Do you think phones for elderly people always will need to have physical buttons? What about a customisable touchscreen smartphone where you can put virtual buttons with pictures of family members to tap for calling them on the home screen for example and lock all unwanted functions?

Designing dedicated physical devices for any special group of people is always going to be very costly for the hardware providers and these devices will never get as much attention as the manufacturer’s mainstream models. A software solution on a mainstream device is much cheaper and more customisable for the specific needs of the individual. It also removes the stigma attached to a “special needs” device.

Of course, the hardware issues, e.g. remembering to charge the battery, as mentioned here would not be solved with a smartphone as such, but these problems could be solved with peripheral hardware, which is cheaper to build than a whole new phone model. With the wifi/bluetooth/NFC capabilities of a smartphone, the phones can communicate anything to any device. Plus they can offer so many more intelligent services for monitoring and alerting for example.

I have recently done a research project with older users (only up to 72 years of age, so not the typical target audience for the phones described here), who used an iPhone for the first time. They found the iPhone easier to learn than their own phone with its deep menus (again, they weren’t special senior phones but normal button operated feature phones) and they also found the touchscreen more pleasant to operate than their phone with its small and fiddly buttons.

I personally think that the way forward is an inclusive design of mobile devices which are operable by a wide audience rather than specialised devices for small groups, similar to the approach of accessibility on websites.

I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on this.

My name is Mona from Egypt,,I study in computer science and will do mobile application about Transportation project, If you do not have any mind to send to me details about your application of transportation, please i want to know if you face any problem in your application,

Thanks in advance

At first, i wanted to say that Amazon probably does not supply the return label to save on those expenses which add to shareholders wealth and save trees. You know they make all their decisions based on tons of data, but it is interesting to think about the alternative. Including the label in anticipation of a return.

It would be interesting to learn the amount of returns frontlineshop recv’s vs. Amazon.

Anyway, I don’t see a big issue with the Addressbook’s new appearance, yet. The way it works seems to be identical to the old addressbook. However, I had wished Apple had invested the time in improving the interaction design instead of changing the visual design.
This new style just seems to be a skin – nothing more.