How your mobile interface will morph in 2012

The mobile user interface is set for a range of changes in the then and there 12-24 months, creating new modes for users to interact with their devices, and with other devices nearby and network-based services.

A second type of gesture support in the end will make use of mobile device cameras to recognize and interpret a range of physical motions by the user. The basic research appears in products like Microsoft Kinect, released a year ago as a $150 add-on for its Xbox gaming consoles: Users can flick through menus by waving their hands, for instance. Microsoft now plans to introduce it for Windows PCs, and last year bought Canesta, which designs chips that work with a device's digital camera to let the device "see" in three dimensions.

The user's voice interaction with a mobile device as well will continue to improve and expand. Apple's Siri, a "voice assistant" introduced with iOS 5 for the iPhone 4S, gives a wide range of voice-activated control and management features.

Personality

But Apple gave Siri a "personality," which "gives the interaction a softer, humorous feel," says Matt Revis, vice president of product marketing and management for Nuance's mobile group. The original Siri, later acquired by Apple, used the Nuance voice engine. Nuance as well offers Dragon Go!, an iPhone app that enables Internet searching by voice.

"We'll see more evolved voice control in 2012, with more natural language and sentence structure from the non-Apple platforms," says IMS analyst Paul Erickson. Voice and touch are complementary, he says, and the mobile user interface will develop to include a mix of different technologies.

Gartner recently identified "mobile-centric applications and interfaces" as one of its "Top 10 Strategic Research Trends" for 2012. This a bundle of technologies, including the short-range wireless Nearly Field Communications, which Gartner sees as making possible a range of "touch to act" uses. One example, cited in a presentation by Gartner analyst David Cearley, is a hotel sending an electronic key to a smartphone, which at the time becomes the guest's room key: He can simply wave the phone at the door handle, and the NFC connection makes it possible to verify the guest and unlock the door.

This interaction points the way to a future mobile interface that uses awareness of the users' "context" -- identity, their online affiliations through various social networks, their location, the time of day, preferences, and nearby devices or online services that users might be interested in, or have need of.