us” logo, which had the opposite effect of the Santa Claus cap, making them less likely to share their candy.

When choosing images for your website, think carefully about the message you’re trying to send. Pick images that are meaningful and that embody that message or feeling. Don’t put graphics on your website for their own sake — if they’re not doing a job, they don’t have to be there. Clichéd and overused imagery and stock photos are also dangerous because it may not send the right message in the given context, so select images that get the effect you’re after.

2. Prevent Choice Paralysis

There is a phenomenon in marketing known as “choice paralysis.” Choice paralysis happens when the user is given too many options. Choice is great, but when your customers are presented with too many options, they may be confused about where to go. Nobody wants buyer’s remorse (where a person chooses an item and decides later it’s not right for them), so many people spend more time than they should on the selection process: they become paralyzed.

In fact, according to Barry Schwatz, when customers have too many options to consider, they end up avoiding a specific service or the task in general (Paradox of Choice) – and this is exactly what we as designers need to carefully consider in our designs.

To remedy choice paralysis, make it easier for people to find the right product or service for them. Tell them what each option is great for, and then suggest the one they should choose. You can even use visuals to highlight the most popular product and steer potential customers towards it. If the product is not right for them, they’ll pick another, but if they’re confused, a “default” choice helps prevent choice paralysis.

3. Show The Product

When you visit a physical store, perhaps a grocery, you can look at, examine and sometimes even taste the products on sale. You make your purchasing decision based on the information you gather there. Are the tomatoes ripe enough? Are those strawberries red enough? What about the look and smell of that freshly baked bread?

When you sell services or Web apps online, you should do exactly the same thing: show the product. It’s surprising how many websites that sell software don’t actually show screenshots of their applications. Sure, these are intangible goods, digital goods that you can’t touch or smell, but they’re still goods you can see.

People make judgments based on what products look like. Why? Because appearance is an indicator, rightly or wrongly, of a product’s usability. This is known as the aesthetic-usability effect.

If people see a complicated and cluttered interface or, in some cases, even just an unattractive interface, they may assume it is not very usable or is hard to learn. On the other hand, if people see an attractive and simple-looking interface, they may start figuring out how it works right then and will want to give it a try. Get people to imagine using your software, and you’ll get closer to closing the sale.

4. Let People Try It

Once you start using a product, you become involved in it. Once you start entering data into it, you begin to make it your own. Every second a user spends trying out features is a second of their time invested in learning and using your product.

When that user is then presented with the question of whether to purchase or subscribe to the product or service, they will more likely say “yes” because they are already involved and have invested time in it. Of course, if the product is bad, then it may turn people off, but then your priority should really be to improve the product until it reaches a level people are happy with.

In recent years, we’ve seen the emergence of the “freemium” business model. A freemium service allows people to use a portion of it free of charge, but requires a purchase to use all of its features. It gives people a taste of the full product but doesn’t limit them to a trial period. This lets them use the product for free without monetary commitment and then upgrade if they like it.

It’s a great model for many online Software-as-a-Service businesses because once somebody begins using your product, they get sucked in. They start to rely on it, and when they rely on it to do business or manage their life, they will very likely need the premium features down the line and will be happy to upgrade because they already know your service well.

Stories are very important in sales because they get potential customers to imagine what it would be like to use your product. Letting people actually try your product for free goes even further. They don’t have to imagine because they can begin using it right away at no cost. Letting people try out your product, whether through a demo, a trial period or a freemium model, is an excellent way to win customers. Now, this isn’t really a “design” element but is important to mention here because of its potential to drive conversions.

5. AIDA

AIDA is a well-known strategy in sales and stands for: Attention, Interest, Desire and Action. It is relatively simple and describes the sequence of events you should aim for to get a sale. So, first of all, you must capture the attention of your potential customer. Once you have it, you should win their interest by explaining how your product or service can help them.

Then, once they’re interested, generate a desire in them for your product. For example, a story about how this product has helped someone like your visitor can help them imagine what this product would do for them, and especially what benefits it would bring. Indeed, the benefit part is key here because benefits, not features, sell products.

Finally, you need to get people to act. This means purchasing the product or signing up for the service. If people want your product, all they may need is a button to check out. If they are interested but not yet sure, you could use a few methods to motivate them further; for example, creating a sense of urgency with a limited-time offer or limited supply.

Now, the AIDA approach applies more to copy — the actual marketing text on the website — than design, so what we need to do on the design side is reinforce that copy, make it stand out and ensure visitors read it. This means making sure the first thing a new visitor sees really grabs their attention. The flow of the page should then direct their focus to the items that achieve the other two goals: interest and desire. Finally, at the end of this flow, we need to convert. So, provide calls to action: “Order now,” “Sign up here.”

It’s important to understand that the design alone won’t sell: you need strong copy in place to do most of that work. The design is there to reinforce and support the copy, rather than the other way around.

This means you shouldn’t design a nice website first and then fill up the space with words. Instead, think about the message you want to send out, write the copy and then construct a design that delivers that. If a delivery truck breaks down, then the package does not arrive, but if there was no package in the first place, then the delivery wouldn’t matter at all.

6. Guide attention

To benefit from something like AIDA, you have to lead your visitors through your content. You can do this by aligning items in a manner that will flow, and using images that guide the eyes. For example, if you want to focus attention somewhere, use a big arrow. Our eyes will notice the arrow and will naturally want to see where it points to.

Structure your content in a way that will flow towards something. Having a bunch of scattered feature descriptions may confuse and make your visitors lost, unless of course if all of the points end in calls to action. If you want to ensure your visitors don’t miss anything, align everything in a linear structure so that the user scans along it. Make sure to end it with the ultimate call to action: that signup or download link.

7. Always Provide Next Actions

ABC: Always Be Closing. If you’re designing a website to sell something, whether a software application or Web service, you should always be thinking about how you’re closing the deal on each page. This doesn’t mean filling every page with big “Buy now” buttons; it means when the customer is ready to buy, they shouldn’t have to look around for the check-out link.

Always provide next-action links to keep the flow going and to ensure you don’t lose the attention of potential customers. Next-action links can direct the visitor to a page with more information about the product or to the actual page where they can make the purchase or sign up. These links could read something like: “Ready to order? Click here,” “Learn more,” “Take the tour” or “Shop now.”

Don’t leave a dead end on any page: always suggest to your visitors where they should go next.

8. The Gutenberg rule

The Gutenberg diagram (or the Gutenberg rule) is a concept that maps out something called reading gravity. Reading gravity describes a habit of reading in the western world: left to right, top to bottom. The Gutenberg diagram splits up a page into four quadrants: the “Primary Optical Area” in top left, the “Strong Fallow Area” in top right, the “Weak Fallow Area” in the bottom left and a “Terminal Area” in bottom right.

The Gutenberg diagram

It suggests that the bottom left area of the page will get least attention as our eyes scan the page from top left to bottom right and that our glance would end up in the lower right portion of the page. How can we utilize this concept? Buttons and calls to action could be placed in bottom right instead of bottom left, as this is the place where the visitor’s glance is likely to alight.

Note that the Gutenberg diagram is more likely to work on pages which have more a balanced distribution of content. If parts of your page have strong highlights through high contrast and bold typography, then those areas would likely attract more attention and so will direct the way a user scans the page.

iPhone owners will argue until their dying breath how good the Apple handset is, Android users pushing the flexibility of Google’s operating system. Some swear by WebOS or Windows Mobile, even so, all of these OS’es have their own limitations which continue to frustrate even the most die-hard users.

There is no such thing as the perfect mobile operating system but with all software products there could always be improvements. What would be included in your perfect mobile operating system? We will discuss this below.

Customization

A huge prerequisite for any mobile owner. The ability to switch wallpapers whenever you feel like, change a theme or assign different ringtones to your contacts, it gives the user a feeling of control, they have power over the phone – not what Apple or Google tell them they can and can’t do.

iPhone owners have long wished for a way to personalize their devices and Apple relented to a point with the introduction of iOS4. Now, iPhone owners can apply a lock-screen and background wallpaper – insane. This is much to the delight of Android users, if the OS can’t perform the specified task, you can bank on there being an app available on the Android Market that can.

WebOS, Windows Mobile, Blackberry and Android all support theming, with iPhone users needing to jailbreak (and invalidate their warranty) if they wish to do so. Apple believe that the application of themes would “take away from the user experience” because it “spent a lot of time and effort developing this distinct and innovative way to seamlessly deliver core functionality of the iPhone.” Enough said.

Most support widgets – little home screen apps that update to display real-time information – the best you get on an iPhone is the date and time, perhaps a push notification from time to time.

The perfect OS would allow users to customize the UI of their phone, handing back control to the person who showed faith in the company by handing over hundreds of dollars/pounds/euros to buy its phone in the first place.

Built-in Social

Whilst most modern mobile operating systems make use of social features, none of them store social networking data so that other apps can access it. Confused, let me explain.

Say hello to Android or WebOS. Both of these operating systems allow you to specify your social-networking or email accounts to populate contact information or display information by way of a widget. This is great, but if you wanted to pull this information for a different purpose, you would be unable to – you would need a specific app to give you the functionality you wished for.

There is a mobile operating system that allows developers to pull social networking data specified by the user: Samsung’s Bada platform. Designed specifically to challenge the likes of Android and iOS4, Bada is a linux-based OS that has a built-in social layer – currently supporting Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and Myspace (Samsung has already announced it plans to add in more social API’s) – meaning a potential app developer can access profile data without having to make a separate connection to the service itself.

This in essence, allows the user to enter their social network credentials once and then specify what apps can access it. Bada will also update your location data to Samsung’s servers, developers will be to grab your location without having to build in a system within an app to manually search for your current location.

The perfect OS would seamlessly integrate social services with the platforms PIM implementation, reducing the need for the hundreds of Twitter app developers to code their own implementation to complete exactly the same task.

Toggle Between Basic and Expert Modes

Mobile operating systems deal with app crashes differently. On an iPhone, if the app crashes, you simply get chucked back to the home screen.

On Android, if an app quits unexpectedly, you get a funny little error message asking you to try again and force close the app. For me, this helps me identify why the app is misbehaving, for first-time users this might be a little bit daunting and give the impression the phone is doing something it shouldn’t (when in fact it is educating the user).

The perfect OS would allow the user to switch between an expert mode that contains all of the network information like Carrier APN’s, firmware and debugging tools, to a basic mode which makes use of wizards or graphics to explain the functions on a phone.

Making The OS Self Aware

No, I don’t want your Motorola Droid to start killing in the name of Skynet.

Most modern smartphones have issues with battery management, gone are the days of a 4-day charge, it’s now become the 4 hour charge (OK, I am overstating that a tad). Tell me if I am wrong (I’m sure you would anyway) but I don’t think many modern mobile operating systems have an intelligent system to automatically adjust settings on the phone to maximise battery life.

I know you can get apps, for example JuiceDefender on Android, that sit in the background and disabling your phones data connection when its not in use, only to switch data back on once in an allotted time period to give your apps a chance to refresh its data.

The function could automatically prioritize the needs of the background apps running on the phone, dedicating resources to each app when it needed it the most.

For me, the perfect OS would have built-in controls that could intelligently monitor your phones’ use and change settings accordingly. Would be a great way to help improve battery life and allow your phone to get to know you a bit better!

Multitasking

Something that both Android and WebOS does superbly, multitasking is still not a standard feature on modern mobile operating systems. Although implemented in iOS4, full multitasking and notifications still haven’t been created to meet most user expectations.

Windows Phone 7 will launch without full multitasking support, limiting the function to official Microsoft apps and stopping any third-party developers from utilizing it.

A large percentage of smartphones are launching with a 1GHz processor and 512MB RAM, for a phone this is a huge amount of power and memory. The excuse that the phone physically couldn’t handle a large amount of apps at the same time doesn’t hold any weight now.

The perfect OS would allow users to run as many apps as they like and cycle through them if they should choose, in the mobile age it should be a right not a privilege.

Conclusion

It was very tempting to include network coverage issues (looking at you Apple) but the above issues would go a long way towards making a mobile operating system work for both heavy and light mobile users. The great thing is we are able to receive a fair number of official updates as well as those developed by the mobile hacking community, an solution to our needs is never far away.

What features would go towards making up your perfect operating system, let us know in the comments.

Today, we’re on the cusp of the Android 2.2 OS update, codenamed “Froyo,” which promises to make Android devices ever faster and more powerful. We’re also hearing whispers of the next generation of Android OS, known only by its Gingerbread codename. So, as a tribute and a quick overview of what Android has accomplished, where it came from, and what’s still to come, we’d like to present you with our “Evolution of Android: Follow The Gingerbread Road(map).”

We won’t touch on every feature below, but all versions will have a decent overview.

Android 1.5 : Cupcake
With the introduction of Android 1.5, we started to hear the name “Cupcake” floating around in reference to the first Android OS software update. The update gave the Android OS a little more polish in some areas, but some of the biggest features of the update were certainly the introduction of the (still bad) on-screen keyboard, as well as widgets. Yes, copy and paste within the browser, video-recording, and then being able to upload to YouTube directly were big deals, but a lot of the upgrades were features you may not use every day, where widgets and the on-screen keyboard likely would be used every day.

Widgets have been available in other mobile operating systems, like Samsung’s TouchWiz, but none were as compelling as Android’s implementation. Sure, it took quite a while for a decent selection of widgets to become available, or for developers to start bundling widgets with their apps, but they eventually caught on. Honestly, widgets are one of the great differentiators for Android.

Widgets provide a good amount of “surface” or “at a glance” information, without the need to launch an app. Sometimes you don’t necessarily need the full functionality of an application to get the tiniest bit of information. For example, the weather widget tells you the high and low temperature of the day, with the current temperature at the moment, and if you need any more from that, just tap the widget to open up the weather app itself. Also with all the ways to customize Android devices, widgets may indeed be on of the biggest appeals, just look at HTC Sense.
Screenshot of the Android Market in Android 1.6 Donut OSAndroid 1.6 : Donut

Android 1.6 : Donut
Then came Android 1.6, also known as Donut. Donut was a small update, but it packed a punch with a revamped search box, camera and gallery application, and a completely refreshed Android Market. The search bar, which was initially intended just for searching the web, now allowed a user to search many other places within the device, like bookmarks, contacts, applications, and more, right from the home screen.

The update to the Android Market would probably be the most noticeable change with Donut, as it was now had a white and green color scheme to it, opposed to the black and gray look of previous versions. The new market was also a little more user-friendly, breaking up applications by paid, free, and “just in.” The new version of the Android Market also supported screenshots of a selected application, which was a much requested feature. Still, the Android Market as it stands today needs some fixing. Application discoverability is still atrocious, but I expect to see some big changes later on with the Market.

The Camera application also saw a revamp, and while it wasn’t the prettiest, it was still a step up from what we were working with previously. Users could easily toggle from the camera to video recording without leaving the app, and the settings were now hidden on the left side of the screen under a slide-out side menu bar. According to the Android Developer site, the Camera application launched 39% faster, and the shot-to-shot time was improved by 28%. The overall look of the revamped camera application wasn’t exactly its strongest aspect.

The only thing unfortunate about the Android 1.6 update? Not many devices actually received it. Devices like the Droid Eris or Hero jumped straight from Android 1.5 to Android 2.1. Donut was a nice, small upgrade, and is still used by about a quarter of all Android users, but that’s as far as it went.
Screenshot of Google Maps Navigation turn-by-turn GPS navigation serviceAndroid 2.0 : Eclair

Android 2.0 Eclair
Android 2.0 : Eclair was a very nice step in the operating system’s evolution. Debuting on the Motorola Droid in November of 09?, this was the second major iteration of the platform and represented the point where Android began gaining the attention of the masses. Thanks to new features, along side Verizon’s relentless marketing campaign, as well as some viral videos, Android OS became a household name.

Eclair allowed Android to flex its “social” muscle. Applications were able to sync with contacts from Facebook, and later on, Twitter, allowing you to have all your contacts from every single social network in onc place. Pictures of a contact were pulled from a social network, allowing virtually no blank pictures for your contacts, as long as they were a part of a particular network. Eclair also brought us the Quick Contact menu, allowing you to tap on a contact’s photo and a menu would slide in, showing all forms of communication with said contact. Eclair also polished the UI, bringing in some slick transitions and overall spit-shine that was much needed at the time.

Eclair didn’t stop there. Android 2.0 brought us a handful of new camera features, such as digital zoom, scene mode, white balance, color effects, and macro focus. We’d have to wait until Froyo for the camera application to be polished up enough to give us the enjoyable experience we have today, but Eclair did make some big updates to the camera app.

Android’s virtual keyboard was also improved with multitouch support, a better dictionary that learned common words, as well as suggestions for contact names. Still, the stock Android keyboard needed a lot of tooling around to be a comfortable typing method.

The Android browser also saw an upgrade, which refined the overall look. Double-tap to zoom was added into the browser so users would not have to rely solely on the plus and minus buttons on the bottom of the screen. The bookmarks view was also altered to support thumbnails, and the browser gained HTML5 support.

Oh, and the biggest update with Android 2.0 was the Google Maps Navigation turn-by-turn GPS navigation service that Google was nice enough to offer for free. That single launch brought Garmin’s stock price down 16%, and Tom Tom’s stock down 21% on the day of the announcement.
Screenshot of Cool Iris 3D gallery in Android 2.1 Eclair updateAndroid 2.1

Android 2.1
Android 2.1 OS represented the second stage of Eclair’s evolution with the introduction of the Nexus One. Android 2.1 brought with it one of the slickest iterations of the Android homescreen ever seen. Android 2.1 is an extension of 2.0, and is still very much Eclair, but with just a little more flare.

Live Wallpapers were introduced into this version of the operating system, which were simply animated, and interactive wallpapers. They may provide little purpose, but were definitely something we’d never seen on an OS, and are just plain fun. Android 2.1 also gave us 5 home screens to work with, instead of the standard 3 we were used to prior to 2.1.

In addition to the extra home screens, the 2.1 update gave you a different way to navigate through your home screens. Dots align either side of the app drawer launcher button, to tell you which screen you were on, and long pressing these dots would give you a thumbnail view of all home screens at the bottom. Somewhere in the middle of iOS and WebOS, as well as somewhere in between “pretty cool looking” and “useless.” Helpful nonetheless.

The Nexus One was also the first handset that extended the existing voice search capabilities found on previous versions of Android by giving a user the option to translate speech into text in any text entry field. A microphone button was added to the keyboard, allowing you to speak instead of typing for emails, texts, search, and pretty much anything else you’d need to type.

Android 2.1 also brought in some cool 3D effects into the OS. The application launcher was replaced with an app launcher icon. Instead of a tab you drag up to reveal your applications, you simply tapped on the app launcher and your applications would fly in from all corners, and scrolling through them produced a 3D “waterfall” effect.

The photo gallery also saw a major 3D revamp. CoolIris helped Google develop the new gallery, and it’s one of the nicest built-in applications for the OS to date. If only they did the same for the Music player…

Still Eclair here, folks, but we’ll make this one quick. Not even a month after the release of the Nexus One, Google pushed out an update to the device. This update was probably the smallest of them all, but packed one of the biggest punches.

Android 2.1 – update 1 (Multi-touch)
This update added multitouch functionality across the board on the Nexus One, save for applications like Gmail. Maps, Gallery, and the Browser now supported the much sought-after feature that iPhone users have had since day one. Multitouch on Android works perfectly well, and is one of the most welcomed additions to the platform.

The update also added Google Goggles into the list of pre-installed applications, and Google Maps was updated to version 3.4, which added some nice extras.

Last but not least, the update made an attempt at fixing the 3G connection problem that had plagued the device for some time. While some people saw some improvements, many did not. Google and T-Mobile have since given up on finding a solution. Hey, at least they were honest.

Android 2.2 : Froyo

Google’s most recent update, Android 2.2 Froyo has stepped up its game in so many fronts, it’s hard to even consider the best of the “competing” OS’s out there actual competition to Froyo. While the iOS 4 has an overall polish and is more intuitive, Froyo pretty much destroys it on all arenas. We won’t go too in-depth with this version, as we’ve covered Froyo in-depth here. But here is an overview of Android’s newest dessert.

Froyo gives users a massive speed increase, thanks to the JIT compiler, and the Java V8 engine. With the JIT compiler, applications will launch quicker, and the overall OS will just be that much snappier. The Java V8 engine, which you can find on Google’s desktop browser, makes the Android web experience the fastest in all the land.

Froyo makes the best of your data connection, and can turn your phone into a mobile hotspot. This feature may not make it to any other phone than the Nexus One, since wireless carriers would rather you pay a premium for that feature.

A feature that people have been waiting for for years in now a reality in Android 2.2. Support for Adobe Flash. Once a device has been updated to Froyo, the Flash player can be found in the Android Market, and performs quite well. Despite Steve Jobs’ utter hatred for the technology, Adobe and Google have proved that the rich media technology can run on a mobile phone, and run pretty damn well at that.

Other features include the option to move applications to handsets’ microSD card, a slightly tweaked home screen look, new widgets, more photo gallery enhancements, a handful of Exchange features, as well as the cloud-to-device API that allows you to send web pages and Google Maps directions from your computer to your phone.
Graphic of Gingerbread Android robot, made by IntoMobileAndroid 3.0 : Gingerbread

Android 3.0 : Gingerbread
With Froyo only available on the Nexus One at the moment, people are already clamoring about what features Android 3.0 Gingerbread may hold for us. We don’t have much solid information to go on at this point, but there are quite a few features that we can expect.

Google Music : Google may get into the music business with Gingerbread, with plans to take on iTunes directly. We might just see Google selling music directly through the Android Market, or downloaded from the as of yet unseen web-portal and sent through Google’s servers to your device. But that’s not all. Google will likely allow the user to stream their computer’s music library over the air to their handsets as well. You can do this now with an application, HomePipe, but Google’s official solution will likely be much better. Google is getting more media-savvy, and the introduction of Google Music should not come as a surprise to anyone. With the introduction of more music services, we can expect a new look to the media player as well.

Online Android Market : In addition to music being streamed from your computer to your handset, Google demonstrated at the Google I/O 2010 conference that users will soon be able to download an application from the desktop version of the Android Market website, and send it straight to your phone without touching it at all. Taking advantage of the already in-place Cloud-to-Device API, this would make browsing for apps a faster and easier experience.

User Interface Overhaul: One of the biggest rumors is that Android will experience a complete UI revamp, and it will likely be taking notes from Android 2.1?s Gallery application. So we’re talking 3D Android here. Snatching up one of Palm’s WebOS designer’s, who will likely lead the design team, will likely aid in the process, and we can’t wait to see what they come up with.

Google Sync: Another rumor that’s surfaced is that there will be an official way to sync your Android device to your PC. If you haven’t realized who Google is gunning for, you probably haven’t actually read this. DoubleTwist, your days are numbered.

There will likely be hardware recommendations to support Gingerbread, not minimum requirements as we’d previously heard. Gingerbread will also be the beginning of a great division between high-end and low-end Android handsets. Gingerbread will obviously be for the higher-end devices, while lower-end devices, if they can make it, will stick with Froyo.

There are a few more rumors swimming out there, but the rumors above will likely come true. That said, most of these things are still rumors, and are in no way confirmed by Google. We also aren’t even sure if Gingerbread will be Android 3.0, where it could pop up as 2.3, 2.5, and so on. With all of the overhauls and revamps, we think Gingerbread deserves to stand out as a 3.0 product.

Expected to hit in mid October, wih devices shipping in November/December, we don’t have too much longer to find out what the sweetest Android may bring us.

What are some features you’d like to see in Android’s next version? Sound off in the comments!

Jobs went on to relate that the iPad had a similar trajectory in that regard. He says that what he was really against was the handwriting-based system for input: “It’s too slow. If you need a stylus you have already failed.”

He notes that Microsoft’s version of the Tablet PC had the battery life, weight, and expense of a PC. “But the minute you throw a stylus out, and you have the precision of a finger, you can’t use a PC OS. You have to create it from scratch.”

Walt then asks him why he built that operating system on a phone first instead of a tablet. Jobs then drops a reveal: “I’ll tell you a secret. It started on a tablet first.”

He had an idea of a multi-touch display you could type on, and six months later his team had a prototype display to show him. After handing it off to Apple user interface experts who “got the inertia rolling,” Jobs realized, “My god, we can build a phone out of this,” and shelved the tablet because at the time the phone was more important.

“When we got our wind back and thought we could do something else, took the tablet back off shelf.”

Can the iPad save journalism?

Kara asks about the future of the tablet from here, and whether or not it can help save journalism and the businesses of newspapers and magazines.

Jobs came out strongly in favor of preserving journalism: “One of my beliefs very strongly is that any democracy depends on a free, healthy press.” He notes that many seminal publications like the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and others “are in real trouble” and that he doesn’t “want to see us descend into a nation of bloggers [ouch! -- Ed. note]. I think we need editorial now more than ever.”

He sees the iPad as being potentially instrumental in getting “people to start paying for this hard-earned content.” He says he believes “publishers should charge less than print. The biggest lesson Apple has learned is price it aggressively and go for volume.”

The post-PC era: Will the tablet replace the PC?

Jobs gave an analogy about how the tablet form factor might indeed end up displacing the personal computer to a significant degree in the not-too-distant future: “When we were an agrarian nation, all cars were trucks. But as people moved more towards urban centers, people started to get into cars. I think PCs are going to be like trucks. Less people will need them. And this is going to make some people uneasy.”

He goes on to admit it’s not necessarily the iPad in particular that might play this role alone: “Is it the iPad, who knows?”

He also says the time frame for this displacement is unclear, whether one year or five or even ten.

Walt says the lack of a keyboard leads some to posit that the iPad isn’t a great device for content creation. Jobs responds: “Why wouldn’t they be? When I am going to write that 35-page analyst report I am going to want my bluetooth keyboard. That’s one percent of the time.”

He appeals to a more long-range view of the tablet as a form factor and how it may evolve to encompass a lot of the things we need our laptops and desktops for today: “The software will get more powerful. I think your vision would have to be pretty short to think these can’t grow into machines that can do more things, like editing video, graphic arts, productivity. You can imagine all of these content creation on these kind of things.”

He says “time takes care” of a lot of the issues that remain as barriers to using an iPad as more of a primary device.

Over the years a range of GUI’s have been developed for different operating systems such as OS/2, Macintosh, Windowsamiga, Linux, Symbian OS, and more.

We’ll be taking a look at the evolution of the interface designs of the major operating systems since the 80’s.

I should mention that this article showcases only the significant advances in GUI design (not operating system advances) and also not all of the graphical user interfaces and operating systems existing today.

The first GUI was developed by researchers at Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) in the ’70s. This research opened a whole new era of computer graphic innovations.

The first personal computer which used a modern graphical user interface was the Xerox Alto, developed in 1973. This was not a commercial product and was intended mainly for research at universities.

Source: toastytech.com

1981-1985

Xerox 8010 Star (released in 1981)

This was the first system that was referred to as a fully integrated desktop computer including applications and a GUI. It was known as “The Xerox Star”, later renamed “ViewPoint” and later again renamed to “GlobalView”.

Xerox 8010 Star, Source: toastytech.com

Apple Lisa Office System 1 (released in 1983)

Also referred to as Lisa OS, which in this case is short for Office System. It was developed by Apple with the intention of being a document processing workstation.

Unfortunately this workstation didn’t last, it was killed by Apple’s Macintosh operating system that was more affordable.

There were upgrades to Lisa OS, Lisa OS 2 in 1983 and Lisa OS 7/7 3.1 in 1984, that upgraded the system itself, but not the graphical user interface.

Apple Lisa OS 1, Source: GUIdebook

Apple Lisa OS 1, Source: GUIdebook

VisiCorp Visi On (released in 1984)

Visi On was the first desktop GUI developed for the IBM PC. This system was targeted towards big corporations and came with a high price tag. The GUI made use of a mouse, it had a built-in installer and help system and it didn’t use icons.

VisiCoprt Visi On, Source: toastytech.com

VisiCoprt Visi On, Source: toastytech.com

Mac OS System 1.0 (released in 1984)

System 1.0 was the first operating system GUI developed for the Macintosh. It had several features of a modern operating system, being windows based with icons. The windows could be moved around with the mouse and files and folders could be copied by dragging and dropping onto the target location.

Apple Mac System 1.0, Source: toastytech.com

Amiga Workbench 1.0 (released in 1985)

When first released, Amiga was ahead of its time. The GUI included features such as color graphics (four colors: black, white, blue, orange), preemptive multitasking, stereo sound and multi-state icons (selected and unselected).

Amiga Workbench 1.0, Source: GUIdebook

Amiga Workbench 1.0, Source: GUIdebook

Windows 1.0x (released in 1985)

In this year Microsoft finally caught up with the whole graphical user interface craze and released Windows 1.0, its first GUI based operating system (although no one would dare to refer to it as one). The system featured 32×32 pixel icons and color graphics. The most interesting feature (which later was omitted) was the icon of the animated analog clock.

Microsoft Windows 1.01, Source: makowski-berlin.de

Microsoft Windows 1.01, Source: makowski-berlin.de

GEM (released in 1985)

GEM (Graphical Environment Manager) was a windowing style GUI created by Digital Research, Inc. (DRI). It was initially created for use with the CP/M operating system on the Intel 8088 and Motorola 68000 microprocessors and was later developed to run on DOS as well. Most people will remember GEM as the GUI for the Atari ST computers. It was also used on a series Amstrad’s IBM compatible computers. It was the core for Ventura Publisher and a few other DOS programs. The GUI was also ported to other computers but did not gain popularity on them.

Source: Wikipedia

1986 – 1990

IRIX 3 (released in 1986, first release 1984)

The 64-bit IRIX operating system was created for UNIX. An interesting feature of this GUI is the support for vector icons. This feature was built into the GUI long before Mac OS X even existed.

Silicon Graphics IRIX 3.0, Source: osnews.com

GEOS (released in 1986)

The GEOS (Graphic Environment Operating System) operating system was developed by Berkeley Softworks (later GeoWorks). It was originally designed for the Commodore 64 and included a graphical word processor, called geoWrite and a paint program called geoPaint.

Source: Wikipedia

Windows 2.0x (released in 1987)

In this version, the actual management of the windows had significantly improved. The windows could be overlapped, resized, maximized and minimized.

Microsoft Windows 2.03, Source: guidebookgallery.org

Microsoft Windows 2.03, Source: guidebookgallery.org

OS/2 1.x (released in 1988)

OS/2 was originally co-developed by IBM and Microsoft, but in 1991 the two companies split up, with Microsoft incorporating the technology in its own Windows GUI and IBM developing OS/2 further. The GUI used in OS/2 was called “Presentation Manager”. This version of the GUI only supported monochrome, fixed icons.

Microsoft-IBM OS/2 1.1, Source: pages.prodigy.net

Microsoft-IBM OS/2 1.1, Source: pages.prodigy.net

NeXTSTEP / OPENSTEP 1.0 (released in 1989)

Steve Jobs came up with the idea to create the perfect research computer for universities and research labs. This idea later evolved into a startup called NeXT Computer Inc.

The first NeXT computer was released in 1988, however significant advances were made in 1989 with the release of the NeXTSTEP 1.0 GUI, which later evolved into OPENSTEP.

The GUI’s icons were bigger (48×48) and it introduced more colors. The GUI was initially monochrome, but version 1.0 started supporting color monitors too. This screenshot gives you have a peek into what would become the modern GUIs.

NeXTSTEP 1.0, Source: kernelthread.com

OS/2 1.20 (released in 1989)

The next minor version upgrade of the GUI showed slight improvements in many areas. The icons looked nicer and the windows were smoother.

OS/2 1.2, Source pages.prodigy.net

Windows 3.0 (released in 1990)

By this version, Microsoft had realized the real potential in GUI’s and started to significantly improve them.

The operating system itself supported standard and 386 enhanced modes, which made use of higher memory capacity than 640 KB and hard disk space, resulting in the ability to use higher screen resolutions and better graphics, such as Super VGA 800×600 and 1024×768.

Also, Microsoft hired Susan Kare to design the Windows 3.0 icons and to add a unified style to the GUI.

Microsoft Windows 3.0, Source: toastytech.com

Microsoft Windows 3.0, Source: toastytech.com

1991 – 1995

Amiga Workbench 2.04 (released in 1991)

Many improvements were made to this version of the GUI. The color scheme changed and a 3D look was introduced. The desktop could be divided vertically into screens of different resolutions and color depths, which nowadays seems a little odd. The default resolution of Workbench was 640×256, but the hardware supported larger resolutions too.

Commodore Amiga Workbench 2.04, Source: guidebookgallery.org

Mac OS System 7 (released in 1991)

Mac OS version 7.0 was the first Mac OS GUI which supported colors. Subtle shades of grey, blue and yellow were added to icons.

Apple Mac OS System 7.0, Source: guidebookgallery.org

Apple Mac OS System 7.0, Source: guidebookgallery.org

Windows 3.1 (released in 1992)

This version of Windows included TrueType fonts which were pre-installed. This effectively made Windows a functional desktop publishing platform for the first time.

Previously, it was only possible to achieve such functionality in Windows 3.0 using the Adobe Type Manager (ATM) font system from Adobe. This version also contained a color scheme named Hotdog Stand, which contained bright hues of red, yellow and black.

This color scheme was designed to help people with some degree of color blindness see text/graphics on the screen easier.

Source: Wikipedia

OS/2 2.0 (released in 1992)

This was the first GUI that was subjected to international acceptance, usability and accessibility testing. The entire GUI was developed using object-oriented design. Every file and folder was an object which could be associated with other files, folders and applications. It also supported drag and drop functionality and templates.

IBM OS/2 2.0, Source: toastytech.com

IBM OS/2 2.0, Source: toastytech.com

Windows 95 (released in 1995)

The user interface was completely re-designed since version 3.x. This was the first Windows version where a small close button was added to each window.

The design team gave states (enabled, disabled, selected, checked, etc.) to icons and other graphics. The famous Start button appeared for the first time.

This was a huge step forward for Microsoft regarding the operating system itself and the unified GUI.

Microsoft Windows 95, Source: guidebookgallery.org

Microsoft Windows 95, Source: guidebookgallery.org

1996 – 2000

OS/2 Warp 4 (released in 1996)

IBM released OS/2 Warp 4 which brought a significant facelift to the workspace.

Icons were placed on the desktop, where custom files and folders could also be created. The shredder appeared which was similar to Windows’ Recycle Bin or Mac OS’s Trash, except it deleted the file or folder instantly and didn’t store any additional copies for later retrieval.

IBM OS/2 Warp 4, Source: toastytech.com

IBM OS/2 Warp 4, Source: toastytech.com

Mac OS System 8 (released in 1997)

256 color icons were the default in this version of the GUI. Mac OS 8 was one of the early adopters of isometric style icons, also called pseudo-3D icons. The platinum grey theme used here became a trademark for future versions of the GUI.

Apple Mac OS 8, Source: guidebookgallery.org

Windows 98 (released in 1998)

The icon styles were almost the same as in Windows 95, but the whole GUI could use more than 256 colors for rendering. Windows Explorer changed almost completely and the “Active Desktop” appeared for the first time.

Microsoft Windows 98, Source: toastytech.com

KDE 1.0 (released in 1998)

This is how the KDE team described the project upon releasing version 1.0: “KDE is a network transparent, contemporary desktop environment for UNIX workstations. KDE seeks to fill the need for an easy to use desktop for Unix workstations, similar to the desktop environments found under the MacOS or Window95/NT. A completely free and open computing platform available to anyone free of charge including its source code for anyone to modify.”

Source: Wikipedia

BeOs 4.5 (released in 1999)

The BeOS operating system was developed for personal computers. It was originally written by Be In in 1991 to run on BeBox hardware. It was later further developed to take advantage of newer technologies and hardware such as symmetric multiprocessing by utilizing modular I/O bandwidth, pervasive multithreading, preemptive multitasking and a custom 64-bit journaling file system known as BFS. The BeOS GUI was developed on the principles of clarity and a clean, uncluttered design.

Source: Wikipedia

GNOME 1.0 (released in 1999)

GNOME desktop was mainly developed for Red Hat Linux, later it was developed for other Linux distributors as well.

Red Hat Linux GNOME 1.0.39, Source: visionfutur.com

2001 – 2005

Mac OS X (released in 2001)

In early 2000 Apple announced their new Aqua interface and in 2001 the company released it with their brand new operating system called Mac OS X.

The default 32 x 32 and 48 x 48 icons were changed to big 128 x 128 anti-aliased and semi-transparent icons.

Lots of criticism followed after the release of this GUI. Apparently users were not quite ready for such a big change, but soon enough they adopted the new style and today this GUI represents the basis of all Mac OS X operating systems.

Apple Mac OS X 10.1 Source: guidebookgallery.org

Windows XP (released in 2001)

As Microsoft tends to change their GUI completely with every major operating system release, Windows XP was no exception. The GUI itself is skinnable, users could change the whole look and feel of the interface. The icons were 48 x 48 in size by default, rendered in millions of colors.

Microsoft Windows XP Professional, Source: guidebookgallery.org

KDE 3 (released in 2002)

Since version 1.0, the K Desktop Environment improved significantly. They polished all the graphics and icons and unified the whole user experience.

KDE 3.0.1, Source: netbsd.org

2007 – 2009 (current)

Windows Vista (released in 2007)

This was Microsoft’s response to their competition. They also included quite a lot of 3D and animation. Since Windows 98, Microsoft has always tried to improve the desktop. With Windows Vista they released widgets and a somewhat improved replacement of the Active Desktop.

Microsoft Windows Vista, Source: technology.berkeley.edu

Mac OS X Leopard (released in 2007)

With their 6th generation, Mac OS X system Apple, once again improved the user interface. The basic GUI is still the Aqua with its candy scroll bars and platinum grey, blue colors. The new GUI features a more 3D look, with the 3D dock and lots more animation and interactivity.

Apple Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, Source: skattertech.com

GNOME 2.24 (2008)

GNOME put a lot of effort into creating the themes and artwork into v2.2.4 as their aim is “to make your computer look good”. They ran a competition to collect some of the most intruiging desktop backgrounds that their contributors have produced for use in v2.24.

Source: gnome.org

KDE (v4.0 Jan. 2008, v4.2 Mar. 2009)

Version 4 of K Desktop Environment produced many new improvements to the GUI such as animated, smooth, efficient window management and support for desktop widgets. The icons size are easily adjustable and almost every design element is much easier to configure. Some of the most noticeable changes include new icons, themes and sounds, which are provided by the Oxygen Project. These icons are more photorealistic. It is definitely a big improvement to the earlier versions of KDE. It can now also be run on Windows and Mac OS X platforms.

Source: Wikipedia

The haters say iPad lacks multitasking, a webcam, Flash support, a USB port, massive storage, a removable battery, CD and DVD support, RAM upgradability, multiple OS support and other features.

The lovers are less clear about why they want one. So allow me to propose the same list as above. It works just as well. The iPad is desirable for what it doesn’t do — can’t do — as much as for what it can do.

A strange trend has emerged that violates the more-is-better ethos of American consumer culture. Some products and services are touting limitations as desirable “features.” And consumers are loving it.

This strikes some as Orwellian doublespeak: “War is peace.” “Freedom is slavery.” “Less is more.”

But the truth is that people don’t buy consumer electronics for the quantity of features. They buy it for the quality of experience.

For technical users, having more features means a better experience. So-called power users are harassed and annoyed by limitations, by the inability to do something they want to do. They feel a thrill when they’re empowered to do some useful new thing.

But for most users, having more features degrades experience. People suffer information overload and its ugly cousin, runaway gadget complexity. They’re harassed and annoyed, not by limitations, but by features they can’t find or figure out, and by problems they don’t understand. They feel a thrill when gadgets perform basic tasks without fail or hassle.

The vast majority of ordinary PC users I’ve talked to have problems on their PCs, laptops and netbooks that bother them greatly but they cannot fix. The sound card isn’t working right. I can’t make this dialog box go away. Why can’t I print?

Gadget overcomplexity doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It’s joined by the growing overcomplexity of life in general. People spend enormous amounts of time and energy these days navigating automated help services and dealing with one complicated mess after another. The relationship between people and their banks, insurance companies, health care providers and government has become hostile, maddening and exhausting.

The last thing people need is PC-related problems they don’t understand when, say, paying taxes online.

Technical people always complain about being buttonholed at every family get-together by relatives who want “free tech support.” But why do they want this? Why do they need it? The answer is that consumer technology is overly complex.

And whose fault is it?

Unfortunately, it’s my fault. And possibly your fault. It’s the fault of everyone, including marketers, who relentlessly call for more, more and ever more features. Combine this with our calls for backward compatibility, and the result is systems that do everything. They’re so feature-rich, so complex, that some people can’t get them to do anything.

I’ve noticed a trend online recently of new services whose main feature is that they hardly do anything.

Twitter was the first major site in this new trend, which boldly asserted its limitations as features. “You can’t send more than 140 characters!” “No pictures!” “No formatting!” “It does hardly anything!” Welcome to the future.

Hard to believe now, but remember when MySpace was the dominant social network? MySpace gave us so many features that people could, did and do plaster their profiles with incredible (usually incredibly ugly) customization. It was early with apps and add-ons. Not Facebook. It turns out that social networking fans wanted a closed system, locked down and feature-limited.

I’ve noticed this trend in the reminders and to-do-list world. Once, most people used an organizer application, like Microsoft Outlook, to manage their to-do lists. Then a new wave of more limited task managers rolled onshore with the Web 2.0 tsunami. Remember the Milk was typical of the first wave. Then came more desirable and less feature-rich services like Todoist. The trend toward less continued with TeuxDeux, which is incredibly “feature-poor.” And if that’s too capable, you can always embrace Now Do This, which is essentially a blank page with one to-do item on it, and a link to add what comes next in the series.

We’ve seen this same devolution in the areas of online backup, blog design, calendaring and a whole range of social and communications online services. And, really, you can’t reduce the number of features of a communications service much more than this.

The less-is-more world is here. Get used to it.

And if you’re going to argue with an iPad fan about why netbooks are better, don’t bother with listing what the iPad cannot do. Limitations are what people want now.

Retrieving information from the Web when you’re on the go can be a challenge. To make it easier, graduate student Pranav Mistry has developed SixthSense, a device that is worn like a pendant and super­imposes digital information on the physical world. Unlike previous “augmented reality” systems, Mistry’s consists of in­expensive, off-the-shelf hardware. Two cables connect an LED projector and webcam to a Web-enabled mobile phone, but the system can easily be made wireless, says Mistry.

Users control SixthSense with simple hand gestures; putting your fingers and thumbs together to create a picture frame tells the camera to snap a photo, while drawing an @ symbol in the air allows you to check your e-mail. It is also designed to automatically recognize objects and retrieve relevant information: hold up a book, for instance, and the device projects reader ratings from sites like Amazon.com onto its cover. With text-to-speech software and a Bluetooth headset, it can “whisper” the information to you instead.

Remarkably, Mistry developed SixthSense in less than five months, and it costs under $350 to build (not including the phone). Users must currently wear colored “marker­s” on their fingers so that the system can track their hand gestures, but he is designing algorithms that will enable the phone to recognize them directly.

Each day more and more people are opening up their email inbox to find an invite to Google Wave (Google Wave). With that shiny new invite comes the inevitable quest for ideas about to how to put the medium to good use.

Should you happen to be one of those people, we’ve got a number of different resources that you can use to get up to speed with Google Wave. This time around, however, we wanted to look at how people are actually using it now. From process modelling and customer service, to project collaboration, annotation, and gaming, the examples listed here highlight the power of the newborn medium, and in part, showcase what we can expect as the platform matures.

1. SAP Gravity: Modeling within Google Wave

Understanding the power of real-time collaboration and its relevance to clients, SAP Research in Australia (Australia) has developed a business process modeling tool called Gravity that works within Google Wave.

The sophisticated tool, which can be embedded within a Wave as a gadget, allows for team members to remotely build complex models in unison, or after catching up via playback, without having to leave Google Wave.

Gravity and Google Wave work together harmoniously to create a modeling environment that appears to be just as robust as, if not more flexible than, expensive desktop software built for the same purpose.

We think SAP is certainly on to something here, and we encourage you to watch the video demonstration of Gravity in Google Wave in action.

2. Salesforce: Google Wave for Customer Service

Salesforce, like SAP, has figured out that they can use the Google Wave platform to support client needs and tackle real-life problems. As such, Salesforce has created a Google Wave extension that clients can use to help automate, and even personalize, the customer service experience.

Watch the demonstration video to see how the Salesforce extension gives customers the ability to use Google Wave to interact with an automated support robot. Of course, customers can request assistance from a human within the Wave as well.

What makes this example stand out is the fact that not only is the Google Wave dialogue being stored as a case record within Salesforce, but, because the robot is connected to the Salesforce Service Cloud, the robot can access previously stored customer data for tailored service. Ultimately, Salesforce has found a way to potentially save clients money on customer service efforts, all the while maintaining active records, with the assistance of Google Wave.

3. Mingle: Integrated Project Collaboration

Mingle is a project management and team collaboration tool developed by ThoughtWorks Studios, who realized that they could add Mingle’s project management metadata to conversations in Google Wave.

The integration is still a work in progress, but a demonstration of the concept was highlighted at Enterprise 2.0, and the basic idea is to give Google Wave users/Mingle clients the ability to bring their Mingle task data, which takes the form of cards, into Google Wave. Existing Mingle cards can be embedded into Wave conversation threads, and new Mingle cards/tasks can be created within Google Wave.

This particular use case highlights how Google Wave can work with existing project management systems for more streamlined and cohesive communication, creating parity regardless of where the user is accessing project data.

4. Ecomm Conference: Annotating a Live Event

Just last week our CEO, Pete Cashmore, wrote about how the savvy people behind the Ecomm conference doled out Wave accounts to attendees so that they could collaborate, in real-time, to annotate presentation content. The result was arguably a much better way to consume conference content than attempting to follow hashtag tweets on Twitter (Twitter).

You can read the full account, which was documented by Charlie Osmond, on the FreshNetworks blog, but here’s an excerpt that we think drives home the utility of the use case.

“Here’s what happened: an audience member would create a Google Wave and others in the audience would edit the wave during the presentation. The result would be a crowd-sourced write-up of the presentation: a transcript of key points and a record of audience comments.”

We happen to think this particular use case is genius, especially for content-rich seminars and events where attendees are typically taking their own individual notes. With the shared Google Wave experience they can combine forces to create a more meaningful and accurate recounting of information shared in conference sessions.

5. Gamers: Google Wave RPGs

A very detailed Ars Technica post highlights that there’s a growing collection of Google Wave users who are using the medium to play wave-borne RPGs (role playing games). As mentioned in the post, there’s a even a Wave dedicated to serving as an index for all the Wave RPGs currently in existence, and the last time we counted it included upwards of 300 contributing members, and a combination of 30 different ideas or full-fledged games.

According to Jon Stokes, the author of the post, Google Wave is adequate for some RPGs, but it could certainly be improved to allow for a more enjoyable experience. In the excerpt below, Stokes describes the current RPG (RPG) experience within Google Wave:

“The few games I’m following typically have at least three waves: one for recruiting and general discussion, another for out-of-character interactions (”table talk”), and the main wave where the actual in-character gaming takes place. Individual players are also encouraged to start waves between themselves for any conversations that the GM shouldn’t be privy to. Character sheets can be posted in a private wave between a player and the GM, and character biographies can go anywhere where the other players can get access to them.

The waves are persistent, accessible to anyone who’s added to them, and include the ability to track changes, so they ultimately work quite well as a medium for the non-tactical parts of an RPG. A newcomer can jump right in and get up-to-speed on past interactions, and a GM or industrious player can constantly maintain the official record of play by going back and fixing errors, formatting text, adding and deleting material, and reorganizing posts. Character generation seems to work quite well in Wave, since players can develop the shared character sheet at their own pace with periodic feedback from the GM.”