Mobile

Trends on Tuesday: Mobile-Only U.S. Audiences Grow While Broadband Usage Drops

The Pew Research Center released an interesting report about home Internet usage that revealed broadband usage plateaued in 2013 and, in fact, dropped 3% in 2015. Later in the report, Pew states the growth in mobile-only audiences compensated for the drop in home broadband usage, so the overall number of people with Internet access hasn’t changed

Will Sullivan

Jan 05, 2016

Digging Into the Data of Our Customer Survey

As a follow-up to the recent post about our annual customer satisfaction survey, we wanted to dig into the data and share some of the overall results to give you some more insights into how we’re using your feedback to improve our programs and services.

Rachel Flagg

Jan 05, 2016

How ABMC Got Started with Mobile App Development

The MobileGov Community of Practice put together six Mobile User Experience Guidelines to help keep mobile users in love with their apps. DigitalGov University hosted a webinar in which the American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC) highlighted two of these guidelines.

Jennifer Johnson

Dec 31, 2015

Trends on Tuesday: Providing Anytime, Anywhere Government Through Mobile App Competitions

Agencies have used an open data competition approach in their quest to provide anytime, anywhere government. For example, in 2011, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) conducted the Apps for the Environment challenge and has a hub for apps created using EPA data. Here’s an update on challenges hosted by other agencies: The National Institute of Standards

Jacob Parcell

Dec 29, 2015

The Data Briefing: Air and Space Museum Launches New Mobile App into the Frontier of STEM Education

The Smithsonian Institution’s Air and Space Museum just released a new educational mobile app, Mobile Missions. From the website: “Find out if you are cut out for a career in aerospace with our free mobile app, Mobile Missions. Take our quiz to discover the best aerospace career for you. Explore objects from our collection related to

Bill Brantley

Dec 23, 2015

How FSA Revamped Their Online Presence with Mobile Moments in Mind

Let the mic drop! Mobile moments are created with the expectation that an app can stun the crowd. Do not let your audience down; they may never come back. Federal Student Aid (FSA), in an effort to provide better customer service, decided to build a mobile-responsive website. Kaegy Pabulos, a Borrower Experience Specialist and project

Jennifer Johnson

Dec 17, 2015

Challenge App-titude: A Successful Newcomer Offers a Few Tips

The Reference Data Challenge, launched this summer, was a call for innovative approaches to a long-standing role of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to make “critically evaluated reference data available to scientists, engineers and the general public.” This challenge—our first-ever app contest and second prize competition as an agency—had the dual aims

Heather Evans

Dec 15, 2015

Trends on Tuesday: Holiday Shopping Sales Show a Move Towards Mobile-First

U.S. shoppers are increasingly using their mobile devices to make purchases during the busiest shopping days: Black Friday and Thanksgiving weekend. According to Custora, online Black Friday sales rose more than 16% compared to last year, and smartphone use rose to more than 36% (up from 30% last year), with iPhones accounting for the lion’s share of

Will Sullivan

Dec 15, 2015

Sixty Years of Tradition: Tracking Santa with NORAD

‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house, Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse; The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there; The children were nestled all snug in their beds;… …wondering when Santa was coming? “Let’s check!” they all

Nirmala Ramprasad

Dec 10, 2015

The Data Briefing: Help #HackSuicide This Weekend

A month ago, I wrote about the White House’s call for data scientists and app developers to come together to help combat suicide. On December 12, 2015, there will be five hackathons around the U.S. to #HackSuicide. All the hackathons are free and open to the public. Even if you are not a data scientist,

Bill Brantley

Dec 09, 2015

Trends on Tuesday: Adobe Moves Beyond Flash

Half a decade since Steve Jobs declared war on Adobe Flash and refused to support it on Apple’s mobile and tablet devices, Flash is finally losing its crown as one of the stand-alone products of Adobe. In the announcement, Adobe said, “Flash has played a leading role in bringing new capabilities to the Web. From

Will Sullivan

Dec 08, 2015

Fascinating Geysers on the NPS Yellowstone Geysers App

Geological phenomena such as steaming mud craters, bubbling mud pools, hot springs and geysers are some of the exhilarating features of a geo-thermal wonderland. Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park falls into this category. If you are planning a visit to

Nirmala Ramprasad

Dec 03, 2015

Trends on Tuesday: Facebook, TV and How to Reach Millennials and Hispanics

How do you capture millennial and Hispanic eyes? Through their hands. (More specifically: their mobile devices, and the social apps within!). AdAge recently analyzed a study from Nielsen’s Homescan panel which found that in a typical month, 12.2% of millennials can only be reached through TV (looking at the top 10 networks only) versus 14.2%

Ashley Wichman

Dec 01, 2015

Trends on Tuesday: What Mobile Devices Do People Use to Access Federal Sites?

Mobile users of government websites are growing in double digit percentages and will likely soon become the majority. For some recent internal project research, I dove into some of the federal government-wide analytics looking at mobile usage and found a few interesting tidbits to share: It’s an OS battle of the As. Apple devices slightly

Will Sullivan

Nov 24, 2015

Wherever You Go, There We Are: the Geolocation API

No matter how you go mobile, you can meet your user’s needs. Recommendations based on location are plentiful, particularly on native apps. But don’t fret, agencies with mobile websites: you can also get in the location customization game. Geolocation is a W3C scripting API that can be used with JavaScript in Web browsers. In the

Ashley Wichman

Leo Yang

Nov 23, 2015

Is There a Generic Equivalent to My Brand Name Drug? Find out with FDA OB Express

The FDA has released a free native app for the public called Orange Book Express, or OB Express, as a mobile version of its Approved Drug Products with Therapeutic Equivalence Evaluations publication that is primarily used by pharmacists.

Nirmala Ramprasad

Nov 19, 2015

GSA.gov Refreshed with Eye Toward Mobile Users

GSA unveiled a refreshed GSA.gov website yesterday with a more crisp design layout, improved usability, and features geared more toward mobile users. Increasingly, website traffic is coming from mobile users. With this in mind, GSA unveiled a newly refreshed GSA.gov website on Nov. 16. “Our ultimate goal for the refresh

Jeff Woodworth

Nov 17, 2015

Trends on Tuesday: Smartphone and Tablet Adoption Grows While Other Digital Devices Slump

Pew released a recent report tracking trends in digital device ownership and found smartphones and tablets have continued to grow in recent years, while other devices have stalled. The big headlines from the report are: Cell phones are now in the hands of more than 92% of U.S. adults, although this trend started to flatten

Will Sullivan

Nov 17, 2015

Post Office Whenever and Wherever—USPS Mobile® App

Technology has become integral to our lives, and now many of these familiar postal services are available at our fingertips on our mobile devices.

Nirmala Ramprasad

Nov 12, 2015

Trends on Tuesday: 5 Tips for Designing Touch Interactions

Josh Clark, one of the pioneers of touch Web design, and author of Tapworthy and Designing for Touch, published an excellent article on A List Apart analyzing How We Hold Our Gadgets that has a wealth of data and graphics about this interesting and emerging design challenge. Below are 5 notable lessons from the post: 1. Portrait (vertical) orientation dominates

Will Sullivan

Nov 10, 2015

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