Real-World Applications of OpenAI’s o1

What makes a successful app is not the number of downloads, but how well the platform fosters use over a long period of time. Fitness apps have learned to excel in this area, because, quite simply, they have to. It’d be nice if you could go for a jog one time, and be instantly fit and healthy. Unfortunately for those of us who hate running (and other activities that don’t involve couches), fitness doesn’t work that way. You have to actually exercise multiple times, day after day, to see improvements in your physical health. Fitness apps, therefore, can only be successful if consumers continue to use them regularly; making them the shining example for app builders to study when thinking about long-term user appeal. While each one is a little bit different, the top fitness apps share key user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) features that keep fitness buffs coming back for more. fitness 1. Allow for Goal Setting (and Tracking) All of the most popular fitness apps offer the ability for users to set goals within the platform. Fitbit is designed to help users reach a certain number of steps or calories burned each day, rewarding them with online badges and praise when they reach those milestones. The long-term appeal of these apps comes less from setting the goal itself, and more from watching yourself move towards (and eventually meet) that goal, also called gamification. It’s basic human psychology. Being able to see and monitor progress keeps people motivated to continue working towards an endpoint or milestone. The jogging and cycling app MapMyFitness not only makes it easy to set goals, but also displays your goals alongside a “percentage complete,” so you can visualize and track your progress. The ability to set and monitor goals increases the likelihood of long-term app usability, as users are much more incentivized to stay on track when they can see how they’re doing. 2. Play Nice with Others The leading fitness apps are easily synced with other platforms and devices, which is crucial to the long-term appeal for their users. People don’t exercise in a bubble; they seek various workout tools, techniques for different body parts or muscle groups, and even entertainment as they work towards their overall health goals. A fitness app that exists in a silo will quickly become useless to consumers — sure, it helps you track your jogging, but that’s not the only activity contributing to your health. People who jog are likely to also care about other aspects of their health, including diet, muscle strength, heart health, and weight management. That’s why many developers have chosen to ensure their apps integrate with larger health monitoring platforms, such as Apple’s Healthkit, and Google Fit. This app provides a central spot to monitor the data being received from various wearables and fitness accounts. Being able to sync well with other products and platforms allows a single fitness app to merge smoothly into a user’s lifestyle. Developers should ensure data collected via an app is easily accessible across platforms — users appreciate the convenience of being able to access and share their data on every platform. 3. Explain Data Clearly The data fitness apps provide is worthless until you know how to apply it to your life and workout goals. Most health-conscious consumers aren’t looking for an overwhelming amount of scientific data to sift through and form conclusions. They’re more often looking for an app to play the role of expert, trainer, or coach — someone to gather information about their fitness activities and then make sense of it for them. The popular Jawbone app sends users regular summaries of their fitness progress, which the app’s SmartCoach transforms into fitness recommendations and personalized challenges. Users can also compare their fitness patterns to those of other people in the same demographic. Adding context to data and showing users the next steps they can take makes it easy and desirable for consumers to keep using the app. 4. Foster Social Connection The best technological innovations are often those that help us connect with other people (think texting, social media, online forums… the Internet in general). Successful fitness apps have realized that adding connectivity is an extremely effective way to engage users over the long-term. A study conducted with Fitbit and Jawbone users found the majority of participants were eager to engage and relate to others through an online community. It determined that while wellness is important, users also want a feature that helps them relate to others. Designing for social connection also means ensuring your app has built-in social share functions. Sharing fitness goals and accomplishments holds a user to account, and creates a community of people who are supporting that person in achieving their fitness goals. The Nike+ running app has a feature where social media enthusiast joggers can snap photos during their run and create a beautiful graphic accompanied by their distance and time details. 5. Keep the Interface Simple When it comes to UI, the hottest fitness apps embrace the “less is more” mentality. Exercise can already bring a sense of dread, and dealing with a page-laden app or lengthy registration process will only make it worse. Yoga app Down Dog has made it simple for yogis of all experience levels to start their workout. Users don’t need to register or log in — they simply select a workout intensity and the app cues the sequence. Down Dog includes high resolution photos and audio guides, meaning users never have to stop in the middle of a workout to research a certain sequence or yoga position. The app also fits its technicalities — including terms of use and social links — all neatly on one page, making things as streamlined as possible for the user. Removing as many mental barriers as possible makes it easy for consumers to continue using an app. If people need to spend a lot of time navigating, exploring, and understanding the layout of your UI, they’re more likely to lose interest and find a simpler app. 6. Design Matters — A Lot Design expert John Maeda urges business leaders to stop thinking of design, technology, and business as three separate things. Good design is essential in everything from product development, to marketing and sales, to the end user’s experience with the brand. The importance of design is evident in Headspace, an app that guides users through short daily meditations. The app goes beyond its simple functionality (helping users meditate), and also creates a positive design experience — extending from the soft pastel color scheme, to the friendly icons, to the blissfully unstimulating interface. Headspace understands its users are not only looking for a meditation tool but moreso a wholly relaxing and mindful experience. Effective design principles help the app achieve its calming aura over the long-term. The Nike+ Training Club app also relies heavily on design principles to deliver the best experience to users. The app targets young, urban fitness buffs. It speaks to its target market with a design that incorporates bold sans serif fonts, energizing images, and minimalist workout videos directed by professional athletes. Just like the Headspace app, Nike+ Training Club doesn’t just give users the tools to exercise — it also delivers the aura of energy, motivation, and clear instruction that puts consumers in the right mindset to keep going. For those considering building the next exciting app, let today’s leading fitness apps coach you in UX and UI strategies for long-term user loyalty. There are plenty of apps that can track your steps, measure your heart rate, or deliver guided meditation instructions; but the ones that keep people coming back — those that become part of users’ routines — are those that make it easy, motivating, and pleasant for them to continue exercising. At Barefoot Solutions, we recognize that encouraging long-term use doesn’t come from what your app can do, but how it makes consumers feel when using it. That’s why we put so much time and attention into building the user-centered aspects of your app. Investing in good UX and UI design will allow you to build an experience that makes it easy, enjoyable, and desirable for consumers to continue using your app well into the future.

We spend significant time on our mobile devices for a wide range of reasons. Much of it is for social engagement, some of it is for managing schedules, other times it’s playing games to get through that meeting in which Jerry just won’t stop talking. Yet one thing we can overlook is how our brain can get atrophied from lack of, shall we say, exercise. Some app developers refuse to stand for that, and get to work building mobile and web applications that not only train your brain, but are fun to use too. Let’s take a look at the best ones they’ve come up with so far.   Elevate A creation brought to life by the collaboration of developers, neuroscientists and cognitive learning experts, Elevate is an overall brain training app. Complete with games of varying kinds that include cartoonish characters like dolls, birds, spaceships, Elevate works to sharpen how you speak, listen, write, and read. The goal is to improve your overall communication skills, which directly translates to real life as you can process information better and socialize with others more eloquently. The use of vibrant cartoons makes it easy to get addicted, as it feels more like a game than an educational tool.   Luminosity Similar to Elevate, Luminosity is also an overall brain training app. The focus of Luminosity however is to strengthen “core” cognitive abilities such as memory, attention span, problem solving, and pattern recognition. By working on these abilities the user will be more equipped for performing real life tasks like decision making and remembering names. Perhaps you’ll finally be able to remember the people you meet at networking events, and the business cards you go home with will actually mean something. With muted down colors and pattern recognition strategies, the games improve brain skills in a subtle and memorable manner.   Duolingo Learning a second, third, or fifteenth language is excellent for the brain. It improves memory retention, slows the onset of Alzheimer’s for older learners, improves test scores for younger learners, and bilinguals have denser grey matter than people who only speak one language. Yet blocking out time to learn a language can be a challenge, a common problem that Duolingo aims to solve. The free language learning app provides an excellent way for the busy person to learn and practice their new language literally anywhere they are. To start, the app requires that you set a goal for how much time you want to spend on the app, e.g. 5 minutes, 10 minutes, etc. each day. From there the app takes you through a series of games, lessons and exercises to train your brain how to navigate through the new language. Gamification is infused every step of the way, as the learner earns hearts for doing well, but loses them when answers are wrong. Run out of hearts - game over and start the game again. While you naturally learn commonly used phrases, every now and then the app throws a teaser such as, "I have a snake in my boot." Who doesn't love a random Toy Story reference?   Personal Zen Carving out time to meditate or simply chill out can be impossible. Enter Personal Zen, the app designed to help users focus more on the positive and less on the negative for the purposes of reducing anxiety and stress. Users follow two characters through their adventures, one a positive, calm and friendly avatar, the other an angry, hostile figure. The easy-to-play game is set on a grass field and players swipe the ruffled grass until you've swiped over all of it. The trick is to swipe as quickly and accurately as you can. As the game progresses, users are conditioned to choose positive options and thinking over negative. Dr. Shannon M. Bennett, Assistant Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College endorsed the app saying, “Personal Zen brings cutting-edge research and well-established strategies for reducing anxiety and stress into the palm of your hand.”   Happify The benefits of being happy absolutely apply to the brain. Happify is the gaming app intended to do just that by recommending activities daily to help you reach goals such as feeling peace of mind, more engaged, gratefulness, feeling more motivated or excited about the future. The user can also select games they feel like playing that day to focus on a particular aspect of happiness like boosting self esteem or appreciating the little things. With statistics showing that 86% of frequent users report improvements in their happiness in just 2 months of use, it’s worth the free download. Want to develop the next app to improve brains across the world? Ping us and let’s see what we can do.

Thinking of creating a health app? Before you get started there are several important factors to consider if you want to compete successfully in this crowded marketplace. According to research2guidance’s 2016 study, the growth of mobile health (or mHealth) app downloads has slowed, but many new apps are still being produced, so supply is outpacing demand. The study suggests that overall revenues for mHealth services will continue to grow over the next few years which means there is still a great deal of potential for new apps to find a place in the market if they provide users with real value and utility. What Health App Consumers Want With so many choices already available, be sure you are investing in an app that will stand out and attract consumers. How do you make your app indispensable? Let’s review some of the things your potential customers want from a health app. DIY Health Users like apps that allow them to gather the information they want easily. Sometimes this is as simple as looking up existing information on health-related topics, but many of the most popular mHealth apps are wellness apps that promote a healthy lifestyle. They help the user track information on their diet, exercise, heart rate, sleep, and more. Some even have social media functions built in so users can share certain information with their followers. Some apps monitor general health, while others are designed to track data related to a specific condition such as migraines, fertility, or diabetes. Having this information at their fingertips can help the user feel like they’re taking charge of their health. Sensors and Wearable Devices Diet-tracking apps generally require the user to input what they eat and drink manually, but sensors that passively collect other types of data can be even more useful. Wearable items such as patches, smartwatches and fitness tracking bands contain sensors that can detect the user’s activity levels, sleep, heart rate, blood pressure, glucose levels, and more. The GPS in a mobile device can determine the user’s speed and distance traveled while exercising. It can also use the physical location to find information about current environmental conditions around the user, such as local weather, pollen levels, and other data that may affect health. This information is particularly useful for users tracking allergies. When developing a wearable device to connect with your mHealth app, remember that it needs to be comfortable, lightweight, and water-resistant so it’s not intrusive to the user. Personalized Messaging The information the user inputs, both actively and passively, can be used to produce push notifications with personalized messages. These can include reminders to perform an activity or take medication, updates on progress toward certain goals, or even warnings based on live data. Uses for Collected Health Data Users of these apps can choose to share their mHealth data with their doctor. This data can help patients and their doctors notice worsening or even the potential development of medical conditions before the associated symptoms become obvious, and is likely to be more accurate than the user’s self-reported information. This is especially true for data the user cannot collect by him or herself, such as ongoing heart rate and blood pressure levels or sleep cycles. On a larger scale, using such data from a group of individuals participating in clinical studies could ensure more thorough and accurate results, but it’s important that apps comply with regulations regarding patient privacy and the sharing of medical information. mHealth has immediate potential to improve patient outcomes, as well as prevent and detect medical issues. It could also reduce costs related to hospital readmission or a patient’s failure to adhere to treatment. Young users can become more engaged with monitoring their own health, leading them to develop good habits now that can help them maintain wellness as they age. The future is bright for user-friendly mHealth apps that can positively impact a user’s quality of life. Is your company planning to build an mHeath app? Contact us so we can help you make it a reality.