DipJar's goal is to make a device so simple that it can be used without an attendant. Signs help communicate "Hey! Stick your credit card in this thing you've never seen, to donate to our cause."
My job was to help the DipJar communicate, "I'm processing your transaction. You're great! Everyone should do like you!"
The great thing about working at a small start up is you get to learn a lot of new things outside of your area of expertise. Designing the language of DipJar was truly a team effort where all our roles crossed over. I worked closely with the Hardware Engineer and Founder to figure out the friendliest form of communication for the DipJars.
"I have detected that something has been inserted"
"I've detected a card that might be a credit card because it has a magnetic stripe"
"Your credit card might be mis-oriented because I don't detect a stripe"
Additional instructions: "Please try again in a different orientation"
"I'm done doing whatever it was that I was doing"
Inverse communications: "I'm doing something"
"I detected a magnetic stripe but for some reason I couldn't get a good read"
Additional instructions: "Please try again"
"I have successfully read your credit card"
Connotation: "You're a wonderful person and more people should be like you!"
If beam broken = 1st sound + animated ellipses, wait then display up arrow
If NO stripe detected + timeout over = arrow pointing at card orientation icon, wait between break beam and retry message
If stripe detected = animated ellipses
If good card read = continue ellipses
If card pulled = start timeout, continue ellipses
If NO good read (at any point) + timeout over = "retry" message
If good read (at any point) + 1.5secs into timeout = 2nd lights + sound
Success!
Wrong Card Orientation, Retry
Something Didn't Work. REtry
