Assignment: Create application for researchers
Scopus is the largest database of research literature and quality web sources. It covers the abstracts and citations of nearly 18,000 titles from more than 5,000 publishers. Scopus is very popular in the scientific community, as it is “the easiest way to get to relevant content fast”.
To make Scopus even easier and faster, Elsevier started with the development of an iPhone application that allows users to stay up-to-date with new articles. The goal of the application is to enable users to indicate their scientific interests and be alerted when new relevant articles are published. Besides these ‘Search alerts’, the iPhone application should also offer an alert each time a relevant article is cited. These ‘Citation alerts’ make it easier for scientists to keep track of the popularity of articles. This is especially relevant for articles they wrote themselves. The goal of the iPhone application was not to completely rebuild all the available functionality that Scopus currently offers. Instead, it should only offer functionalities that make sense when using a mobile phone.
Method: Interaction Design for small screens
Based on the requirements set by Elsevier an Interaction Design was needed. As always when designing for small screens, the main challenge was to reduce the number of options on each screen without increasing the number of screens too much. This meant that some of the more advanced functionalities offered in the Web version of Scopus needed to be simplified or left out.
The Interaction Design was carried out by defining possible user flows and creating sketches of the various screens. These flows and sketches helped in communicating and discussing ideas with the various parties involved. In addition, they also sped up the development process.
The final Interaction Design described how the application could be used to quickly create alerts and retrieve relevant new articles and citations. It also detailed how users could save articles, add notes and e-mail results. Based on the flows and sketches, Service2Media created the visual design and built the application.
Result: Clear and simple application
The application 'Scopus Alerts (Lite)' is now available in Apple’s iTunes store. The application is free for all existing users of Scopus, more details can be found on the info site.
The first responses from users are positive and Elsevier is planning to create more mobile applications to serve the scientific community.
More information?
For more information about this project or on designing for mobile devices, please contact us.
