Designing applications using the UI Framework

FCA developed the UI, User Interface Framework to enhance our connected customer experience by providing a feature rich framework containing commonly used components and support functions. It is required for UI applications to use the UI Framework.

The framework supports the different Styles approved for the FCA radio platforms. It provides a consistent look and feel, support for FCA standards, faster UI implementation, and support for the best practices. The framework frees the app developers to work on the critical behavior of an app.

Additional references:

UI Framework Building Blocks provides a guide for setting up and building a Hello World application.

UI Framework Reference Implementation provides a walkthrough of an example application.

UI Framework Features:

General
Scrolling List
Tab Layout
Grid Layout
Pop Ups
Keyboards
Progress Indicators

General

  1. Splash screen - the framework provides a hook to make it easy for an app to supply a splash screen.

    Figure - Sample App Splashscreen
  2. Multiple Locales - the framework supports multiple locales. Default Locales are English, Spanish, and French.
  3. Page Management - the framework supports multiple page management. An app can contain multiple pages and each page can navigated to using the framework methods as well as the Navigation Bar back button.
  4. Navigation Bar - the framework supports a navigation bar containing a Signal Strength indicator for a connected apps landing page, back button to navigate back to the prior page (supports multiple page management), and an empty container for the native X button.

    Figure - Sample App Navigation Bar
  5. Resource Loading - the framework provides hooks to allow an app to load external resources in the background and supply a Codename One resource file when the app is starting.
  6. Versioning - the framework version is available to an app to verify it is the version the app expects.
  7. Theming - the framework supports the Simplified Uconnect® Theme which is required for apps to use. For occasions where a component needs to change based on the vehicle brand. The framework integrates the vehicle brand into resource loading decisions.
  8. Hard Buttons - the framework supports the hard back button on all screens that have soft back key as well as the scroll knob/enter button
  9. Display - the framework supports multiple display sizes, text fields with a hint, and valid and invalid sounds (kona.beep).

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Scrolling List

A scrolling list can be a formated as shown in Figure - Formatted List, or non-formated list as shown in Figure - Non-Formatted List, or a list of text lines as shown in Figure - Scrolling Text.

A list will automatically enable a vertical scroll bar if required.

the formatted list supports the requirement of additional features such as a new item indicator and a delete item indicator.

In addition to a vertical scroll bar you can also swipe the list or use the hard scroll knob to scroll vertically.

The items in the list can be selectable allowing an app to know what the customer selected.

Figure - Formatted List Figure - Non-Formatted List Figure - Scrolling Text

 

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Tab Layout

The Tab layout allows for a tabbed pages as shown in Figure - Tabbed Pages. The individual tabs are selectable and each tab is associated with its own page. In the figure a list is shown as an example, but the page is not formatted.


Figure - Tabbed Pages

 

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Grid Layout

The Grid layout provides a configurable grid with selectable items as shown in Figure - Grid Layout.


Figure - Grid Layout

 

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Pop Ups

Pop Ups are modal and either an action button or the X button must be pushed to exit the pop up.

The pop ups support one or two buttons and the app that displayed the pop up will be notified of the button push so that the appropriate behavior can be created.

The buttons will support either text, image, or both.

The pop up will contain one or more lines of header text and one or more lines of message text.

Figure - One Button Pop Up Figure - Two Button Pop Up

 

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Keyboards

Each input field is automatically associated with a keyboard. An input field can also apply different constraints to the input field so different keyboards are used. The different keyboards are shown in the following paragraphs.

Keyboard Form


Figure - Page With Keyboard Enabled Fields

 

Text Keyboard


Figure - Text Keyboard

 

Text Password Keyboard


Figure - Text Password Keyboard

 

Numeric Keyboard


Figure - Numeric Keyboard

 

Numeric Password Keyboard


Figure - Numeric Password Keyboard

 

ABC Jump Keyboard is a little different than the test or numeric keyboards. The ABC Jump keyboard is used to allow a single character to be selected and that character is used

Figure - ABC Jump list Figure - ABC Jump Keyboard

 

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Progress Indicators

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Figure - Bar Style Progress Indicator

 

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Updated: 12/28/2017