Palm OS User Interface Guidelines [pdf, 2003]

Number of Pages: 186 # Palm OS ® User Interface Guidelines CONTRIBUTORS Written by Jean Ostrem Engineering contributions by Bob Ebert, Roger Flores, JB Parrett, Jesse Donaldson, Ron Fernandez, David...

Number of Pages: 186 # Palm OS ® User Interface Guidelines CONTRIBUTORS Written by Jean Ostrem Engineering contributions by Bob Ebert, Roger Flores, JB Parrett, Jesse Donaldson, Ron Fernandez, David Fedor, Greg Wilson, Clif Liu, Brian Maas, Ezekiel Sanborn De Asis, Brent Gossett, and Maurice Sharp Special thanks to Catherine E. White, Neil Rhodes, Julie McKeehan, Alexander Hinds, and Lee Fyock Copyright © 2003, PalmSource, Inc. and its affiliates. All rights reserved. This documentation may be printed and copied solely for use in developing products for Palm OS ® software. In addition, two (2) copies of this documentation may be made for archival and backup purposes. Except for the foregoing, no part of this documentation may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means or used to make any derivative work (such as translation, transformation or adaptation) without express written consent from PalmSource, Inc. PalmSource, Inc. reserves the right to revise this documentation and to make changes in content from time to time without obligation on the part of PalmSource, Inc. to provide notification of such revision or changes. PALMSOURCE, INC. AND ITS SUPPLIERS MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES THAT THE DOCUMENTATION IS FREE OF ERRORS OR THAT THE DOCUMENTATION IS SUITABLE FOR YOUR USE. THE DOCUMENTATION IS PROVIDED ON AN "AS IS" BASIS. PALMSOURCE, INC. AND ITS SUPPLIERS MAKE NO WARRANTIES, TERMS OR CONDITIONS, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, EITHER IN FACT OR BY OPERATION OF LAW, STATUTORY OR OTHERWISE, INCLUDING WARRANTIES, TERMS, OR CONDITIONS OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, AND SATISFACTORY QUALITY. TO THE FULL EXTENT ALLOWED BY LAW, PALMSOURCE, INC. ALSO EXCLUDES FOR ITSELF AND ITS SUPPLIERS ANY LIABILITY, WHETHER BASED IN CONTRACT OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE), FOR DIRECT, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, INDIRECT, SPECIAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES OF ANY KIND, OR FOR LOSS OF REVENUE OR PROFITS, LOSS OF BUSINESS, LOSS OF INFORMATION OR DATA, OR OTHER FINANCIAL LOSS ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THIS DOCUMENTATION, EVEN IF PALMSOURCE, INC. OR ITS SUPPLIERS HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. Palm OS, Palm Computing, HandFAX, HandSTAMP, HandWEB, Graffiti, HotSync, iMessenger, MultiMail, Palm.Net, PalmPak, PalmConnect, PalmGlove, PalmModem, PalmPoint, PalmPrint, and PalmSource are registered trademarks of PalmSource, Inc. or its affiliates. Palm, the Palm logo, MyPalm, PalmGear, PalmPix, PalmPower, AnyDay, EventClub, HandMAIL, the HotSync logo, Palm Powered, the Palm trade dress, Smartcode, Simply Palm, ThinAir, WeSync, and Wireless Refresh are trademarks of PalmSource, Inc. or its affiliates. All other product and brand names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. IF THIS DOCUMENTATION IS PROVIDED ON A COMPACT DISC, THE OTHER SOFTWARE AND DOCUMENTATION ON THE COMPACT DISC ARE SUBJECT TO THE LICENSE AGREEMENT ACCOMPANYING THE COMPACT DISC. L Palm OS User Interface Guidelines Document Number 3101-001-HW February 24, 2003 For the latest version of this document, visit http://www.palmos.com/dev/support/docs/. PalmSource, Inc. 1240 Crossman Avenue Sunnyvale, CA 94089 USA www.palmsource.com Palm OS User Interface Guidelines iii Table of Contents About This Document ix Why Follow Guidelines?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix How This Book Is Organized . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi What This Book Does Not Cover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi Additional Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xii 1 Palm OS Application Design 1 2 Fitting In 23 User Interaction with Palm Powered Handhelds . . . . . . . 23 Graffiti or Graffiti 2 Writing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 Onscreen Keyboard. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 HotSync Operation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 Hard Keys. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 Icons in the Input Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 External Keyboard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Application Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Integrating with the Application Launcher . . . . . . . . . . 26 Application Icons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 Version String . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 iv Palm OS User Interface Guidelines Default Application Category . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 General Application Layout Guidelines . . . . . . . . . . . 30 Main Application Forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 Control Placement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 Labels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 Fonts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 Graphical Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 Custom Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 Application Categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 General Application Behavior Guidelines . . . . . . . . . . 39 Launching the Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 Exiting the Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Supporting Global Find . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 Respecting User Preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Allowing System Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Becoming Compatible Worldwide . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 3 Forms 45 Choosing between Types of Forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 Use Modal Forms Sparingly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47 Avoid Modal Forms for Lengthy Data Entry . . . . . . . . 47 Modeless Forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 Modal Forms. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 Alert Dialogs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 Types of Alerts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 Progress Dialogs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 Palm OS User Interface Guidelines v About Dialogs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Tips Dialogs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69 4 Executing Commands 71 Choosing between Buttons and Menus . . . . . . . . . . . 71 Limit the Total Number of Commands . . . . . . . . . . 72 Use Buttons for Important Tasks . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Use Menus for Destructive Commands . . . . . . . . . . 74 Don't Duplicate Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Remember the Goal: Minimize Taps . . . . . . . . . . . 75 Use Buttons for Commands Executed by New Users . . . . 77 Don't Provide Save or Exit Commands . . . . . . . . . . 77 Command Buttons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 Menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 5 Presenting Options 99 Choosing Which Element to Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99 Choosing Several of Many Options . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 Choosing One from Many Options . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 Implementing a Combo Box . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104 Check Boxes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106 Pop-Up Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112 Push Buttons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118 Selector Triggers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120 vi Palm OS User Interface Guidelines Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120 Sliders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124 6 Displaying Data 127 Choosing Which Element to Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127 Fields . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136 Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144 7 Scrolling 147 Choosing between Scroll Bars and Scroll Buttons . . . . . . . 147 Scroll Bars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 Scroll Buttons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 System Supplied Behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 Look and Feel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155 Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156 8 Color and Graphics 159 Palm OS Color Support . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159 Colors of User Interface Elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 Graphics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161 Palm OS User Interface Guidelines vii A Ten Things to Remember 163 Index 167 viii Palm OS User Interface Guidelines Palm OS User Interface Guidelines ix About This Document This book describes how to design applications for Palm Powered ™handhelds so that they conform to PalmSource, Inc's user interface guidelines. Read it if you are an application designer or a developer and you are considering creating applications that run on