The Problem
The current tablet application for Alarm.com mimics the design of the mobile interface. The tablet takes content from the mobile app and enlarges it without adding any more insight into the home monitoring system. The design doesn't utilize the larger screen and has empty white space on either side of the cards. Since the cards were simply enlarged, extensive scrolling is required to access additional content. The side bar has symbols that don't match those of the cards which slows down user navigation.
The current tablet application.
1) Lots of wasted white space on the larger screen shows increases need to scroll and decreases data-to-ink ratio
2) Many tiles are located lower on the page even though the entirety of the overview screen hasn't been fully utilized
3) Green symbols when a system is "disarmed" can be confused with the feel-good idea that the house is locked. The inconsistency between locked/unlocked, armed/disarmed
Our Goal
Our goal was to redesign the table app to better utilize the size and functionality of the tablet while maintaining mobility and functionality of the design. An important consideration was consistency between the new design and existing alarm.com interfaces. We determined the main functionality of the tablet included leisurely but deeper monitoring than a mobile device, mobile monitoring and check-ins, and reacting to an alarmed state.
Use Case A:
For the first use case, we considered Mr. Smith, a user who pulls out his tablet for a nightly check in. Mr. Smith has his home set up with garage door sensors and video monitors. He can access the recent activity of the whole systems in the "overview" tab, and change the state of his house with a single touch.
- System status is salient so user can easily check in on system.
- Can expand video to full screen to better utilize screen space.
- Users can view device recent activity more efficiently by pressing the recent activity button in the top corner of the tiles. This prevents users from having to manually sort and this decreases the user navigation. The icon then changes dynamically to the symbol for that card to flip back.
The overview of the home page -- white space fully utilized, prominent and salient icons for the state of the system, live and recorded video footage, efficient user navigation, intuitive grouping by device, use, and room, and organization that allows for quick and easy overview of the entire system.
Mr. Smith can then navigate into specific rooms of the house, where the sensors and video are filtered base on room. He doesn't have to search through each device's tile to find relevant information, but can instead get a room by room overview.
The recent activity tab has been modified to timeline format to relieve the cognitive load for the user.
Use Case B:
this use case follows Mr. Smith in the case of a system breach with a fully loaded configuration. This state is activated when there is an event that the device recognizes as a non trivial disruption.
The red pulsing borders surrounding recent activity associated with the break-in and the solid red borders around the videos clearly direct the user’s attention to the relevant information.
The buttons and timer allow for a quick reaction to an alarmed state; The progress bar of timer provides additional visual aid to indicate how long until the automatic police call is made giving user clarity about system status.
When system breach happens, the devices associated with the app all vibrate violently and consistently until the user interacts with the interface. If the house has a speaker system, a shrill alarm is played loudly. For normal notifications when System is Not OK or System is OK, the user receives generic android or iOS notifications that mimic the description on “recent activity.”
Mr. Smith can take his tablet with him to his son's room where together they can track the intruder by watching the recent activity and triggered videos. From the alarmed state, Mr. Smith can either confirm the break-in, in which case the police will be dispatched, or file a false alarm.
The icon indicating the countdown changes from a count down until police are automatically called to a countdown until the police actually arrive.
Use Case C:
Mrs. Smith received an Alarm.com notification, and is now checking in on the system when it is “not ok”.
The yellow pulsing indicates which devices have issues. The pulsing both diverts the user’s attention to the affected sensors as well as differentiates between the lights and devices with issue.
The yellow icons clearly differentiate an alarmed state from a state "not ok," which simply indicates there is something malfunctioning with home system. This could be a light bulb outage, a dead camera battery, a broken sensor, etc.
