About
Twic is a simple reader of a Twitter user's home feed. It's main goal is a search of a better Twitter feed usage experience. Currently it has the following features:
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reasonably minamalistic visual appearance, with just a list of tweets and a Refresh button - a single button application :-)
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every tweet item displays also a minimal set of data - only author's avatar and a tweet text;
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tweet text is rendered with minimal visual distractions, using only a basic typography;
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tweet's embedded content if any is shown directly, without a need for extra click on it to expand;
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older tweets are on the top, newer on the bottom, providing a most natural way for reading;
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read tweets are not shown. Once a user reads to the bottom of the feed he/she sees a Refresh button with a count of new, yet unread tweets. After clicking on the button the old, already seen tweets are replaced with new ones;
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the Refresh button is grey if there are no new tweets in a feed, or orange if there are new itwems - a one glance one click usage pattern;
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font size is reasonably larger;
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links are resolved and shown as on a Hacker News - just domains;
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extra options and data are shown on mouse over;
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uses Twitter streaming API and websockets and client side storage to provide instant and real time reaction for user input;
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gentle animations here and there to exploit user's muscle memory and continuity feeling;
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can be operated using only a mouse, or only a keyboard, or both - either way with minimal amount of actions required.
All the checks and feed tracking are done automatically and are invisible for the user. Thus user has a very simple workflow - if the single button in the UI is orange, then he/she may click on it and get new tweets. The button becomes grey until next tweets will be available.
Compare with the original Twitter UI:
Twic has also a more advanced features - posting new tweets, retweeting, starring tweets, replying, old feed view up to the beginning. Filtered feed views and conversation views are planned.