Design Digest #1
Insights and updates from In The Pocket's Product & Design team
🔬 In The Pocket Insight
A glimpse in our way of working
Gaining user insights through diary research
These days, designing and building digital products goes hand in hand with user research. In our experience it only leads to better products that are more successful. However, doing research in a controlled environment can lead to less natural responses. Test subjects are not in their natural habitat and might respond a bit differently than when you would ask the same question while they’re going about their day.
A great tool to get much closer to what your users are really doing and thinking is diary research. We’ve had great experience with engaging test users through Whatsapp by asking them questions, letting them share voice notes and pictures about a product they’re using. We recently partnered with VTM Go to get insights into people's streaming behaviour and got some great insights that will help them further shape their roadmap.
‍
đź’ˇ Did you know?
App Shortcuts
When the unfortunate moment comes when a user decides to delete your app, it’s a great time to ask for feedback. Did you know you can add shortcuts when pressing down on an app icon. Here you can place a custom shortcut button to capture user feedback right before they delete your app.
‍
🛠️ Tooltips
Everything new in our favourite tools
Annotations in Figma DevMode
Figma's DevMode is going out of beta on January 31st. Together with the official launch, they are also introducing a big new feature: Annotations.
With annotations you can add measurements, properties or custom notes with a single click. What’s great, the annotations will update when you update your design, so you don’t have to manually update documentation. With the new API, you can also automate creating or managing annotations.
Native 3D on iOS from Spline
Spline is adding native 3D support for iOS, iPadOS, macOS and visionOS. This allows you to create a 3D object or scene and use it directly in your apps similar to how you would use a Rive or Lottie animation. You can even generate an app from Spline, so you can publish your 3D experience directly to the App Store.
Stark updates
Our favourite accessibility tool launched a bunch of new features: single click ticket creation for accessibility issues, redesigned design annotations and accessibility notes to add screen reader documentation.
Linearity Move
A brand new motion tool, Linearity Move was launched this month. It’s a great alternative to After Effects to animate illustrations, brand assets or social media posts from the makers of Linearity Curve, which in turn is an alternative to Illustrator.
‍
🆕 New at In The Pocket
New Venly app makes web3 user-friendly
Venly provides Web3 technologies to developers and enables users to manage their coins and tokens in the Venly Wallet. In The Pocket designed and developed the new Venly app (iOS & Android), where users can authenticate transactions with biometrics and check their transaction history. The design language in the app reflects the cutting edge and futuristic visuals that is the bread and butter of the Web3 age.
We focused a lot on delight and simplicity during the design process. Because the app contains a lot of new and complex technologies, it was our goal to make it as easy to understand as possible. There’s a lot that can go wrong on the blockchain, like losing your NFTs or sending funds to the wrong address. Designing the flows correctly while keeping it user-friendly was crucial.
‍
‍
Shift Report 2024
Our annual report on the cutting edge trends in digital, tech and business has been launched again and it’s full of interesting design insights. Allow us to inspire you with some of the design-focused wisdom that is inside the 96-page report:
- The need for UX design as a response to the tidal wave of AI technologies that is springing up all around us
- The design flaws inherent in some spatial computing platforms that are on the market today
- How you should design digital experiences after the European Accessibility Act goes into effect
- How interface design can transform the general AI prompt into a more usable and accessible tool for interacting with intelligent products
‍
đź“° What you might have missed
Updates on In The Pocket Design
New Figma Plugins
We continuously add new content to In The Pocket Design, we recently added new Figma plugins on our Plugins page. Check them out to discover what plugins we are using to improve our workflow.