It is encouraging to see a big increase in mobile web adoption and Google has definitely proved it has the last word when it comes to SEO. Responsive web design is the big winner of the go-mobile race and will most likely continue to gather the spoils. However, the mobile web has a lot of room for growth when it comes to strategies, user experience or conversions. The new .app top-level web domain together with WordPress’s REST API and the emerging JavaScript frameworks could definitely push things in the right direction. This year we might see a new development on the mobile web, a wave that will take us beyond responsiveness and into the promised land of web apps.
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In this article, Anya Pratskevich will share some ideas about app page design. She’ll also argue that dropping your assumptions and testing is the only way to find content that not only looks and reads great, but also helps your bottom line. The reality is that nobody knows for sure how to design for maximum conversion. What worked in one project will not necessarily work in another. What you can do is test everything: whether it is a different background color for each screenshot (worked in our case) or simply rearranging your current visuals on the page. Design optimization is a dicey game, so roll with it and have fun testing.
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Web applications are highly interactive, dynamic and performant, while websites are informational and less transient. This very rough categorization provides us with a starting point, from which to apply development and design patterns. In this article, Dmitry Nutels will show you examples that will get you to the point of being able to be a better judge of how, in your particular application, a server-side rendering solution should be approached. The evolution steps he’ll go through are hardly comprehensive, especially in the area of data retrieval on the server. There is a lot of additional work being done by tools and frameworks that have been inspired and enabled by React: Redux, Relay, Fluxible, Alt and so many, many more.
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It’s possible to make visually impressive augmented reality projects using just open source libraries. In this tutorial, Martin Sikora will make use of OpenCV in Python to detect circle-shaped objects in a webcam stream and replace them with 3D Earth in Three.js in a browser window while using WebSockets to join this all together. His core idea behind this demo was to use tools that are common on the web and don’t require any prerequisites so anyone can start using them right away. That’s why Martin wanted to use just circle detection and not pattern matching, which would require to print or have some particular real-world object.
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In this article, Shawn Jansepar will guide you through his experience in building an app for Beyond the Rack in which he and his team mix native and web content to create an app that “feels” native. With Beyond the Rack, he set out to build an app in which he could easily ship value to users without sacrificing the experience. By following an approach that puts technology in the back seat, allowing them to use the right technology for the task, they believe they have achieved just that.
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As a designer, you have the power to help millions of people live longer, healthier and happier lives. But a truly delightful and meaningful app doesn’t happen by magic. In this article, Jen Maroney presents useful examples and explains how you can achieve best results when design consumer-facing healthcare apps. She’ll explore how to plan and conduct research, design moments of delight, integrate data from third-party devices and develop a messaging matrix.
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To be successful in designing the first major Apple Watch app for launch, the entire way Cole Sletten thought about app design needed an overhaul. The patterns and processes that became standard for other devices were of little help and, in many cases, could actively hinder efforts to create a beautiful, functional and user-centric watch experience. Designing apps for the Apple Watch requires thinking in a way that’s unlike the way you design for any other device. As you get familiar with these new patterns of interaction, there is a huge opportunity for designers and brands that harness the power of this device and deliver on its promise — a seamless user experience that carefully balances information, intimacy and interruption.
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In this article, Maximiliano Firtman will review the platforms available today, what you can do on each of them, how to plan the architecture, and how to develop apps or companion services for these new devices.
Do you remember the shoe phone from Get Smart? The shoe phone you saw on TV was followed by many other wearable devices on TV. Many years later, we can say that wearable devices are here and ready to use. We, as designers and developers, need to be ready to develop successful experiences for them. Today, Maximiliano will cover the most important platforms ready to support our content and services, what we can do on them and where to start in terms of languages, SDKs and emulators.
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How do you maintain that momentum and ensure that your app keeps gaining in popularity? In this article, Ryan Bateman covers some practical approaches to keeping users interested in and using your app, including talking to your users, keep on launching features, making the first impression count and using all functionalities of the operating system. The following tips are all long-term approaches to maximizing user retention, driving daily usage and getting users hooked on your app, but they don’t have to be deployed simultaneously. Your general aim, and best approach, should simply be to demonstrate that you know and care about your users’ needs and requests.
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In this article, Jordan Crone will talk about his experience with Cross-OS mobile app development. His goal was to cut through the typical pains in the app development process and create a three-platform app in four weeks.
His team was working with Scripps, an American cable TV media company; their new business development team had been working on concepts for new, rapidly developable apps. They wanted to prove that app development could be done leanly and agilely by working quickly, eliminating unnecessary clutter, utilizing cross-device user experience similarities and leveraging web views.
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