Gaming the Android OS for Improving the Design of Smartphone Launchers

Gaming the Android OS for Improving the Design of Smartphone Launchers

Matthias Böhmer and Antonio KrügerUbiquitous Media Technologies LabDFKI GmbH // Saarland University

Workshop on Informing Future Designs via Large-scale Research Methods and Big DataMobileHCI 2013, Munich, Germany

Böhmer and Krüger, CHI 2013

How fast can people launch their apps?

Study by implementing tasks within application

Study by collecting data through system APIs

Study by observing usage of system UI

App runs in foreground.Study tasks contained in app.

App may run in background.Collecting data through APIs.

Observing transitionsbetween app and system UI.

Related work: e.g. in-game feedback (McMillan et al. 2010); off-screen visualization (Henze et al. 2010), touch precision (Henze et al. 2011); adoption of NFC (Kranz et al. 2013)

Related work: e.g. work on app usage (Böhmer et al. 2011), work on battery charging behavior (Ferreira et al. 2011), AppAware (Girardello & Michahelles 2010)

New approach: chosen for this work

Wanna play? Go http://rappidly.org

Preliminary Findings

- Available on Google Play since June 2012- More than 590 installations, 41 users shared data- 304 rounds played with 164 different apps

- On average user has played 7.41 rounds (SD 19.90, min 1, max 128)

- On average 5.66 seconds to find apps (SD 4.46)- On the lower end: note taking apps (1.20 to 2 seconds)- Maximum search time: Facebook (40.65 sec).

Discussion and Future Work

- Make game more engaging to grow larger?- What makes a difference in app search time?

- App usage behavior, e.g. most used apps faster? - Icon arrangement, e.g. the more folders the slower?- Launcher design, e.g. the more icons the slower? - Icon design, e.g. red icons can be found faster?- Device models, e.g. tablets slower than phones?- Screen sizes, e.g. the bigger the slower?

- Extendable to other research questions?

Matthias Böhmermatthias.boehmer@dfki.deWanna play? Go http://rappidly.org

Gaming the Android OS for Improving the Design of Smartphone Launchers

Study by observing usage of system UI