AraReader: Application for Reading & Creative Note-Taking 📝
AraReader combines the functionality of a digital reader and note-taking application. It is a unique software that helps people who read many narrative and non-fiction texts from digital devices create visually appealing creative notes without spending extra hours on creativity during the note-taking process.
Thanks to a deep understanding of potential users’ needs and market research of existing applications, we came to the idea of connecting text and notes which can help people navigate easier in their notes.
In this project, we were using the Double Diamond Process methodology. You can find a detailed explanation for every stage below:
Creative thinking process: collecting ideas for future reading & note-taking application. I mapped the opportunity area for AraReader and sketched the possible functionality. Thanks to market research and interviews with active readers, I understood that the proportion of linear to non-linear notes should be around 60/40.
Collecting note-taking references from active readers: during the research phase of the project, I conducted six interviews with active readers and reviewed their notes which they were taking in non-experimental conditions.
Ideation process: both text and notes should be presented on one screen. Moreover, they should be interconnected with each other.
In the AraReader, creating connections between parts of the text and notes is a success factor for an easy note-creating process, a quick search, a more straightforward revision process and intelligent memorisation.
I worked on a creative toolkit for the application. It can help users make their notes creative and aesthetically appealing without being designers. The note-taking toolkit allows users to create both linear and non-linear notes. It aims to boost the note-taking creativity of readers without taking extra time to develop advanced graphics.
Reading & note-taking mode: text is on the left side, and notes are on the right side. Notes contain anchor tags, which are connected to the sentences in the text. They have different colours codings according to the highlights in the text. In addition, readers can add an emotional reaction to the piece of text or a note by including an emoji.
Reading & note-taking mode: Users can use both linear (lists and texts) and non-linear (mind-maps, loop diagrams, timelines and tables). Every note is connected to a word or a sentence in the text by an anchor tag with a page number. By clicking on the anchor tag, a reader comes back to the highlighted part in the text.
Reading & note-taking mode: By choosing a drawing tool, a user can sketch a diagram with different colour pens.
Search: When searching for a particular word or a term, a search result list consists of findings in the text and in the notes.
This project was created as a master's thesis project on the MA Integrated Design program at Anhalt University of Applied Sciences. Academic advisors: Dr. Prof. Michael Hohl and Prof. Alejandro Lecuna.
AraReader was nominated for Designpreis Brandenburg.