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Software Engineering vocabulary · Web, Mobile and Interface Development

Gesture

Meaning in software engineering, with examples

/ˈdʒestʃər/nounCommon term

In software engineering, gesture means: A movement of the fingers on a touchscreen, such as a tap, swipe, pinch or long press, that tells a device to do something.

In Turkish: dokunma hareketi, hareket, jest

How it is used

Mobile designers talk about tap, double-tap, swipe, drag, pinch to zoom and long press. Gestures are invisible, so important actions should also have a visible button. iOS and Android differ in some system gestures.

Example sentences

  1. Users didn't discover the swipe gesture for deleting messages.

  2. Our custom gesture conflicts with the Android back gesture.

Common collocations

  • swipe gesture
  • gesture navigation
  • pinch gesture
  • hidden gesture
  • interaction designThe part of design that decides how a product behaves when people use it: what happens when they tap, type, swipe or wait, and how the system responds.
  • affordanceA quality of an object or interface element that suggests how it can be used, for example a raised button that looks pressable or a handle that invites pulling.
  • microinteractionA small, single-purpose moment of interaction with its own feedback, such as liking a post, switching a toggle or a field shaking after a wrong password.
  • feedbackThe signal a system gives in response to a user's action, such as a button changing colour, a loading spinner or a success message, so people know what happened.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Web, Mobile and Interface Development

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