brandknewmag.com
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INTERACTING WITH THE CONTENT, NOT THE DROPDOWNS
One thing that liberated the Google Maps design team, Jones says, is the fact that people’s expectations of user interfaces
are changing. In an age of touch-screen devices and minimal UIs, people are used to more directly interacting with content,
instead of menus and dropdowns. For the redesign, Jones and his team wanted to do for Maps what Chrome had done for
browsers: strip away all the buttons and controls, and have users interacting with maps directly.
“During our design process, we were super aggressive,” says Jones. “We would ask ourselves, ‘What would we design if we
could only keep 20% of Maps’ features? In the end, though, there were incredibly few features that ended up being dropped.
They’re just not all screaming for attention anymore.”
The old Google Maps obscured the map when trying to show you information about the pin. In the new design, this information appears to the side.
The cardinal design principle of the new Maps design is to contextualize the
location it is showing a user at any time, and only present the user further
options for interacting with a location as appropriate. For example, if you
are browsing a map, and click or tap a nearby subway station, Google
Maps will present you with a card telling you what trains and buses service
the station, and when they will be arriving. Simultaneously, Maps adds an
overlay so you can see the train and bus routes.
NOT ONLY IS THE VECTOR
APPROACH FASTER, BUT IT IS
ALSO TRULY 3-D.
The same principle governs interacting with any other location. Click on a restaurant, or search for it, and a card will pop
up with its address, hours, website, phone number, and reviews. From there, you can save it to a list of your Google Maps
favorites, making it easier to navigate to in the future, or call up directions with just a tap. A Street View or Google Earth view
of that location is just a button click away.