Rob Tannen presents an insightful guide to Ergonomics for Interaction Designers.

This presentation is based on a number of articles found on Rob Tannen’s website: Designing for Humans.

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Some inspiring User Experience design from Microsoft… for once.

The most interesting and engaging technology here is demonstrated right at the beginning in the form of an interactive education platform. Unfortunately however, I think the business applications are far more likely to see the light of day, such as the touchscreen business cards and meeting console.

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During the Opencast Matterhorn Leadership and Planning Meeting, Allison Bloodworth and Judy Stern of UC Berkeley Educational Technology Services provided an overview of the Business Analysis and User Experience roles and processes. The Matterhorn BA/U Team was proposed as a unified team working together as a cross-project resource to help the Matterhorn team understand & design for user and business needs that will be more likely to be adopted and used successfully.

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…And so in steps Adobe Fireworks.

Ok, ok, so I agree that the idea of “re-work” is a slightly heavily weighted if not clumsy argument and there is no such thing as a tool for all seasons, one-stop shop. Of course, I’m not suggesting that Firework’s CSS and HTML export functionality is anything more than a handy rapid prototying and user testing feature. Nor do I think Photoshop should take a back seat when dealing with web (subtle cough) “photography”. I do believe however that as part of an iterative workflow, Adobe Fireworks really stands out.

In a nutshell, Firework is a hybrid imaging application that includes powerful vector tools to create non-destructive scalable elements and tools to optimize graphics for the web by using the native PNG format to keep layered file sizes low. Interestingly, one of the original goals of the Fireworks development team was to create a program in which users could do all their work without ever having to jump to another application. Having said that, integration with other Adobe (previously Macromedia) products is seamless. With the advent of Rich Internet Application and Adobe’s commitment to Flex, Fireworks CS4 allows Flex components to be inserted into a design making it ideal for the design development of Flex (and Flash) based web applications. For those still not content with Fireworks out of the box, it can also be extended by those who are familiar with JavaScript or Flash.

Whilst long time users of Adobe Photoshop may find it difficult to migrate their workflow to Fireworks since Photoshop has been the web design tool for many over a decade, Fireworks CS4 now has improved support for import of PSD files and preserving all slices made in Photoshop.

In the end, yes, it is about choice. However, Adobe really has succeeded in creating a tool that can be integrated into your existing workflow, and enhances your productivity by functioning as both prototyping and design applications.

Useful stuff:

• Smashing Magazine presents: Adobe Fireworks Tutorials and Dowloads.
• Adobe Products: Fireworks.
• Adobe Fireworks Development Center.

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If you have to explain to someone what human centered design is and you only have about two minutes: show them this movie from MAYA design.

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1) What is the best way for user interface design and usability to integrate with software engineering processes, specifically Agile processes?

Design and engineering must work well together if we want design cemented in the overall software development process.  Many perceive design as being oriented towards a waterfall approach, costly, and a “nice to have, but not necessary”.  We must change these perceptions by repeatedly producing better results through close work with software engineers.  Agile processes, whether strictly or loosely followed are the most promising framework for design and engineering to come together and pave the way for future software products and superior user experiences.
And since there are often fewer design resources than engineering resources, it is easy to develop a design-engineering bottleneck. The best way I have found to avoid/remedy this is to develop design artifacts (standards, templates, and best practices) for common scenarios so that many situations requiring design input can be solved without designers. It’s not as simple as developing the artifacts and giving engineers a link to them; it is up to the designers to educate engineering when and why the artifacts should be used.

2) How can we better quantify the value of design and usability (ROI)?

There are several books on the subject and countless online resources, and yet most designers stumble when asked this question.  If we can’t speak the language of executives, i.e. “dollars”, then we will remain “less important”.  And we need more than examples of value delivered from a particular case study: we need standardized quantifiable metrics that pass the executive litmus test.  If we have these already, then we all need to learn how to track and measure them and how to start communicating our value with them.  In addition to asking “how can we measure the value we deliver?” we also need to ask “how can we deliver the most value?”

3) Where does design and usability belong within an organization?

In some software organizations user interface design resides in the engineering or development department.  In others it sits in marketing along with product management.  In some it is actually its own department in parallel to development and marketing.  While organizational structures do vary from company to company, design seems to be all over the place with even less of a standard structure.  Regardless of detailed top-level structure, I would strongly argue that design be parallel to engineering and product management, otherwise design becomes less strategic and mostly tactical, and that is very dangerous.

4) What’s next for software user interfaces?

If you are a designer, you should always be on the lookout for new and better ways to improve user experiences.  I read online blogs, journals, the results of user interface studies, and attend conferences searching for the stepping stones that lead to the next creative and innovative solution.  I’m particularly interested in new software interaction paradigms – designs that leverage the power and uniqueness of our digital medium rather than rely solely on mental models of physical objects mapped to the digital world.  For example, is clicking a button the best solution for the physical and digital world?  Maybe…

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It’s really a very easy read and well worth taking a look over. What surprised me the most is how many features from as far back as “The Xerox Star” (later “ViewPoint” and later again “GlobalView”) remain consistent throughout the last 28 years of OS development despite the dramatic changes in PC usage and functionality.

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Yes, and I’m ashamed to admit it, but previously I was working with the oh-so-butt-ugly default Wordpress install. Ok, I’m quite sure it has it’s benefits – I just can’t stand it! So, I put my money where my mouth is and very hastily threw together this site. I’m not really a web designer by trade… I can’t code in PHP and I only know enough HTML and CSS to get me to the ‘quick and dirty client mock-up’ stage. So if it’s bad, or if it’s wrong, or if it plain just does not work… please let me know… politely!

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Kicking us off was Carsonified’s founder, Ryan Carson, revealing his lessons learned from the aquistion of DropSend.com… and it did exactly what it said on the tin -14 tips to help any young and energetic entrepreneur prevent catastrophic meltdown!

Perhaps the most revealing and inspiring talk with regards to good design was presented by Eoghan McCabe and Des Traynor from Contrast. A two-headed presentation (at lightening pace) discussed how many conventions born out of unimaginative web design had transferred to the design of web applications. This raised a very interesting question – why aren’t web application designers taking advice from software application designers since common to both is the creation of successful applications?

A subject very close to my heart -that of an accessible web for all- was discussed in (a notably accessible manner) by Robin Christopherson from AbilityNet, a charitable UK organisation dedicated to helping disabled adults and children use computers and the internet. This particular presentation focused on how the ill implementation of Captchas (those boxes containing the funky lettering used for sign-ups that are intended to prevent spam) actually renders screen reading software useless.

All in all – an excellent, and incredibly well organised day! Top marks to Carsonified!

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For development sometime in the near future – I’ve purchased two domains that I hope to turn into fully fledged community sites focusing upon usability, accessibility and design issues. The plan to date is to create two sister sites aimed at slightly different target audiences. More details will be revealed in the coming weeks!

Incidentally, the picture is of one of my finest achievements – my 10 foot (floor to ceiling) cup tower! This feat of engineering took me over 6 months of hardened coffee consumption – so you see kids – the late nights do pay off!

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