Jodene Eikenberry
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Vulcan Labs (part of Vulcan, Inc.)
The Windows XP OS wasn't designed for a small display. This creates unique navigational and task completion challenges for an ultra mobile PC form factor. To solve some of these problems, the FlipStart software team has developed a custom software application to provide a user friendly solution for accessing email, calendar and contact information, launching software, playing music, and navigating the windows file system."
I was responsible for a redesign of the UI to solve usability issues and apply a branded visual design. Previous versions of the UI interaction model had attempted to mimic familiar desktop software functionality despite a radically different form factor. For instance, the software would be controlled using a jog dial and back button, not a keyboard and mouse. This hardware configuation made specific demands on the software's UI that hadn't been approached from a UX perspective, creating a cumbersome, inefficient and unintuitive user flow.
As with the auxilary display project, I started from scratch. Again I used task based analysis to redesign the software beginning with the information architecture. Working with the Director of Software, decisions were made to move some functionality to the Control Center (where standard keyboard/mouse input was used) and drop other features that didn't fit the interaction model. Working iteratively with the lead software developer, I completed the branded visual design as actual FlipStart prototypes became available to test the work on.
