Macadamian’s Jean-Francois Morin (right) used Web Real-Time Communication technology today in Ottawa to activate a browser-to-browser video call from a laptop to an Android tablet held by Macadamian’s Doug Michaelides during WebRTC: Transforming Enterprise Communication. Experts agreed immediate customer service opportunities exist for content providers, contact centres and online retailers.

 A transcript of the event will be made avaliable in the coming weeks. Please stay tuned to our blog for more information on WebRTC.

Listen to this sample audio clip from the podcast!

This is the first of four instalments in our audio podcast series titled, The UX Power Tools Behind Compelling Software -- featuring one of Macadamian's all-star user experience researchers, Anneliis Tosine, and user experience designers, Sara Fortier.We kick off the series by drilling down on the critical importace of task-based personas.

Task-based personas capture the motivations and behaviors of a group of users, as well as the actions those users need to take, when interacting with a software product.

They play an essential role in demystifying the outcomes users are trying to achieve so software teams can create incredible user experiences.

In this exclusive audio podcast we delve into task-based personas to help you:

• prioritize and focus choices about product features and design;
• pinpoint user needs to distinguish apps in the marketplace;
• discover radical innovation opportunities.

You probably know WebRTC enables instant video, voice and text communications, as well as screen-sharing, between Internet browsers – without the trouble of proprietary software plug-ins. This is great news for Macadamian and anyone else like us who’s in the business of building amazing customer experiences. I believe WebRTC has the X-factor that’s going to shake things up. It’s going to humanize Web software and enrich the nature of interactions between people online and on mobile. 

(Left to right) Hugh Finnan, director of product management, Google Chrome, and Todd Simpson, chief of innovation, Mozilla, demo the first WebRTC video chat between Firefox and Chrome. Watch the video.

We are much more visual than we think. Before I expand on that thought let’s consider the 7%-38%-55% rule. Back in the late ‘60s a smart guy named Albert Mehrabian discovered that only 7% of people’s perceptions of you are based on the actual words you speak. The other 93% of people’s perceptions of you are formed from your tone of voice (38%) and body language (55%).

Why is this important and what’s in it for you?

WebRTC is all about creating more meaningful and authentic experiences. Since experiences are about feeding input to our senses, visual interaction potential is about to be unleashed with the accessibility of WebRTC. It’s inspiring a culture shift where people connect easily, spontaneously and naturally, and free of barriers, in ways we never dreamed. Imagine consumers browsing your company’s website and activating instant chats with you or your staff. The best customer experiences will result from your ability to convey awesome verbal and – you guessed it – non-verbal communications, especially in light of the live video chat capabilities of WebRTC.

The bottom line for businesses is that this is a chance to build stronger relationships with customers and gain an advantage in today’s competitive marketplace.

If you happen to be in Ottawa on May 23, we’re hosting an event in collaboration with the Ottawa Product Management Association titled, WebRTC: Transforming Enterprise Communication. I encourage you to learn more and register at www.WebRTCOttawa.com.

It’s going to be very interesting to see how WebRTC pans out in the years to come. One thing is for sure: you can count on Macadamian being in the know and ready to offer insights on this innovation.

Here are some great articles and links on WebRTC along with a story describing Mehrabian’s study:

• WebRTC - official website
• WebRTC Conference & Expo, June 25-27, 2013
• Businesses need to explore Firefox, Chrome's WebRTC to bolster services and cut costs
•  5 Threats that Could Derail WebRTC
•  A wakeup call for start-ups: WebRTC video built into the Web
• WebRTC, Online Code Editor Team Up for Real-Time Coding
•  Macadamian WebRTC Media Release
•  Macadamian May 23 Event Registration in Ottawa - WebRTC: Transforming Enterprise Communications
• Psychology Today - Is Nonverbal Communication a Numbers Game?

App A

App B

App C

App D

Did you guess? Here’s the answer in case you didn’t:

Evernote

Facebook

Twitter

Yelp

All those screenshots were taken on iOS. In this familiar, consistent environment, the 4 applications are easily recognizable as their own individual brands.

What happens to that brand identity when you start moving the applications to different platforms? What do you preserve?

Let’s see:

BB10

Web version

Windows 8 Version

Android

From those screengrabs, we can see that the Twitter look and feel is very consistent between the web version, the iOS version and the Blackberry 10 version. When we move to the Android and Windows Phone 8, the choice was made to move closer to the platform look and feel and a little further away from the twitter look and feel.

When you choose to do that, You have to use a more subtle way to express your branding. You have to be consistent with your color schemes, typography, icons and hopefully, you can squeeze your logo in there. But is that enough?

Looking at the Android and Windows Phone 8 applications, would they still be as recognizable if I went into photoshop and did the same thing to them that I did to the iOS app?

Why did they choose to stick to their iOS branding for BB10 but not for WP8 and Android? Is it because the platform is so new? Is it because Android users get upset when you give them an app that looks like an iOS app?

After 24 hours of nonstop coding and designing some amazing applications were created.

Others

We're currently ramping up for the second annual MacHack, our intense 24-hour application development marathon. It's a great way for us to have fun and stay current on the latest development and design techniques and trends. This year a total of 60 Macadamian staff members are participating simultaneously from our four global offices located in Gatineau, California's Silicon Valley, Yerevan in Armenia and Cluj-Napoca in Romania. The event kicks off Saturday, April 13 at 8 a.m. ET.

Follow us on Twitter  to get live updates as our teams dream up, demo and deliver a slick pack of drool-worthy apps -- from scratch, in just 24 hours. Each product must be themed on at least one of these categories: BlackBerry 10, big data and the cloud. All the apps are judged and winners get some cool prizes. We'll be tweeting with the hashtag #MacHack.

Tell us what kind of apps you'd like to see!

Sara Fortier and Susan Hosking from Macadamian’s Silicon Valley Innovation Lab are joining me on site at Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park on April 6 and 7 for the fourth annual PhotoHack Day. Our team was invited based on our extensive experience designing apps for Windows 8. We’ll be offering our expertise during this exciting coding marathon. The event brings together some of the most talented developers and designers who have a passion for creating outstanding applications using Web and mobile photo APIs. Different teams compete to create and showcase their innovative apps. Macadamian is offering an hour-long workshop and design review session to select PhotoHack winners as part of the event prizing.

Hope to see you there!

10 per cent of errors related to Electronic Healthcare Records lead to unsafe conditions for patients. These errors are generally due to “the ways healthcare providers interact with technology,” according to a study by the Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority.

>> Listen now to our audio podcast, “EHRs: Secrets of Successful Usability”

I recently co-presented on the topic of EHR usability at the 2013 Healthcare & Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference in New Orleans. The session was titled, Top 10 Usability Myths Debunked!  We were overwhelmed by the attendance – vendors, clinicians, hospital administrators and nursing informatics professionals were just some of the attendees. It was such a hot topic that HIMSS invited us to present a second session to accommodate demand.  

In speaking with several people after the presentation, it is apparent that many are dealing with a lack of usability and proper design in the EHRs they’re working with daily -- and they’re looking for ways to improve them.

Many clinicians were desperate to find out what they could do to improve the usability of EHRs that have already been implemented. We received lots of comments and nods of agreement regarding workflow. Understanding multiple clinicians’ workflows, and the intersection of those workflows, is key to creating an EHR that works and adds value. It’s not just about the physician. You must also understand the nurses, pharmacists and respiratory therapists’ roles and tasks too!

We expand on our HIMSS presentation in an exclusive audio podcast titled, EHRs: Secrets of Successful Usability, providing strategic insights and practical advice that can help you create incredible EHR user experiences to benefit patients, physicians, hospitals and clinics.

Within the context of EHR user experience you’ll learn how to:

• use mobile devices efficiently and effectively;
• improve patient privacy;
• leverage “big data”.

Go BlackBerry Go!

Though providers are not required to follow the Stage 2 requirements until 2014, vendors should take steps now to position their products for success and comply with these new guidelines. Here's a summary of what's involved, with excerpts from the official documentation.

Where Do We Start?

The certification requires that you perform Summative Usability Testing on specific areas of the product, following a formal User Centered Design (UCD) process. 

The essential document to read in detail is NISTIR 7742 Customized Common Industry Format Template for EHR Usability Testing. It outlines how the ONC recommends you document all of the results of your summative usability testing.

What Is Summative Usability Testing?

Summative usability testing is comprised of having representative users walk through a series of tasks and measuring the amount of time to complete the task, how many and what type of errors occur, and satisfaction with the task interaction.

The goal is to benchmark the current usability of an interface—as measured by things like task times, completion rates and satisfaction scores. 

Summative testing is typically carried out by a user experience design professional who runs the tests one-on-one with representative users of the system, one at a time. 

What's Required?

You will need to submit the information specified in the NISTIR 7742 template, for each and every one of the applicable eight certification criteria specified in this certification criterion and for which certification is sought.

The following information/sections in NISTIR 7742 are required for submission:

• Name and version of the product
• Date and location of the test
• Test environment
• Description of the intended users
• Total number of participants
• Description of participants: their experience and demographic characteristics
• Description of the user tasks that were tested
• List of the specific metrics captured during the testing for effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction
• Data scoring
• Results of the test and data analysis
• Major test findings
• Identified area(s) of improvement(s)

According to the ONC, there are illustrative tables on pages 11 and 20 of the NIST 7742 document that may not need to be populated, depending on the tasks tested. All of the sections specified above must to be completed, including ‘‘major findings’’ and ‘‘areas for improvement.’’ EHR developers can perform many iterations of summative user testing. Thus, the submission that is ultimately provided for testing and certification may be the expression of a final iteration in which few areas for improvement would be identified.

What Are the 8 Areas Of Focus?

• § 170.314(a)(1) (CPOE);
• § 170.314(a)(2) (Drug- drug, drug-allergy interaction checks);
• § 170.314(a)(6) (Medication list);
• § 170.314(a)(7) (Medication allergy list);
• § 170.314(a)(8) (Clinical decision support);
• § 170.314(a)(16) (Electronic medication administration record);
• § 170.314(b)(3) (Electronic prescribing);
• § 170.314(b)(4) (Clinical information reconciliation). 

The test procedures to cover these areas is explained in detail here.

How are the Results Captured?

Use the Customized Common Industry Format Template for EHR Usability Testing (NISTIR 7742). The form and format for how the data is presented for testing does not necessarily need to be according to NISTIR 7742 (i.e., an EHR technology developer could capture information specified in NISTIR 7742 without having to use the template).

What's Out of Scope?

NISTIR 7804 ‘‘Technical Evaluation, Testing and Validation of the Usability of Electronic Health Records" is not included in the 2014 Edition EHR certification criteria, but the ONC may consider it for future editions of certification criteria.

Which UCD Methodology Should be Used?

The methods for how an EHR developer could employ UCD are well defined in documents and requirements such as ISO 9241–11, ISO 13407, ISO 16982, and NISTIR 7741. ISO/IEC 62366 and ISO 9241–210 are also acceptable alternatives.

If you are working with a User-Centered Design consultant, ask which methodology they will be using. The ONC strongly advises EHR developers select an industry standard process because compliance with this certification criterion requires submission of the name, description, and citation (URL and/or publication citation) of the process that was selected.

This certification criterion is a first step toward formal usability testing becoming part of the culture of EHR technology development. At a minimum, only lab- based summative testing is necessary to be performed in order to demonstrate compliance with this certification criterion. However, the ONC notes that nothing precludes field- testing and formative testing from also being performed and we encourage EHR developers to do so.

For more information on how Macadamian can help, contact us at software@macadamian.com.

WebRTC generated an impressive amount of buzz at this year's Mobile World Congress, with Ericsson, Mozilla and AT&T demoing their WebRTC proof of concepts. What is all the excitement all about ? WebRTC offers the ability to transform the nature of how we communicate through the integration of real-time communications (voice, video, and text) into web applications without requiring plug-ins. WebRTC is a game changer, and it's no wonder that industry analysts are predicting that 1.5 billion devices will be using WebRTC by the end of 2014. But, as with any cutting-edge technology in the early stages, there are gaps.

At Macadamian, we've been buzzing about WebRTC since a world-leading telecom company asked us to help them integrate it with their Unified Communication system (PSTN, Cell network, and SIP phones.While WebRTC is very exciting, the framework is still in development, and there are some barriers that need to be addressed in order to integrate WebRTC in your web application. 

Here are a list of the top five challenges we have run into to date, and some tips and tricks to solve them. 

 1.     Limited use of ICE

WebRTC uses Interactive Connectivity Establishment (ICE) for Network Address Translation (NAT) traversal. ICE is a good choice because it helps two peers find the best transport to communicate. ICE itself isn't the issuee. The challenge is that there aren't many other devices/technologies that use ICE. This creates issues when it comes time for WebRTC to use ICE to communicate with a non-ICE client. 

Solution. You can solve this problem by using a middleman. You create software to establish communication with the WebRTC client using ICE and establish the communication with the non-WebRTC client without using ICE. This will let the two clients talk to each other without any problems.

 2.     Use of  an Uncommon Codec

WebRTC doesn't employ many of the most common codecs such as g.729, which is used in Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP). Due to licensing issues, VP8 was chosen for the video codec over the more popular h.264. The latter would have been a better choice for mobile devices, since recent versions of Android and iPhone have hardware decoding for h.264 but not for VP8. 

Solution. The solution required to address this challenge  is a transcoding server which will transcode VP8 into the more popular codecs.

 3.     SIP-like Client Integration

If you are looking to integrate with other SIP-like clients, you will encounter challenges with the Session Description Protocol (SDP). WebRTC makes use of specific RFCs. The challenge is that it may be missing RFCs that are critical to your environment. 

Solution. Currently, in order to integrate WebRTC functionality in your  existing UC system, the SDP messages that flow between the client and server will need to be modified.

 4.     Incompatibility with Legacy Phone Systems

The choice to use out-band DTMF (Dual Tone Multiple Frequency) makes WebRTC incompatible with legacy phone systems. Out-band DTMF tones are carried on a separate signalling channel, not the voice circuit. The majority of PBXs require in-band DTMF.

Solution. To solve this problem, you need to use a server that detects out-band DTMF from one client, and then insert the equivalent in-band DTMF for the other client.

 5.      Challenge: Lack of support legacy web browsers

Users with older browsers won't be able to use WebRTC. Currently, the only browsers that support WebRTC are Chrome, and an upcoming Firefox beta. The most elegant solution would be for every user to upgrade, but that's not going to happen. 

Solution. You're going to want your users who don’t upgrade to be able to take advantage of your RTC functionality, so what alternative can be considered ? An alternative option is to implement a browser plug-in such as a Flash application or Java applet.

Notice a theme in the challenges identified? Many of these issues stem from the fact that WebRTC is a forward-looking technology that does not sync with legacy systems, and that most of the solutions require a translator that sits between the two clients and enables them talk to each other. For now, WebRTC requires some workarounds for interoperability with legacy UC systems. Despite the challenges, it's time to think about how your organization can best leverage WebRTC to drive revenue and market advantage. The industry specificiation is coming, and it is bound to be a game-changer – industry leaders such as Google, Ericsson, Mozilla, and AT&T have begun investing heavily in the technology. As you begin to explore WebRTC strategy, we hope that these solutions help you avoid some of the major pitfalls.

If you'd like to find out more about WebRTC, or get a free assessment of your WebRTC project, contact us at software@macadamian.com.

In this exclusive audio podcast Macadamian's director of engineering, Tony Hooper, and director of user experience design, Jennifer Fraser, speak to the realities of creating apps for today's fragmented mobile market.

They outline three core challenges everyone encounters creating mobile apps and offer practical design tips and technical advice. 

In less than 10 min. you'll get insights to help you: 

• adapt apps to fit multiple mobile ecosystems;
   
• deliver a consistent brand identity and customer experience;
   
• handle HTML5, responsive design and gestures for mobile.

Click here to access the podcast.

 To acess all session clips, visit our YouTube channel by clicking HERE

To acess all session clips, visit our YouTube channel by clicking HERE