Interface Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

Apple patent reveals scrollable menus, toolbars for OS X Lion

by Mike Schramm (Nov 8th, 2010)

Apple has filed a patent featuring some concepts for scrollable menus and toolbars that could eventually be used in the next version of OS X, 10.7 Lion. The new patent covers all kinds of things, from extra UI elements in the OS X desktop to special iOS menus and features. But they all look like ...

Artist creates real-life home icon

by Mike Schramm (Nov 3rd, 2010)

Artist Johannes P. Osterhoff (whom you may remember from his paintings using OS X elements) has been reusing Apple's interface elements again. His latest project is a real-life construction of the Home icon from OS X, which he's made into a wearable display. The doors and shutters are actually ...

TUAW's Daily App: FlightBoard

by Mike Schramm (Oct 18th, 2010)

I can't say I'm a huge traveler -- even though I've hit up quite a few conventions this year for work, I haven't been flying so much that I need to keep tabs on what's going on at the airport. But I like the idea of FlightBoard anyway. It's an app that will automatically create a departing flights ...

Blind user explains why he loves the iPhone

by Mike Schramm (Sep 20th, 2010)

Here's a wild little story that made its way around the blogonets this past weekend -- it was originally posted in June, but it got recirculated on Twitter, and we first heard it from Steve Troughton-Smith. Austin Seraphin is a blind person, and he says that getting an iPhone changed his life ...

Ping reaches a million, attacked by spam

by Mike Schramm (Sep 7th, 2010)

Apple's new social network, Ping, has been around for about a week now, and all of the pundits have had their chance at weighing in on what Apple got wrong and right. And what's the result? Not bad, but not great -- more than a million people joined the network in just 48 hours. That's not terrible ...

iPort: Wall-mounted home automation for iPad

by Mike Schramm (Aug 20th, 2010)

I have already seen the iPad used in home automation -- Savant is using an iPad app to hook up to some of their home automation systems, using Apple's tablet to control the TV, a whole entertainment system, or even do some remote control of house lights or HVAC, or even monitor cameras remotely ...

TUAW's Daily App: RunMonster

by Mike Schramm (May 27th, 2010)

There are quite a few "run tracker" apps in the App Store (I know our own Erica Sadun is a big fan of RunKeeper). However, RunMonster is also worth a look, if only because it's just plain gorgeous. It lets you do all of the usual things: track your runs and bike rides, keep stats on your workouts, ...

Open source video blimp controlled by an iPad

by Mike Schramm (May 18th, 2010)

So far, we've seen a car, a helicopter, and even a Dalek controlled by an Apple device, so here's another form of transportation: a blimp, this time controlled by an iPad. Bonus points for making the video interesting and fun, too -- we get a well-edited and shot video montage of how the iPad got ...

Chloe the Corgi, meet iPad

by Mike Schramm (Apr 15th, 2010)

Well, we've already introduced a cat to the iPad, so a dog would naturally follow, right? Tested.com tried their best to bring their corgi Chloe (I really love corgis, ever since Cowboy Bebop) to the iPad, but as you can see in the video above, she doesn't take to it quite as well as Iggy the cat ...

Hands-on: Savant shows off their iPad interface

by Mike Schramm (Apr 9th, 2010)

Savant AV brought their iPad road tour to a location that happens to be pretty close to me in Irvine, California. So, I headed down there to take a look at their brand new iPad app, an interface for wirelessly controlling their high-end home automation systems. The company helps dealers put ...

TUAW First Look: Digg's iPhone app

by Mike Schramm (Mar 25th, 2010)

Digg released its official iPhone app this morning, and after playing with it for a little while, I can tell you that it does what it says on the box: it will let you browse, interact, and comment on the popular news aggregator without many problems (there was one major issue -- I'll mention it in ...

Aqua scrollbar art

by Mike Schramm (Mar 6th, 2010)

I love these bits of art by Anders Clauson featuring iconography from the old Aqua OS X interface -- obviously it's not a straight representation of the actual interface, but instead, it's kind of a weird deconstruction of the scrollbars. There's one that's just a random desktop screenshot, and ...

BumpTop offers a 3D desktop on your Mac

by Mike Schramm (Jan 20th, 2010)

I've never really gotten into the whole 3D file navigation thing (ever since "It's a Unix system! I know this!", it's seemed pretty corny), but BumpTop might be the exception I've been waiting for. It's a 3D overlay for your OS X desktop that turns files into 3D objects to move around, pin on the ...

Apple updates patent for magic wand remote

by Mike Schramm (Dec 31st, 2009)

Apple has updated a patent that they already held featuring a sort of a Magic Wand -- a remote control for operating a media system by controlling an on-screen cursor. That might sound familiar if you own a Wii -- even the pictures look very similar to the way the Wiimote currently works. And the ...

Survey: Less than half of touchscreen users prefer touchscreen

by Mike Schramm (Nov 4th, 2009)

Here's a few interesting stats from a survey recently conducted in Europe. These aren't specifically about the iPhone, but given that smartphones relied on buttons almost exclusively before Apple's handheld came along (and nowadays, everyone's bragging about their touchscreen technology), a ...