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A hard look at kiosk software

In the Software Research Center, KIOSKmarketplace takes a look behind the screens at how software makes a successful kiosk.

March 20, 2002

Push a few buttons on an interactive touchscreen, and Macy's customers give the wedding gift their friends wanted. A trucker, tired after a long day on the road, swipes a loyalty card and redeems points to get a free shower. At theme parks, families buy tickets to take their favorite rides-when they want to.

All these kiosk applications, and more, are possible because of software. If hardware is the body of a kiosk, software is the blood. Understanding why kiosk software is unique is essential for anyone planning on designing, owning, or deploying a kiosk system.

"You have so many things that have to be controlled and manipulated in a kiosk setting," said Gary De Blaquiere, WebRaiser Technologies Inc.'s vice president of marketing and business development. "In a kiosk you should be managing not only the people interacting with it but the content going back and forth."

With so much interaction, well-designed software is key.

David Campbell, vice president of professional services for kiosk software maker Visible Advantage Corp., said, "From the user interface point of view you really have to go with your understanding your target audience."

He said that young audiences, being familiar with computers, can use an interface that works more like those used on personal computers. However, older audiences, who may not be as familiar with computers, need an interface that uses large buttons and is easier to use.

Though many designers favor creating applications for the least capable users, Campbell doesn't feel that is the way to go.

"Typically, designers have designed simple, simple, simple, so that users have no chance of getting lost. More knowledgeable users get bored with those interfaces very rapidly. So you really have to build for the market you're going after," he said.

Kiosks use different kinds of software, for many reasons. The KIOSKmarketplace Software Research Center probes software used for kiosks, including the operating systems

Sound off! What would you like to see covered in the Software Research Center? Tell the editor.

that run the hardware and the applications, Web browsers, remote management software, development software, applications, and more.

OS: The foundation

In a kiosk system, as with any computer system, everything is managed by the operating system. The choice of an operating system and how it is set up is the key to a stable, reliable kiosk platform.

Craig Keefner, publisher of Kiosks.org, said,  "Any operating system needs to be robust enough to where it can gracefully shut down and note that the kiosk might have a problem."

Sometimes, a software developer will be asked by a client to develop a design for kiosks that are already in place. In those cases, the designer may not have a choice but to use older operating systems.

"You shouldn't run on old operating systems," Keefner advised. "There are a lot more tools and options on newer operating systems. But sometimes you don't have a choice."

Most readers will be familiar with Microsoft Windows 98, NT, and 2000. But other less well-known choices include kiosks based on Unix, Linux, and Macintosh. The choice a customer will make depends partly on experience, partly on a company's existing network (see "KIOSKmarketplace asks: Which operating system is best?")

Greg Swistak, president of kiosk maker Factura Corp., wrote, "The best operating system is the one that is a good fit with a customer's architecture and infrastructure. For example, if a customer plans to maintain the system with existing resources, but has no experience with UNIX, a Linux kiosk, although attractive from a price/performance perspective, would probably be a poor fit."

The choice of operating systems is a major decision, ultimately affecting such software choices as which remote management software can be used and even which Web browsers can be used.

Browers: The windows

Though it's not necessary, more kiosks are using Web-based software on which to run their applications, whether or not Web access is the reason for the kiosk.

Hamed Shahbazi, president of Vancouver, British Columbia-based Info Touch Technologies Corp., said, "It has to do with the strategy to update network content. The Internet is the most powerful distribution network we've ever seen. You change one source document, and everything else changes."

Info Touch uses Internet Explorer in its kiosks.

"It's the most advantageous for us," said Joseph Nakhla, chief marketing officer for Info Touch, in a KIOSKmarketplace feature (see "Do kiosks need browsers?"). "That little brower can be the vehicle to unlock the power of that real estate and deliver ROI."

What users see on a kiosk is different than what they might view on their PCs. Info Touch, like many companies, removes the signature toolbars and other signs of IE's graphical user interface (GUI).

"We completely customize the browser for the usage of our clients," Nakhla said.

Web-based software is portable, and easily developed through open-source tools, which means that the software is vendor-neutral. But browsers have to be handled properly in order to be secure.

Remote management: The Insurance

When it comes to maintaining kiosks, companies have two choices: send staff around to inspect each and every machine, or network the system to be managed centrally. As kiosk deployments increase and are placed in far-flung locations, the choices become more and more obvious. To insure that kiosks become a successful business proposition, remote management is as important to a kiosk as electricity.

Penny Crump, communications manager for Netkey, maker of Netkey Manager remote management software, said in an article about remote management, "As the pace of kiosk technology increases, people need to be able to deploy (content) on a wide range of kiosks. With mass deployments of Web-enabled kiosks you need something to control them all from one location." (see "Remote management roundup, part 1".)

Remote management permits kiosk operators to perform these and more essential functions:

• Monitor the health of the computer.
• Monitor the status of peripherals, such as printers and bill acceptors.
• Send custom alerts to administration staff.
• See via screen shots what is being displayed.
• Restart the machine after a software or hardware failure.
• Schedule advertising.
• Download new software to the machine.
• View reports.

"You get a one-time window for people to use kiosks," Keefner said. "Dead units can turn people off. If you have a high-use system and it's relying on communications, then it needs to be monitored. A system has got to be fast and has got to be up."

Development software: The Architects

To be a killer app, programs have to look good and work even better. Kiosk applications may seem simple, but they are more complex than users can know.

Visible Advantage's Campbell said, "Behind the scenes you certainly have all the items that are trying to keep that user out of trouble. You have to have some level of restrictions over your interface, and where people can navigate to. All of that has to be built into the back end of the kiosks and built into the architecture to software developers can get them."

Companies such as Degasoft, with its Designer application, and Netkey, with its Creator application, have developed specialized design software. The packages are designed so that developers can more easily integrate kiosk applications with touchscreens and peripherals commonly used on kiosks, and more easily develop the kinds of screens customers will be asked to navigate.

Other keys to cost-efficient, rapid application development are using standards, open architectures, and object-oriented programming. Good design programs incorporate an integrated development environment (IDE) that gives developers the tools to use these programming techniques.

Campbell said that object-oriented programming was a way to take pieces of programming code (objects), and combine them to create a finished application.

"You can use any bits and parts from anywhere and use that content or pre-developed applications that are delivering content and use them inside that same kiosk interface just as you would in a Web page," Campbell said.

Using this approach lowers the cost of application development for many reasons. Among them is the fact that designers can add or remove objects, rather than redesign the entire application, to keep pace with new developments.

"If someone comes out with a new smart card you can add an object that checks for smart card validations," he said.

In addition, an application that doesn't work is going to be associated with the objects that aren't working.

"It's easy to isolate where problems are and assemble new applications much more rapidly," Campbell said.

Applications: pay the mortgage

The kiosk industry is like a team of explorers hunting for the killer application. For years, the model to look up to has been the ATM. It does one thing, dispense cash, and it does it incredibly well. Thanks to transaction processing fees, ATMs earn money for deployers.

St. Jones, kiosk application designer for Netplex, said in a recent KIOSKmarketplace article (see "St. Jones is Netplex's guardian angel"), "The best example of the way a kiosk should run is the ATM. It's easy to use and it gives you something right away."
 
Based on the lessons learned from ATMs and kiosk applications, Jones had these suggestions:

"It (a kiosk application) needs to deliver something to the client after the third click. The customer should get something before they are asked for their name, address, phone number and all that other information.

"Using a kiosk should be faster and easier than talking to a salesperson. A customer should spend no more than three minutes at the kiosk. And anybody should be able to approach it and use it. Your grandmother should be able to approach the kiosk and use it."

In her KIOSKmarketplace column, "The secret of kiosk success," Francie Mendelsohn, head of kiosk consultancy Summit Research Associates Inc., gave advice any designer should heed:

"In more than seven years of testing and evaluating kiosks, I've learned one truth that becomes more self-evident with each passing year: The simpler but more compelling the application, the more likely the kiosk will be successful."

For a kiosk to be healthy, each part of its software, like the parts of the body, must do its job, and must mesh smoothly with the other parts. All this is so that the kiosk customer, who doesn't need to know what goes on inside the enclosure, can swipe a credit card and take care of buying that wedding gift.

KIOSKmarketplace created the Software Research Center to help kiosk deployers make their systems great. Periodically, new articles will be added to the Research Center, so check back often.

[Editor's note: Info Touch Technologies became Tio Networks in April 2006.]