A glossary of UX design terms applied to Virtual Reality (VR)
“Gentlemen, this is a football”
We’ve all been there, when even members of your own UX team have slightly different things in mind when talking about modals, pop-ups, popovers, poppers, and so on. The fun really begins when you start talking to devs or people outside your bubble about comps, wires, sketches, and prototypes.
At such times I feel like starting with the very basics, like holding up a fork so we can all hopefully get some consensus to build upon. I remember one of my favorite professors channeling his favorite football coach when trying to teach us undergrad Chemistry, starting with the absolute basics just like that famous Lombardi story: “Gentlemen, this is a football.”
What I need
Currently at my day job I am working on the design of an augmented reality (AR) experience to help folks with their prescription needs. It’s new territory for me and the designers I’m consulting with; all of us have designed for the “real reality” of rectangles (mobile, tablets, monitors) and none of us have experience designing for the reality-virtuality continuum of immersive eXtended Reality (XR) contexts — VR or AR, so we have interesting conversations like this:
“Well, when that menu pops up, er, spawns, where does it go?”
“What do you mean?”
“Like, is it sort of attached? Does it move around when Ellen moves the pill bottle in her hand, or does it just sit there? It’s a choice, really.”
“What do you mean by ‘attached’?”
“You know. Connected. Anchored. Or not. I’m not saying it has to be, just wondering what you mean…”
Ugh.
I’m sure I’m one more Medium article or new book away from a definitive guide to UX design terminology for XR contexts, but right now I really need some consensus so I’m putting this out there into the world. I have no ego at all about this; if you know better terms or a reference somewhere, I’m all ears, so to speak.
But for now, let’s start carving out some consensus. What I really need right now is a way to describe where panels (or whatever) are displayed with my fellow designers, and “floating out there, kinda” doesn’t scale very well.
Some terms describing element location in XR contexts
I’m designing specifically for panels right now, but really I could be referring to other elements as well. I’m not sure if panels are the best solution for what I’m doing, but it feels like they’ll certainly work for what I’m trying to do here.
Apart
This panel is positioned a small distance away from and is unattached to the object that spawned it — in this case, a pill bottle. It is not visually proximate nor does it appear to be anchored — it doesn’t move as the pill bottle moves.
Floating
This panel is “floating” close. It’s visually associated with the pill bottle — proximate, and perhaps tied with other cues — but does not appear attached to it. Manipulating the pill bottle will affect the floating panel, somehow (as opposed to “Static,” below).
Anchored
This panel is floating and connected to the pill bottle, or other spawning object. If the objects is moved or its orientation changes, the panel follows.
Static
This panel is resting in space and remains fixed in its position regardless of how the user moves their point of view or how they manipulate the spawning object.
Mapped
The panel is static (as above) and flows along a nearby (ideally flat) surface like a tabletop or wall, or along the surface of the object. The best surface is smooth, visually uniform, and has plenty of real estate for the panel.
Affixed
This panel is “pasted onto” the perceived viewing frame and moves with the user’s head. It’s as if this pane were on the lens of the glasses (or whatever) instead of “in” the space the user is moving through.
That should sort some things out, yes?
I’m a UX designer and researcher with over 20 years of total experience in the areas of e-commerce, healthcare, insurance, big data, retail, online identity, and community. I’m speaking for myself, not as a representative of any organization. Any imagery used in the public domain, is correctly attributed, or I own a license to display.
What I know about football (both kinds) or the Packers I could put in a thimble and still have room left over, but I have patient friends who are willing to explain things to me.
