April 2010

Podcasts from the IA Summit 2010: Day 3

"This year marks the 11th annual Information Architecture Summit. Our theme is meant to inspire everyone in the community—even those who aren't presenting or volunteering—to bring their best ideas to the table. As busy practitioners, we rarely have the chance to step back and think about the future of our field—we're too busy resolving day-to-day issues. By gathering and sharing practical solutions for everyday challenges, we can create more breathing room to plan for what's to come." (Jeff Parks - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on April 30, 2010 | Classification: Events - Information architecture | Permalink

Navimation: Exploring Time, Space & Motion in the Design of Screen-based Interfaces

"Screen-based user interfaces now include dynamic and moving elements that transform the screen space and relations of mediated content. These changes place new demands on design as well as on our reading and use of such multimodal texts. Assuming a socio-cultural perspective on design, we discuss in this article the use of animation and visual motion in interface navigation as navimation. After presenting our Communication Design framework, we refer to relevant literature on navigation and motion. Three core concepts are introduced for the purpose of analysing selected interface examples using multimodal textual analysis informed by social semiotics. The analysis draws on concepts from multiple fields, including animation studies, ‘new’ media, interaction design, and human-computer interaction. Relations between time, space and motion are discussed and linked to wider debates concerning interface design." (Jon Olav H. Eikenes and Andrew Morrison ~ IJDesign Volume 4 No. 1, 2010)

Posted by PJB on April 30, 2010 | Classification: Information architecture | Permalink

Developers, UX is not UI, learn that and stop trivializing!

"And while this might be just my personal feeling, I am under impression that this kind of misunderstanding and trivialization of UX comes mostly from the developer-centric cultures like ones from Microsoft, Sun and IBM. Reason more for those companies to keep investing and educating all parties involved – you owe that to the customers and to the community of practice! Good things have been done so far – but obviously much more needs to be done." (UX Passion)

Posted by PJB on April 29, 2010 | Classification: HCI - User experience | Permalink

The Month to Remember (From 33)

"But in the most pleasing connection of all -- and the Commissioner was, is and shall always be about connection -- remembering connects with learning." (Richard S. Wurman - Huffington Post)

Posted by PJB on April 28, 2010 | Classification: Information design | Permalink

The Differences Between Good Designers and Great Designers

"Four years ago Cameron Moll gave a presentation on 9 skills that separate good designers and great designers. It's a great talk and if you have the chance I suggest you at least check out the PDF slidedeck. I think the points he makes in the presentation are still relevant today and go a long way in educating us in how designers should be approaching their interactive designs." (Drawar)

Posted by PJB on April 28, 2010 | Classification: Information design | Permalink

Classification Schemes (and when to use them)

"When you do information architecture work you’ll realize that most sets of content can be organized in more than one way. One of the challenges for an IA project is figuring out what way works best for your audience, your content and your project’s goals." (Donna Maurer - UXBooth)

Posted by PJB on April 28, 2010 | Classification: Information architecture - Information design - Metadata | Permalink

Usability Do's And Don'ts For Interactive Design

"We often talk about how to make our websites more usable, whether it’s tweaking the HTML structure of pages to benefit the user’s process or figuring out how best to display a message via CSS. But we never bring this thought process into our jQuery-based (and other JavaScript-based) elements. How can we enhance the user experience and usability of our jQuery events? Below, we'll briefly discuss ways to look at the code and the result of our interactive designs and, thus, improve their usability." (Smashing Magazine)

Posted by PJB on April 27, 2010 | Classification: Technology - Usability | Permalink

Search Patterns is Customer Behavior and Business Insights

Interview with Peter Morville about his new book Search Patterns - "(...) I'm a skeptic when it comes to grand visions of The Semantic Web. In narrow domains such as medicine, we can develop thesauri (or 'ontologies') that define terms precisely and map hierarchical, equivalent, and associative relationships. But these approaches simply don't scale, and they can't keep up with the rapid evolution of language and knowledge." (Bridgeline Digital)

Posted by PJB on April 27, 2010 | Classification: Information architecture - Interviews - Patterns - Search | Permalink

Podcasts from the IA Summit 2010: Day 2

"This year marks the 11th annual Information Architecture Summit. Our theme is meant to inspire everyone in the community—even those who aren't presenting or volunteering—to bring their best ideas to the table. As busy practitioners, we rarely have the chance to step back and think about the future of our field—we're too busy resolving day-to-day issues. By gathering and sharing practical solutions for everyday challenges, we can create more breathing room to plan for what's to come." (Jeff Parks - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on April 26, 2010 | Classification: Events - Information architecture - Podcasts | Permalink

The Promise of Using UI Patterns for Large Software Packages Revisited

"In this case study, we reflect on how a UI pattern-based design for building standard business software affects the user experience and the user-centered design process. We learned that pattern-based design does not optimize the user experience per se. Additional factors, such as user-centered design, prototyping tools, and management support determine the success or failure of the pattern-based approach. Interweaving the factors in the right way is a prerequisite for success." (Annette Stotz and Udo Arend - SAPDesignGuild)

Posted by PJB on April 26, 2010 | Classification: Patterns - User experience | Permalink

Intentional Communication: Expanding our Definition of User Experience Design

"Design and content. Content and design. It's impossible (and stupid) to argue over which one is more important than the other - which should come first, which is more difficult or 'strategic'. They need each other to provide context, meaning, information, and instruction in any user experience (UX)." (Kristina Halvorson - interactions XVII.3)

Posted by PJB on April 26, 2010 | Classification: Content strategy - User experience | Permalink

interactions: Business, Culture, and Society

"Our cover story puts an explicit emphasis on what has been an implicit theme of interactions over the past two years: the desire to improve the world around us through interaction design." (Jon Koiko - interactions XVII.3)

Posted by PJB on April 26, 2010 | Classification: Interaction design | Permalink

Designing For A Hierarchy Of Needs

"Based on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, the idea of a design hierarchy of needs rests on the assumption that in order to be successful, a design must meet basic needs before it can satisfy higher-level needs. Before a design can 'Wow' us, it must work as intended. It must meet some minimal need or nothing else will really matter. Is this true? Or could a design that's hard to use still succeed because it makes users more proficient or meets certain creative needs? Do you have to get all of the low-level needs exactly right before considering higher-level needs? To answer these questions, let's start by looking at Maslow's hierarchy." (Steven Bradley - Smashing Magazine)

Posted by PJB on April 26, 2010 | Classification: Information design | Permalink

Service Design and the Customer's Journey

"In short, just step up to the plate and own the passages that make up your customer's journey. By the use of some straight-forward tools and processes (which are mostly extensions of items that should be in your user experience toolkit already), you can incorporate service design thinking and deliverables into your overall practice." (Fritillaria)

Posted by PJB on April 26, 2010 | Classification: Information architecture - Service design | Permalink

UK Election Email Newsletters Rated

"The main British parties' email newsletters have higher usability scores than we found for US political newsletters in our last evaluation." (Jakob Nielsen - Alertbox)

Posted by PJB on April 26, 2010 | Classification: Usability | Permalink

User Experience Metrics

"These days many sophisticated metrics are built into web analytics packages, but few tools help us recognize which are really measuring that holy grail of UX: user engagement." (52 Weeks of UX)

Posted by PJB on April 26, 2010 | Classification: User experience | Permalink

A DIY Guide to Content Strategy

"You’re a web professional: a designer, developer, information architect, or strategist. Your team has the web design disciplines covered: research, strategy, user experience design, standards-based development, and project management. But something’s going wrong with your projects; the user experience just isn’t meeting your expectations. You're reasonably sure you know why: there’s a problem with the content. You realise that your team could use some help from the discipline of content strategy, but for whatever reason, hiring a dedicated content strategist isn't a feasible option. So what can you do to add some content strategy to your projects? Learn how web professionals can practise content strategy for ourselves, through advocacy, improved design processes, and community engagement. And when we have the luxury of a dedicated content strategist, learn how we can engage with the discipline in our everyday practice." (Jonathan Kahn)

Posted by PJB on April 23, 2010 | Classification: Content strategy - Events | Permalink

Podcasts from the IA Summit 2010: Day 1

"This year marks the 11th annual Information Architecture Summit. Our theme is meant to inspire everyone in the community—even those who aren't presenting or volunteering—to bring their best ideas to the table. As busy practitioners, we rarely have the chance to step back and think about the future of our field—we're too busy resolving day-to-day issues. By gathering and sharing practical solutions for everyday challenges, we can create more breathing room to plan for what's to come." (Jeff Parks - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on April 23, 2010 | Classification: Events - Information architecture - Podcasts | Permalink

Touch Gesture Diagrams

"A set of resources w/ Dan's motto Tab is the new Click." (LukeW)

Posted by PJB on April 22, 2010 | Classification: Tablet design | Permalink

UX Groundswell

"Because I never stop thinking about wicked design problems or obsessing about user experiences, I decided to share my ideas here." (K. Bella Martin)

Posted by PJB on April 22, 2010 | Classification: User experience - Weblogs | Permalink

Mac & the iPad: History Repeats Itself

"For those of us around Apple for the launch of the 1984 Mac, things are awfully familiar. In bringing that original Mac to market, Steve hit on a formula that worked for him. He keeps repeating it, and it seems to get better every time. It worked for the iPhone, and it worked for the iPad, too. Here are the necessary elements." (Bruce Tognazzini)

Posted by PJB on April 21, 2010 | Classification: HCI - Tablet design | Permalink

Sketching in Screenwriting

"Screenwriting is a bit of an outlier when it comes to my investigation of sketching and the performing arts. After all, a screenplay by itself isn't a performance. But it has a lot to teach us about sketching and the structural aspects of service." (Jeff Howard ~ Design for Service)

Posted by PJB on April 21, 2010 | Classification: Service design | Permalink

IA Summit 2010: Some Highlights

"Trying to summarize the summit turned out to be harder than I expected. What I've posted below seems more like several tips of the largest ice bergs rather than a thorough recap. My notes don’t do justice to all that went on but they’re a start at least." (@mattzellmer)

Posted by PJB on April 21, 2010 | Classification: Events - Information architecture | Permalink

Physical Place and CyberPlace: The Rise of Personalized Networking

"Computer networks are social networks. Social affordances of computer supported social networks--broader bandwidth, wireless portability, globalized connectivity, personalization--are fostering the movement from door-to-door and place-to-place communities to person-to-person and role-to-role communities. People connect in social networks rather than in communal groups. In-person and computer-mediated communication are integrated in communities characterized by personalized networking." (Barry Wellman 2001)

Posted by PJB on April 21, 2010 | Classification: Social Web | Permalink

Want Magazine: Coming Soon

"Want Magazine was born out of love for new understanding of man-made experiences (...) and our resulting motivation for contributing in return with enriching experiences of our own." (David Gómez-Rosado)

Posted by PJB on April 20, 2010 | Classification: User experience | Permalink

Industry trends in prototyping

"Prototypes are meant to be a cost-effective way of experimenting with ideas. They are generally considered part of the pre-planning phase, rather than part of the construction or manufacturing process that results in the final product—although obviously the discoveries made during the process of prototyping should ultimately both inform and shape the construction process." (Dave Cronin ~ Cooper)

Posted by PJB on April 20, 2010 | Classification: Interaction design - Prototyping - User experience | Permalink

Design Patterns: Faceted Navigation

"Faceted navigation may be the most significant search innovation of the past decade. It features an integrated, incremental search and browse experience that lets users begin with a classic keyword search and then scan a list of results. It also serves up a custom map that provides insights into the content and its organization and offers a variety of useful next steps. In keeping with the principles of progressive disclosure and incremental construction, it lets users formulate the equivalent of a sophisticated Boolean query by taking a series of small, simple steps. Learn how it works, why it has become ubiquitous in e-commerce, and why it’s not for every site." (Peter Morville & Jeffery Callender ~ A List Apart)

Posted by PJB on April 20, 2010 | Classification: Information architecture - Navigation | Permalink

Typography for Lawyers

"Even though the legal profession depends heavily on writing, legal typography is often poor. Some blame lies with the strict typographic constraints that control certain legal documents (e.g. court rules regarding the format of pleadings). But the rest of the blame lies with lawyers. To be fair, I assume this is for lack of information, not lack of will. This website fills that void." (Matthew Butterick) - courtesy of luctiemessen

Posted by PJB on April 20, 2010 | Classification: Typography | Permalink

Touch Gesture Reference Guide

"(...) a unique set of resources for software designers and developers working on touch-based user interfaces." (LukeW)

Posted by PJB on April 20, 2010 | Classification: Tablet design | Permalink

Ubiquitous Service Design

"Decades later, these concepts remain relevant, and yet we must adapt for new contexts. As Glushko and Tabas explain, today's service systems may include interrelated sub-systems (e.g., person-to-person, self-service) across multiple locations, devices, and channels; and customer satisfaction is influenced by the extent of integration and consistency across those channels." (Peter Morville ~ Semantic Studios)

Posted by PJB on April 19, 2010 | Classification: Service design - User experience | Permalink

CHI 2010: Growing the UX Management Community

"As User Experience matures as a discipline and grows in influence in the business community, UX leaders need to support one another by sharing their insights with their counterparts in other organizations, as well as with the educators molding the next generation of UX leaders at universities offering Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) programs. Indeed, the success of UX design and research initiatives within organizations depends significantly on how UX leaders position their teams and partner and build support with other senior leaders in their organizations." (Jim Nieters ~ UXmatters)

Posted by PJB on April 19, 2010 | Classification: Events - User experience | Permalink

The Process Police

"No process guarantees success. If there were a process that guaranteed happy users everyone would be using it. Nobody gets it right every time. Design doesn’t work like that. It’s iterative, responsive, ever-changing. You have to react as much as plan. You have to change your process on the fly to react to the marketplace. That's why we need to optimize for what's most important, a happy user, and do whatever it takes to make it happen, process be damned." (52 Weeks of UX)

Posted by PJB on April 19, 2010 | Classification: UCD - User experience | Permalink

IA Summit 10: Whitney Hess Keynote

"In her keynote closing the 2010 IA Summit, Whitney asks if our work is just our job or our passion. To really make the difference we seek, our practice needs to be our calling. The UX community is united because of a common mission: We empower people to become self-reliant and more resourceful, organized, social, and relaxed. We don’t do it for them, they do it for themselves." (Jeff Parks - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on April 16, 2010 | Classification: Events - Information architecture - User experience | Permalink

Content Strategists Gather in Paris!

"You may not have heard of them yet, but you will. They're called Content Strategists, and they're fast becoming the most in-demand advisers for Web sites and corporate customers looking for a way to evolve into content makers and curators." (Steve Rosenbaum - Huffington Post)

Posted by PJB on April 16, 2010 | Classification: Content strategy - Events | Permalink

To-do list for next IA Summit

"IA Summit as an exercise in design. Need I say more? So let's have fun." (Louis Rosenfeld)

Posted by PJB on April 16, 2010 | Classification: Events - Information architecture | Permalink

The perils of persuasion

"The success of UCD has sustained demand for user experience design skills, and the land rush has continued in 2010. UX is becoming a cookie cutter add-on for digital agencies and I rarely meet a web designer now who doesn’t claim UX proficiency, although not all can articulate what that means. And it’s not just the designers: I also see back-end developers, SEO professionals and marketers rapidly appending these two magical letters to their CVs." (Cennydd Bowles)

Posted by PJB on April 16, 2010 | Classification: UCD - User experience | Permalink

The Secret to Designing an Intuitive UX: Match the Mental Model to the Conceptual Model

"A mental model represents a person's thought process for how something works (i.e., a person's understanding of the surrounding world). Mental models are based on incomplete facts, past experiences, and even intuitive perceptions. (...) A conceptual model is the actual model that is given to the user through the interface of the product." (Susan Weinschenk - UX Magazine)

Posted by PJB on April 15, 2010 | Classification: Design research - Information design | Permalink

Defining the Designer of 2015

"(...) it has been apparent that design studios and corporate departments have been looking for a new kind of designer, one that has traditional skills and yet a much broader perspective on problem solving. Because one of AIGA’s central responsibilities is to keep abreast of developments in the industry, we recognized that we needed to better understand the emerging role of designers and to enter into a deeper discussion with educators and design leaders on how to prepare designers for future changes." (AIGA)

Posted by PJB on April 14, 2010 | Classification: Design research - Information design | Permalink

Why You Need A Content Strategist?

"Are you investing in your content? Do you have a strategy? If not then help is at hand. You need a content strategist, but who are they and what do they do?" (Paul Boag)

Posted by PJB on April 14, 2010 | Classification: Content strategy - Podcasts | Permalink

The riddle of experience vs. memory

"Using examples from vacations to colonoscopies, Nobel laureate and founder of behavioral economics Daniel Kahneman reveals how our 'experiencing selves' and our 'remembering selves' perceive happiness differently. This new insight has profound implications for economics, public policy -- and our own self-awareness." (TED2010)

Posted by PJB on April 14, 2010 | Classification: Design research - User experience | Permalink

New Computer Interface Goes Beyond Just Touch

"Touch screen interfaces may be trendy in gadget design, but that doesn't mean they do everything elegantly. The finger is simply too blunt for many tasks. A new interface, called Manual Deskterity, attempts to combine the strengths of touch interaction with the precision of a pen." (Erica Naone - MIT Technology Review)

Posted by PJB on April 14, 2010 | Classification: HCI - Tablet design | Permalink

5 Minute Madness

"(...) as a community like this matures, it's natural (but not inevitable) that the pioneers leave, and the new folks carry on without them." (Peter Morville)

Posted by PJB on April 14, 2010 | Classification: Events - Information architecture | Permalink

CHI 2010 Opening Plenary: Thinking About Messy Futures

"Not only are profound and apparently lasting demographic changes underway, but technology is also changing, or it is not changing in the ways that had been expected." (Jack Rosenberger - CACM)

Posted by PJB on April 13, 2010 | Classification: Events | Permalink

Mobile Internet Will Soon Overtake Fixed Internet

"And what does Mary Meeker see in her crystal ball this year? Two overwhelming trends that will affect consumers, the hardware/infrastructure industry and the commercial potential of the web: mobile and social networking." (Mathew Ingram - GigaCom)

Posted by PJB on April 13, 2010 | Classification: Design research - Mobile design - Social Web | Permalink

Touch Usability: News and research on touch interface usability

"This blog is a personal project and the opinions here are strictly my own." (Kevin Arthur)

Posted by PJB on April 12, 2010 | Classification: Tablet design - Usability - Weblogs | Permalink

IA Summit 10: Dan Roam Keynote

"In his day one keynote from the 2010 IA Summit, Dan Roam—founder of Digital Roam Inc and author of the best-selling Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures - shares his unique visual-thinking approach with a receptive crowd in Phoenix. Transcending language barriers, his approach helps solve complex problems through visual thinking, and has helped resolve challenges at many businesses: Microsoft, Wal-Mart, and eBay to name a few." (Jeff Parks - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on April 12, 2010 | Classification: Events - Information architecture | Permalink

IA Summit 10: Richard Saul Wurman Keynote

"With the majority of the earth's population now living in cities, Richard Saul Wurman realized there was a yawning information gap about the urban super centers that are increasingly driving modern culture. In this keynote presentation from the 2010 IA Summit, Mr. Wurman discusses his 19.20.21 initiative: an attempt to standardize a methodology to understand comparative data on 19 cities that will have 20 million or more inhabitants in the 21st century. He encourages the design community to take initiative and solve big problems rather than make small changes incrementally." (Jeff Parks - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on April 12, 2010 | Classification: Events - Information architecture | Permalink

Into the groove: Lessons from the desktop music revolution

"Musical instruments provide really intriguing examples of user interface design. While it can take years of training and no small amount of aptitude, an instrument in the right hands can provide highly nuanced control over the many aspects of sound that come together to form one of the highest forms of human expression. And even for those of us who will never achieve such heights of virtuosity, merely using such a 'user interface' can result a great sense of enjoyment, immersion and fulfillment (what is often referred to as a state of flow)." (David Cronin - Cooper Journal)

Posted by PJB on April 09, 2010 | Classification: HCI | Permalink

Design to Read

"Many people do not read easily. They may have a visual problem or dyslexia. They may have not have had opportunities to learn to read, or be reading in stressful conditions or poor light, or perhaps they are reading in a second language. Is it possible to provide one consistent set of guidelines or approaches that will allow designers to meet all the apparently diverse needs of these people? Or are there compromises to be made?" (About Design to Read)

Posted by PJB on April 09, 2010 | Classification: Information design - Visual design - Writing | Permalink

The Design Process and the Scientific Method

"The design process is messy, difficult to explain and sell, and its results are not certain from the beginning. People want more predictability." (Dan Saffer - Kicker Studio)

Posted by PJB on April 09, 2010 | Classification: Information design - User experience | Permalink

Design anthropology: What can it add to your design practice?

"Designers primarily concern themselves with how to create a 'successful' communication, product, or experience. But with the past 10 years of globalization, digitalization, and ever increasing design complexity, designers have come to realize that to answer the question of design 'success' requires that they answer that question of how the processes and artifacts of design help define what it means to be human. This 'humanness' can range from how humans control the environment through tools (homo faber); how high-heeled shoes affect natural ways of walking; to moral issues of how participation in the design process empowers marginalized communities. In this space, the practice and theory of design anthropology has emerged." (Dori Tunstall)

Posted by PJB on April 07, 2010 | Classification: Design research | Permalink

Designing with Lenses

"A design lens allows you to view your user experience design from the perspective of a single design principle. Lenses were originally created for game design but are just as powerful for user experience design." (Bill Scott and Theresa Neill)

Posted by PJB on April 07, 2010 | Classification: User experience | Permalink

Horizontal Attention Leans Left

"Web users spend 69% of their time viewing the left half of the page and 30% viewing the right half. A conventional layout is thus more likely to make sites profitable." (Jakob Nielsen - Alertbox)

Posted by PJB on April 06, 2010 | Classification: Usability | Permalink

Using a Collaborative Parallel Design Process

"Genetic algorithms essentially mimic evolutionary biology to find optimal solutions. Initially, they select a population of solutions based on some evaluation criteria, then use some subset of that population—the fittest members—as breeding stock for the subsequent generation of solutions. This process continues for multiple generations, each getting closer to an optimal solution. This article describes my experience with parallel design and discusses how to make parallel design more collaborative." (Mike Myles - UXmatters)

Posted by PJB on April 05, 2010 | Classification: User experience | Permalink

Design Patterns for Mobile Faceted Search: Part I

"This column covers design patterns for maximizing the real estate available for search results, while the next will cover strategies for making people aware of filtering options." (Greg Nudelman - UXmatters)

Posted by PJB on April 05, 2010 | Classification: Mobile design | Permalink

IDSA Design Research

"We have launched this site in connection with the release of the spring issue of Innovation Magazine, which is dedicated to design research. All of the articles from the magazine are available here. We encourage you to read these articles and share your thoughts and ideas through the site."

Posted by PJB on April 04, 2010 | Classification: Design research | Permalink

The Power of Personas

"In this installment, we took somewhat detailed tour of personas. First, we covered how to make them—the processes and techniques involved in developing, validating, and maturing the personas themselves, which has a big benefit to the whole team involved in getting a much better understanding of whom the solution is being developed for. Then we discussed some different uses of personas, how not to use them, as well as how to—chiefly to gain empathy to inform what and how you build so that it makes sense for your target audience as well as a valuable communication tool to keep team members on the same page, speaking the same language, and collaborating in terms of people rather than in terms of technical or hierarchical terms." (Dr. Charles B. Kreitzberg and Ambrose Little)

Posted by PJB on April 02, 2010 | Classification: Personas | Permalink

Service design goes mainstream

"Reading with interest an unfolding flameup at Design for Service caused by Jeff Howard's post entitled UX Rockstars need not apply. The gist of the conversation is a few folk getting all hot under the collar about disciplines and domains. Especially the emerging challenges in the US by this new fangled idea of Service Design and it seems to be freaking people out. Which is a good thing in my book. The argument was instigated by sweeping statement from an interview with Jesse James Garret of Adaptive Path, that went like this (...)" (Paul Sims - Made by Many)

Posted by PJB on April 01, 2010 | Classification: Service design - User experience | Permalink