We believe that the first impression matters, especially when it comes to introducing a new product for the first time. Our aim is to delight the user from the moment they open the box, through to the setup wizard which will help them get started with their new device.
Devices have become an essential part of our everyday lives. We choose carefully the ones we want to adopt, taking into account all manner of factors that influence our lifestyle and how we conduct our everyday tasks. So when buying a totally new product, with unfamiliar software, or from a new brand, you want to make the first impression count in order to seduce and reassure the user that this product is for them.
The out of the box experience (OOBE) is one of the most important categories of software usability. It essentially says how easy your software is to use, as well as introducing the user into your brand through visual design and tone of voice, which can convey familiarity and trust within your product.
How did we do it?
We started to look at research around users’ past experiences when setting up a new device and there feelings about the whole process. We also took a look at what our competitors were doing, taking into account current patterns and trends in the market.
After gathering research we started to simplify as much as possible the OOBE workflow, taking into consideration the good and the bad things. Once we had analysed this, we started to define the design goals for the project, which included:
- design for seduction
- simplicity
- introduce the brand through design
- transform the setup wizard
What did we change?
In order to create a consistent experience across all devices, we drew together common first experiences found on mobile, tablet and desktop, these included:
- choosing a language
- Wifi setup
- choosing a Time Zone
- choosing a lock screen option
One of the major changes we wanted to achieve was to give the user the same experience across all devices, moving us closer to achieving a seamless convergent platform.
What did we achieve?
We achieved our main aim in creating the same visual experience across all devices.
Primary and secondary screens
We defined two types of screens: Primary screen (left), Secondary screen (right)
The secondary screens created more space for forms, which helped us define a consistent and intuitive animation between screens.
Dialogs
All dialogs were transformed – where possible – into full screen dialogs. We kept them to only communicate confirmation or error messages.
Desktop installer
The desktop installer was simplified and modernized for a less time consuming experience.
The implementation of the OOBE has already begun and we cannot wait for you to open the box and experience it on your new Ubuntu device.
UX Designer: Andreea Pirvu
Visual Designer: Grazina Borosko
What release are you targeting to debut this OOBE?
Are those buttons [1] what all buttons made using the SDK will look like? Although less unique, they look much better than the old ones :)
[1] http://design.canonical.com/wp-content/uploads/photo_2015-09-28_14-29-46.jpg
Very reminiscent of Windows 8 or 10. I don’t like, I don’t like minimalism. Ubuntu needs to go its own way and not try to copy Windows and to try to please Windows users. Horrible!
As am already using ubuntu after ditching windows it just looks awesome great if i can see this in future versions like in 16.04 LTS ubnutu
Looks awesome. Ubuntu has always looked like smeared poop. Not anymore.
Nice article. I am always interested in the creative process, so thanks for sharing.
When I thought Canonical designers were rubbish this comes out of the box!
Awesome!!!
I really love it! I’m expecting to be on 16.04 + Uphone! :D
I just don’t get how Ubuntu can value design and yet have it’s primary color palette built around brown.
How Can I make such beautiful windows with Python? Is it PyQt5? Or some other library?
In this days, I think about make a really nice interface for LibreOffice.
installer looks great.
But I also think for a great first impression you guys also need to update the theme as much as possible, specially the icon-pack in unity 7, since it will still be the default for next LTS.
Looks terrific. I would also suggest to renew the icons and theme. I know a big overhaul will come with unity 8, but looks like we will have to live with unity 7 for a some time. First impressions are important, but the user sees unity 7 every day, and that impression is also important in the perception people have about Ubuntu.
I like warm touch of Ambiance/Ubuntu Orange combination.
This whitish/pink-magenta-violet-whateverthiscoloris combination… nah!
These are Canonical colors.
Maybe you could make Enterprise Ubuntu version with these colors, and make obvious difference between Canonical supported product (give it more significance) and Ubuntu for simple mortals.
¡Ya era hora!
I’m looking forward to it to see new designs in desktop too.
I like it.
This looks really great! I love that but as some users said before, not only the first impression is important, also the daily impression is important, so I think you must redesign the general UI in desktop and icons set. This is not w8 or w10 look, this is the trend look!
Regards,
Thank you for sharing this. I like the overall design but some tweaks may help. Let us focus attention on the last image (language selection). In many cases content scale (increase its width) very well, for example: file manager, photo manager, because you may show more icons or bigger images. But for network or language selection you have just one narrow column of text, it gives impression of too much whitespace. Lines between list items are too wide and check mark is too far from selected item. So what I propose here is some kind of frame (rectangle) around the list and an attractive background beyond. Just type “game main menu” in the image search engine and you will get the idea. Have a good design day. ;-)
All well and good but there’s something ironic about tarting up first impressions while ignoring all the remaining impressions of Unity. Like a great many others I abandoned Ubuntu for Linux Mint because I hated it. I have used Ubuntu since about 2005; still use the server version.
I have to admire the almost Jobsian chutzpah that underlies the “We know better than you” approach to UI design, and I get the underlying logic of cross-platform consistency. It may have led to Microsoft’s strategic disaster with Windows 8 which could prove a downward inflections point from which it never really recovers.
But even Microsoft corrects its mistakes (and makes new ones).
Canonical’s pig-headedness about Unity, when it has corrected other mistakes (Amazon search, the hopeless app store e.g.) is hard to fathom and it makes the subject of this article fairly “so what” to those who have given up and switched to Mint. This was an entirely avoidable, self-inflicted mistake. I might have stuck it out if it was even possible to put the Unity toolbar at the bottom of the screen on a desktop. But no, we know better than you drove large numbers to Mint. I no longer know anyone using Ubuntu on the desktop (I work in IT; I have known many; we’ve given up).
So… This is all very nice, but… It’s solving the wrong problem. Ubuntu could and should have remained the nr 1 distro on the desktop. This isn’t going to turn that around. Nor is it going to overturn Android.
Bug Nr 1 for a lot of people is Canonical’s approach to Unity. It is simply Stupidity.
Who wants a nice UI for installing that? It’s just being short-changed with a smile.
I,VE ALLWAYS Loved Ubuntu thanks DB.
I see you’ve removed the border from the ‘Next’ button (and no doubt all buttons) in the desktop installer, making it more difficult to click on.
Why have you made buttons harder to click on for the sake of aesthetics? This is bad design.
There’s nothing wrong with the current Ubuntu installer and it’s arguably the best of any Linux distro. But I understand the distro makers want to create a new look, and I’ll be interested to see how it works in whichever Ubuntu release it appears in.
I worry a bit when I see a phrase like “create a consistent experience across all devices”; this is what happened with Windows 8 and Gnome 3, which don’t work well on desktops. Why should the interface be consistent, when the devices have fundamentally different methods for interacting with them? Please Canonical, do what’s right rather than just follow what others are doing.
Hoping that 16.04 will ship with this graphic, even with Unity 7, rock solid plus beautiful equals really awesome LTS!