An article in the NYTimes lamenting the contrast of how writers think and how Word doesn’t cut it. Ultimately, it’s an entertaining article about crafting a UI for a specific usertype.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/magazine/06wwln-medium-t.html?

Scrivener for Mac
http://literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.html

MS Word was arguably created for everyone needing a word processor. But when addressing the experience of writing, particularly for writers, Word comes up short. Accommodating non-linear thinking with notes, outlines, metaphors and approaching the empty page as a canvas to minimize distractions among other things are what Scrivener employs to help writers write.

O’Reilly sponsored event started in Seattle that is starting in other cities. It is a bi-monthly meet of geeks to introduce cool ideas and impressions in a Pecha-Kucha way (20 slides, 5 minutes). Before the drinking begins…

We should present there and maybe try to start a reboot of 2nd Monday or similar group here.

http://ignite-chicago.org

http://igniteseattle.com/

You can see talks that occurred at Ignite Seattle here:  www.youtube.com/user/ignitenight. And probably also on the main Ignite Seattle page.

February 21-22

http://www.design.cmu.edu/confluence/

Why does Vista Suck? Blame Automated Testing

“This isn’t to say that automated tests are useless… far from it. However, if your requirements for “tester” are the same as your requirements for “programmer,” then you’re not really doing testing.”

However, there were lively pro/con comments….

What if we took a use-case approach to defining our design and dev processes? Would that give us a different perspective of how we would like to work?

Sometimes a use-case needs to be documenting in text. Other times a workflow does the best. And in still other cases, would a prototype be more appropriate? When something is very well understood, do you need to textually define it or can you just build it?

A nomenclature (meta data) for a use case seems also to be a needed thing. Some are very finite others are at a high level. Some are self contaned (can be completed in one-sitting) others are extended across time and multiple steps.

Use-cases should be able to be used for products as well as software. Anything requiring user-interaction, could use use-cases as a tool.

Thoughts?

Amazing article Eric found that gets at the soul of our approach.

From Cooper -Digital Product Design firm in San Francisco

http://www.cooper.com/insights/journal_of_design/articles/design_engineering_the_next_st.html#part2

“The Triad … Interaction design is design for humans, design engineering is design for computers, and production engineering is implementation.”

“And that is exactly what programmers at all levels and in all sub-disciplines of computer programming do: they design code at the same time as they build it. If we could untangle these two parts of the programming job, we could begin to defeat the apocalyptic horsemen.”

“Software is the only medium where the construction materials are entirely the same as the design materials: source code…. In no other medium is this true and it is this watershed more than any other that defines the post-industrial era.”

“In my 30 years experience designing and building software, I have learned that the most expensive software to build is the wrong software. You might think that I’m describing the situation where you build the wrong software, have to throw it away, and then build the correct software. Actually, that’s not a bad thing to do at all, as long as it’s disposable code.”

“Currently there is a pitched battle raging in the programmer world between conventional engineering methods and Agile methods… Both methods are correct, but only when used at the correct time and with the correct medium.”

“By getting the right people doing the right jobs in the right sequence, the whole process becomes more predictable, faster, and less costly.”

A great candidate for an ‘epiphany of the day’ found at a blog of Jesper Rønn-Jensen who gets at the heart of what User Experience is. I found this and other excellent UX links through Stephen Pautz’s site, who has inquired on our job posting and is a voracious reader of all things UxD.

http://justaddwater.dk/2006/06/21/user-experience-revisited/

Excerpt: (originally sourced from the excellent blog of Thomas Baekdal)

Focus on making it easy to be happy, and usability, user-experience and greatness will come all by itself.

Also, from the blog, check out this excellent User Experience chart (and also Poster!)

From the Apple Developer Connection, UX guides for Mac OSX, iPhone, etc.

http://developer.apple.com/ue/

I read a great little post by Jason Fried at 37Signals about the placement of the iTunes icon on the iPhone. Instead of putting the new button in the next open slot in the grid (lower left), the icon, while still in the grid, was placed closer to the iPod icon in the lower right. The author was delighted that this was a great example of “Context over Consistency”. The rules may seem to have been broken, but upon closer inspection, you see that it was a balancing act between competing logic opportunities: consistency of the grid read vs. proximity to related major function (iPod).

I agree with this approach, however, in this case it is daring because if this is the new ‘consistency’, it will have challenges ahead as the UI fills up with icons (three slots left!). At some point, associations with the four major functions along the bottom will be lost on the user as icons compete for proximity. Add in right and left-handedness, and you’ve got quite a balancing act! But with context already a driver, maybe it will introduce new methods to accommodate a growing family of icons (see ‘Spaces’ or ‘Stacks’ in Leopard).

As designers, we all know that you have to know the rules and when to break them. If a ‘rule’ was apparently broken, you may be called on it. But as the author put it, “Consistency is the easy choice. Context is the thinking choice.” (Comments poster goes further and adds, “Performance above all”).

Association for Usability encompassing many disciplines

http://www.upassoc.org/

UPA is also a LinkedIn group that you can network within (adds logo to your profile).