Yakyak: UI Improvements ["YakYak 2.0"]

[austin-guevara]

Hi, fellow Yak-ers!

I'd say it's high time to iterate on the UI design for YakYak (not to mention update a few UX interactions that are highly counter-intuitive).

I opened this thread as a starting point for myself (and others) to share some new design concepts. This won't look like a major overhaul but will begin to develop a new design language for YakYak that moves beyond just "imitating" Hangouts.

A basic overview:

• New squared style for message bubbles, unique to YakYak
• Improved color distinction between "myself" and the other members of a conversation
• New workflow for creating new conversations and managing existing conversations
• Color tones that focus on the content (the messages), rather than the elements of the UI
• More intuitive conversation view (new messages create their own blocks)
• Minor UI and typeface tweaks to polish and improve the overall experience
• A new launch screen that makes the loading experience feel "snappier"

_I'll be posting mockups in this thread soon (over the next couple of days). Maybe some of the incredible past collaborators (who are more proficient technical developers than myself) can make this come to life once again!_

Some requested new features, that could possibly be released along with this update

• The option to reply directly to notifications
• The ability to add new members to an existing conversation
• Link previews (view linked images, videos, and GIFs within the app; website previews)
• Image zoom within the YakYak window

[averissimo]

looking forward for the mockups and discussion!! :D

[austin-guevara]

Hey again! Here are a few screens that show the updated UI. Many of these updates are not far from how things are in the current build, yet they would make for massive improvements. Take a look and leave some feedback below!

Conversation View – Rich Links
Here you can see an overview of the updated UI, as well as a concept of link previews.

Conversation View – Alerts
This screen shows an improved view for alerts (such as "this person is calling you" or "you ended a call with this person").

Start New Conversation
This demonstrates the UI when creating a new conversation, either with one person, or with an entire group.

Launch Screen
See this article for an explanation of why we should do this. The example is a bit dated, but the concept holds true. Showing the UI elements will help the launch time to feel quicker because parts of the applications have already loaded.

[austin-guevara]

@ariu any desire to take a stab at this one? 😉

[davibe]

@austin-guevara you are good.

[averissimo]

__Launch Screen__ sounds awesome and should be "easy" to implement as the previous iteration of yakyak's start-up was drawing an empty interface and waiting for the connection to hangouts

current "connecting" and "loading contact information" is there just to hide that barebone interface... changing it to have some mockup contacts could replace that with meaningful information

[stale[bot]]

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