Re: [IxDA Discuss] Any usability studies on free hand gestures?
On May 1, 2008, at 9:43 PM, Amnon Dekel wrote: *design guidelines for best gestures* to implement- i.e. rules to help a designer select gestures. The rules should include things like from what physical poses gestures should start, how they should end, which gestures are more readily understood and easy to learn by users etc. This is what my new book is about. While I'm not a fan of rules per se, I do go into things to think about when selecting, documenting, prototyping, and, of course, designing interactive gestures. Some of which is in the first chapter, a draft of which can be downloaded from the book's website: http://www.designinggesturalinterfaces.com Dan Saffer Interactive Gestures: Designing Gestural Interfaces O'Reilly, Fall 2008 Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
[IxDA Discuss] IxDA Announces Downloadable Interaction 08 Presentation Videos
The Interaction Design Association (IxDA) is pleased to announce that videos from presentations at IxDA's Interaction 08, held February 8 - 10, 2008 at the Savannah College of Art and Design are now downloadable in MP3 and MP4 (iPod Video) versions. Just right-click (or control click in OSX) the link under the embedded video and select Save link as in your browser.: http://interaction08.ixda.org/videos.php A number of our members had emailed to request this, and they'll make great viewing while commuting on the train and other times away from a browser. Big thanks to Nasir Barday for his work making these available! Here again is a list of the Interaction 08 Presentation Videos: A Call to Arms * Keynote: An Insurgency of Quality Alan Cooper, Cooper * Keynote: The Design Eco-System Bill Buxton, Microsoft Practice and Skills * Concept Models: A Tool for Planning Interaction Dan Brown, EightShapes * Concept Ideation and IxD Gretchen Anderson, Lunar * Don't Make Me Click Aza Raskin, Humanized * Conceptual Designs Susan Wyche, Georgia Tech * Effective Prototyping Methods Jonathan Arnowitz, Google * What Makes a Design Seem Intuitive? Jared Spool, UIE * Designing for the Other 99% Morten Hjerde, mBricks * Help Me! A New Approach to Support Interactions Doug Bolin, Avenue A | Razorfish * New Interaction Model for a Modular Personal Infotainment System Sajid Saiyed, Phillips Thinking in Different Ways * Keynote: Intervention-Interaction Sigi Moeslinger, Antenna Design * Design for Flow Dave Cronin, Cooper * Conversations with Everyday Objects Bill DeRouchey, Ziba Design * Classic Design Movements and IxD: Kissing Cousins? Chris Bernard, Microsoft * Hit it with The Pretty Stick Jenny Lam, Jackson Fish Market * Strategic Boredom Molly Wright Steenson, Princeton University * Device Art Régine Debatty, We Make Money Not Art Interaction Design and Cinema * Cinematic Interaction Design Sarah Allen, Laszlo Systems * Dramatic Features in Interaction Design Chris Conley, Gravity Tank * Self-Conscious Gaming Andrew Hieronymi, SCAD Interaction Design and Organizations * Interaction Across Disciplines Michele Tepper, frog * Experience Design, Convergence + The Digital Agency David Armano, Critical Mass * User Interface Design in an Agile Environment: Enter the Design Studio Jeff White and Jim Unger, JewelryTV Case Studies * Designing for SpaceTime, Building in No-Time Matt Jones, Dopplr * Redesigning Sony-Ericsson's Product Catalog Saskia Idzerda, Media Catalyst * Visualizing Radio Yasser Rashid, BBC Interaction Design's Place in the World * Keynote: Dense Notation, In Context Malcolm McCullough, University of Michigan * Ethics of Everyday Design Gabriel White, frog * Interaction Design for Community Empowerment Carl DiSalvo, Georgia Tech About IxDA http://ixda.org Founded in 2003, the Interaction Design Association (IxDA) is a member- supported organization committed to serving the needs of the international interaction design community. With the help of thousands of members worldwide, we provide a forum for the discussion of interaction design issues. IxDA's mission includes evangelism of our field, innovation in our discipline, professionalism in our standards of practice, support for interaction design education in academic programs, and community building for our growing global community of interaction design professionals. IxDA Discussion Forums: http://ixda.org/discuss.php Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] Any usability studies on free hand gestures?
From: Amnon Dekel [EMAIL PROTECTED] but rather a search for *design guidelines for best gestures* to implement- i.e. rules to help a designer select gestures. The rules should include things like from what physical poses gestures should start, how they should end, which gestures are more readily understood and easy to learn by users etc. Dan Saffer's work seems to be the definitive place to start. Here are a few other ideas: all somewhat non-specific but they may help. There's a new chapter book edited by Kortum: Beyond the GUI. Each chapter has a description and guidelines for a different type of non-GUI interface including haptics etc. I reviewed the chapters in draft but I haven't yet seen the published book. I can't remember if it has just what you need but it's probably worth a good look for the references alone. (Academic book, lots of refs in it). A lot of the Australians are very interested in remote working and the interpretation of gestures involved in remote working - it's natural given their geography. (e.g., doctors remote from patients). There were some interesting presentations on this at OzCHI 2007. I'm not sure that they are exactly what you want but again, it might give you some references to follow up. I was just reading some reports of CHI2008 on www.usabilitynews.com. It seems that there was quite a bit on non-traditional interfaces - those might also be a place to start looking. Best, Caroline Jarrett [EMAIL PROTECTED] 07990 570647 Effortmark Ltd Usability - Forms - Content We have moved. New address: 16 Heath Road Leighton Buzzard LU7 3AB Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] IxDA Announces Downloadable Interaction 08 Presentation Videos
Hi all, I've just managed to wrap the list of videos in some RSS/Podcast magic that should hopefully make this easier to download the videos to an iPod/iPhone via iTunes, or any other device that supports podcasting for that matter. On iTunes, you can click on Advanced - Subscribe to Podcast and paste the following link: http://futureshape.net/ixda/IxDA-Interaction-08-Videos.xml That's my first attempt to make a podcast so I'm not sure if I've done things 100% the right way, but it seems to work OK in on my machine. If there is enough interest, I can also create a podcast file for the audio (MP3) version of the talks. And if IxDA would like to copy this file to their website and submit this to the iTunes podcast catalogue, I'm more than happy to help. Cheers, Alex On Fri, May 2, 2008 at 7:43 AM, James Leftwich, IDSA [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The Interaction Design Association (IxDA) is pleased to announce that videos from presentations at IxDA's Interaction 08, held February 8 - 10, 2008 at the Savannah College of Art and Design are now downloadable in MP3 and MP4 (iPod Video) versions. Just right-click (or control click in OSX) the link under the embedded video and select Save link as in your browser.: http://interaction08.ixda.org/videos.php A number of our members had emailed to request this, and they'll make great viewing while commuting on the train and other times away from a browser. Big thanks to Nasir Barday for his work making these available! Here again is a list of the Interaction 08 Presentation Videos: A Call to Arms * Keynote: An Insurgency of Quality Alan Cooper, Cooper * Keynote: The Design Eco-System Bill Buxton, Microsoft Practice and Skills * Concept Models: A Tool for Planning Interaction Dan Brown, EightShapes * Concept Ideation and IxD Gretchen Anderson, Lunar * Don't Make Me Click Aza Raskin, Humanized * Conceptual Designs Susan Wyche, Georgia Tech * Effective Prototyping Methods Jonathan Arnowitz, Google * What Makes a Design Seem Intuitive? Jared Spool, UIE * Designing for the Other 99% Morten Hjerde, mBricks * Help Me! A New Approach to Support Interactions Doug Bolin, Avenue A | Razorfish * New Interaction Model for a Modular Personal Infotainment System Sajid Saiyed, Phillips Thinking in Different Ways * Keynote: Intervention-Interaction Sigi Moeslinger, Antenna Design * Design for Flow Dave Cronin, Cooper * Conversations with Everyday Objects Bill DeRouchey, Ziba Design * Classic Design Movements and IxD: Kissing Cousins? Chris Bernard, Microsoft * Hit it with The Pretty Stick Jenny Lam, Jackson Fish Market * Strategic Boredom Molly Wright Steenson, Princeton University * Device Art Régine Debatty, We Make Money Not Art Interaction Design and Cinema * Cinematic Interaction Design Sarah Allen, Laszlo Systems * Dramatic Features in Interaction Design Chris Conley, Gravity Tank * Self-Conscious Gaming Andrew Hieronymi, SCAD Interaction Design and Organizations * Interaction Across Disciplines Michele Tepper, frog * Experience Design, Convergence + The Digital Agency David Armano, Critical Mass * User Interface Design in an Agile Environment: Enter the Design Studio Jeff White and Jim Unger, JewelryTV Case Studies * Designing for SpaceTime, Building in No-Time Matt Jones, Dopplr * Redesigning Sony-Ericsson's Product Catalog Saskia Idzerda, Media Catalyst * Visualizing Radio Yasser Rashid, BBC Interaction Design's Place in the World * Keynote: Dense Notation, In Context Malcolm McCullough, University of Michigan * Ethics of Everyday Design Gabriel White, frog * Interaction Design for Community Empowerment Carl DiSalvo, Georgia Tech About IxDA http://ixda.org Founded in 2003, the Interaction Design Association (IxDA) is a member- supported organization committed to serving the needs of the international interaction design community. With the help of thousands of members worldwide, we provide a forum for the discussion of interaction design issues. IxDA's mission includes evangelism of our field, innovation in our discipline, professionalism in our standards of practice, support for interaction design education in academic programs, and community building for our growing global community of interaction design professionals. IxDA Discussion Forums: http://ixda.org/discuss.php Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines
Re: [IxDA Discuss] Alan Cooper's Goal-Oriented Design process - step-by-step
Hi Brandon, From my humble experience, there's no so much needs for the detail or distilled version of the process. but instead, better have insight on the metaphor of the process ( in his book, cooper compare it with movie making). and the key points runs along the process: 1. concept model 2. behaviour pattern 3. persona for user modeling 4. etc this makes use less bounded to specifice steps (or even create localized version that fit your own problem) Cheers -- Jarod On Thu, May 1, 2008 at 3:53 AM, Brandon E.B. Ward [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Anybody have a super-distilled version of the Cooper design process? I'm thinking something like: 1. Research user goals. 2. Refine research results. 3. Develop personas. 4. Write high-level scenarios. Etc. etc. I guess one could make one based on the chapter/section titles from About Face 3, but ... If anyone has something like this that'd be gEAT! B Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help -- Designing for better life style. http://jarodtang.spaces.live.com/ http://jarodtang.blogspot.com Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
[IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
I was reading about Microsoft having recruited Adobe's (think photoshop UI and more) Mark Hamburg to work on user experience. I don't find Adobe product o be particularly user friendly, but I do find them to be consistent and remarkably efficient once you get over a learning curve. I appreciate that approach a lot. I found my self wondering if, for professional tools, there is greater adoption, product loyalty and stickiness in leaving a certain amount of difficulty in the UI? The thinking goes... if the process is to easy, then everyone can do it and it erodes my (the professional user's) value in the marketplace. I know most people don't think much about economics and supply and demand on purpose, but self preservation is certainly prevalent at all levels. Thoughts? Mark Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] Any usability studies on free hand gestures?
I'll second Caroline's suggestion of reading Beyond the GUI. I just read several chapters of the book which just came out including the chapter on Gesture Interfaces and find it an excellent mix of research and practical advice. Each chapter, has a set of design guidelines and many have techniques for testing the non-GUI interfaces or in the gesture chapter, a section on How to build and test a gesture vocabulary. I think that the research adds to the practice so far in that each chapter describes the primary human factors associated with the interface so there is some foundation and rationale with additional references for real depth. The reference is: Kortum, P. (2008). HCI beyond the GUI: Design for haptic, speech, olfactory, and other non-traditional interfaces. Amsterdam: Morgan Kaufmann. This book is somewhat along the lines of Mayhew's classic book from around 1992, Principles and Guidelines in Software User Interface Design which reviewed research theory and then abstracted principles and guidelines from that theory. Books that connect research, theory, adn practice are powerful and provide a stronger foundation for recommendations. Chauncey There's a new chapter book edited by Kortum: Beyond the GUI. Each chapter has a description and guidelines for a different type of non-GUI interface including haptics etc. I reviewed the chapters in draft but I haven't yet seen the published book. I can't remember if it has just what you need but it's probably worth a good look for the references alone. (Academic book, lots of refs in it). Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
In a way, we've seen this erosion of value happen before. The first Mac brought desktop publishing to the consumer - and to this day, we are inundated with poorly designed flyers and newsletters. A certain amount of difficulty [for beginners] is left in the tools by design? I agree, but for different reasons. Given the conflict between (a) performance efficiency (for expert users) vs. (b) support for novice users (ie: ease of learning, time to learn, etc.) - performance efficiency is the priority goal. Andrei? Can these tools also be made easy to learn, but where this added functionality does not interfere with expert use? Sure, but at a greater design and engineering expense. Constantine Lockwood's Instructive Interaction perhaps? Regards, Shep McKee On May 2, 2008, at 8:23 AM, mark schraad wrote: I found my self wondering if, for professional tools, there is greater adoption, product loyalty and stickiness in leaving a certain amount of difficulty in the UI? The thinking goes... if the process is to easy, then everyone can do it and it erodes my (the professional user's) value in the marketplace. Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] IxDA Announces Downloadable Interaction 08 Presentation Videos
Alex, Nice work! That's what I've been waiting for. Now it's time to catch up on the sessions I missed. Many thanks, Jack Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] Alan Cooper's Goal-Oriented Design process - step-by-step
One thing I would add to this thread is the use of story in the Cooper method as a way of doing requirements definition. This is more fully developed in About Face 3 than in previous editions. When I teach this book, I find story (through context scenarios, key path scenarios, and validation scenarios) an effective way to define data elements and functional requirements, especially in relation to the personas that students have previously developed. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=28587 Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
On May 2, 2008, at 9:35 AM, Will Evans wrote: Agreed - on the other hand - no matter how easy desktop publishing/design tools are - they will never replace a designer with a non-designer in things that matter. Absolutely. I should have said a PERCEIVED erosion of value in relation to designers of both print and web in the 90s. Everyone thought they could do the job just fine, as they now had the tools. Why pay a print/web designer? And on May 2, 2008, at 9:35 AM, Will Evans wrote: The were well paid, and behaved almost like priests in charge of sacred rituals with their mystical ability... Good point, and much like many the behavior in many Windows only IT groups. But, is there really a correlation between this shroud of secrecy and a conscious design decision to protect the value of their users? Revisiting and paraphrasing Mark's initial question: Does [...] a certain amount of difficulty in the UI influence: - Product loyalty? Yes. - Stickiness? Yes. - Greater adoption? Yes... IF you are the market leader and/or the prevailing tool. There's not as much demand for these tools to lower the barrier to entry. And any demand has to be balanced against the demand for further innovation from your existing user base. Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] designing for behavioral change for the purposes of sustainability
I have been doing user experience design for the Web and software for many years now, but until recently have not had the opportunity to design physical products, so sustainable design is a new thought on my mental table. I'm currently enjoying its exotic flavors, although I'm not sure what much of it is. : ) So apologies for any ignorance or obviousness displayed below. On Thu, 1 May 2008 14:06:57, Boston IxDA [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Thank you Dan. Before I go though your blog and paper I wanted to say the crux of my pessimism stems from my viewpoint that consumer desires rarely align with the greater good. We are still very much in the 'culture of the self'. I'd agree with you there, erm, Boston. Most of our consumption is mindless. Most of *my* consumption was mindless, until I started thinking about it. I'm not sure people are ready to do that... and I'm absolutely sure our economy is not set up to do that. How I've managed my own is to think about my needs and define parameters for them. I'll admit to being an Apple fanboy. But I don't own an iPhone. And although I nearly salivate every time someone whips one out, I will not buy one until my criteria are met: It must have 3G, 32GB of storage, and support stereo Bluetooth. At that point, the device will meet not only my immediate needs, but my *needs for the forseeable future.* If I buy one now, I know I will want to get rid of it and buy a new one when these new features are added. I've thought of other features that may be added in the future, but I really don't care about those. So if, e.g., GPS is added after I buy my iPhone, I won't care. Obviously, I've spent far too much time thinking about this, and as an IxD I'm hyper-aware of how I (and others) use technology. I think it will be *incredibly* difficult to get the majority of humanity to adopt a similar attitude. Most people just don't care that much. And on top of that, our economy depends on mindless consumption. If everyone did what I do, a lot less stuff would get bought and our economy would collapse. One of the ideas in the article about Nokia's thinking that Dave posted contains an idea I think could help us alter this, the idea of the device that is constantly upgradeable. I don't know the degree to which Nokia has thought about this, but if we bought various boxes for different purposes and subscribed to services that would deliver functionality, we could still get the thrill of the new without having to throw something out. Yes, stuff breaks and processors get faster, but as IxDs, I think we can do a lot to design these services... feature/software upgrade paths, the ability to swap out or upgrade components, change batteries, etc. I think this is where we can do the most good. I struggle to think of opportunities where conscientious design avoids breaking ease of use, they make awkward bedfellows. Not to say it cant work, just hard for me to see how every socially responsible designer can apply behavior conditioning as a design methodology without creating in products that appear to Nanny the user. Nagware is bad. Flat out. So that's where we come in... how can we *make it easy* to do the right thing? Like recycling. It wasn't very popular when we had to separate different kinds of plastics, tin, aluminum, etc. But now, most services allow us to put like materials together (plastic, metal, paper) and *they* are the ones who sort it. This has made recycling almost effortless and as a consequence it has taken off. With what I've described above, my elaboration on Nokia's idea, that's another opportunity. There's no nagware in that. If anything, it's a benefit for the consumer. Instead of having to pay $200 for a new phone, they can pay $50 to get a new processor installed or upgrade the memory. Of course, if it's hard to do these things, they won't happen. If *we* make it easy, they will. - Fred Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
I think there is another thread of logic here which is to measure the potential and realistic investment of the user as a metric for furthering 'ease of use'. For casual letter writing that the layperson does via live office or google online, ease of use is critical. For professional users of financial analysis software, ease of use maybe a trade off for efficiency once additional competency is achieved. So domain experience, and time invested in the specific application are two metrics worth noting. A third would be frequency. I only do my tax return once a year. The application I use for this as a non tax professional needs to be pretty easy to use... because next year I can not likely count on remembering the process and the commands. As for the stickyness/preference issue, I did no mean to imply that we should be so cunning or cynical as to make it more difficult to use as a marketing ploy. But early adopters are more likely to be professionals and willing to invest some learning to achieve efficency. And so compromising that efficiency for ease-of-use would be a mistake in early diffusion stages, because those early adopters, well, won't adopt it. Later, as the product and the function become more mainstream... those efficiencies are less likely to be realized and the quick in-and-out aspect of the application becomes more important (- it would seem). On Fri, May 2, 2008 at 9:35 AM, Will Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In a way, we've seen this erosion of value happen before. The first Mac brought desktop publishing to the consumer - and to this day, we are inundated with poorly designed flyers and newsletters. On Fri, May 2, 2008 at 8:55 AM, Shep McKee [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In a way, we've seen this erosion of value happen before. The first Mac brought desktop publishing to the consumer - and to this day, we are inundated with poorly designed flyers and newsletters. Agreed - on the other hand - no matter how easy desktop publishing/design tools are - they will never replace a designer with a non-designer. in things that matter. You either know typography or you don't, and access to the entire adobe font folio doesn't replace training, education, and years of critique. When notepad was replaced by wysiwyg, the web proliferated with web sites -- 99.999% were complete crap. And even in the design community - many print designers with strong design backgrounds jumped on the web and made some of the most aesthetically pleasing and completely useless/unusable/inaccessible sites around (this continues now with agencies building flash sites like crack addicts). But to Mark's point - when I was doing extensive user research for a complex quantitative software package for risk modeling - many of the users did in fact take mastery of the very complex software package as a point of pride - and frankly didn't want me there doing contextual inquiry because they were frightened by the idea of the software becoming easier/simpler to use. The were well paid, and behaved almost like priests in charge of sacred rituals with their mystical ability to create probability curves out of ether through incantations and sacred rituals - they didn't want a protestant reformation of the process - their power gave them comfort. Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] designing for behavioral change for the purposes of sustainability
So Fred, as a web/software guy i think you have more to offer than you think you do, but I'll get to that in a minute. I wish that guy who videotaped the NYC IxDA event on Sustainable interactions would post his stuff already. I'm very upset he's flaked as the event really highlighted well many of the issues. A great example of interaction design that leads to behavior modification is the simple inclusion of mileage info panel in a vehicle. The product itself doesn't change, but the way people use that product has been shown to change when such added instrumentation is added. The post-child of this experience is even further exemplified in the panel that is included on a Toyota Prius that shows you which engine is working when and why. They have shown that drivers who keep it turned on are more susceptible to behavioral changes than those who turn off the screen. But back to pure software: I won't have links so maybe others can provide them. 1) A plug-in that presents the carbon footprint of your air travel plans. it works on Firefox. a great tool that doesn't nag, but provides data to be converted to knowledge over time that can impact our decisions. The plug-in connects to information that compares the airline footprint compared to driving or train further engaging knowledge. 2) GoLoco is a web service that helps people find carpools. Purely done on the web. There are other examples like these that are not about nagging, but either about teaching or about offering options. I think that Pauric's perspective is both on target but cynical beyond being useful. It is true that our economy is completely based on consumption and unless we change the basic under pinnings of that, we can only go so far. A great vid for learning more about this (I REALLY recommend people look at this; it only takes 20min) is http://storyofstuff.com/ . It is one of the best lessons in the impact of our economy on our world that I have ever seen. Better than Al G. I think there is a lot to be gained by buying better for the environment products as opposed to bad for the environment products. Yes, we have learned that the prius is not the pure answer to the hummer, but it does take certain steps in the right direction, as it is a part of a greater whole of acknowledging change is necessary. There are many other examples of this sort of brand of change that is going on that is worthwhile to enable even if it is not solving ALL aspects of the problem. BTW, having a green strategy is a growing requirement for enterprise buyers of products and services. We at Motorola Enterprise Mobility are being asked this all the time now. We are addressing this through supply chain, through battery management, through changes in materials and sourcing, etc. We have a big advantage in that our average product lifecycle is about 3-10x longer than consumer products. ;) For those of us who are just in software/web, there are lots of questions to ask ourselves: 1) Does doing the task on a computer really save us anything? 2) Is there a way to do the task on the computer that can reduce use? Heck, can we reduce use by reducing the # or brightness of pixels? 3) Is there an opportunity in my system to engage people to change behavior inside or outside of my system towards the end goal of sustainability -- David Malouf http://synapticburn.com/ http://ixda.org/ http://motorola.com/ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] linkedin groups
yeah, i wasn't able to search for the ixda group either on L.I,, so I did an advanced search for ixda, found a linkedin member that DID have the icon at the bottom of their profile, and clicked on the icon itself and i was able to request to be added that way (think someone has to approve me first tho so the jury's still out on the successful outcome). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=28579 Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] IxDA Announces Downloadable Interaction 08 Presentation Videos
Maybe it is just my wonderful corporate Internet policy, but Jared Spool's video does not show up for me. Anyone else having better luck? On another note... what an amazing conference. Can not wait until next year! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=28623 Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
On May 2, 2008, at 8:23 AM, mark schraad wrote: I found my self wondering if, for professional tools, there is greater adoption, product loyalty and stickiness in leaving a certain amount of difficulty in the UI? The thinking goes... if the process is to easy, then everyone can do it and it erodes my (the professional user's) value in the marketplace. Maybe everyone can do it, but they can't all do it well! The emergence of easier-to-use prosumer cameras certainly hasn't reduced the need for professional photographers, and I'd have to imagine that there are far more graphic designers working today than in the years before desktop publishing and Photoshop. Certainly, given easy tools offering professional functionality, you might find that some part of the market no longer needs professional help. If all Fred needs is a little Web site for his homeowners' association, he can probably get that done himself with iWeb or RapidWeaver -- either of which produce what could pass for professional work -- and he won't be contacting a Web design firm. But as the market expands, competitive pressure gives us richer and more complex tools as well as simpler and easier ones. There will always be demand for experts who can do remarkable and beautiful things with advanced tools. I take plenty of family snapshots, but we still go to the professional photographer every year for the Christmas card picture. Intentionally leaving things harder doesn't seem to be a viable strategy in a free market -- the next guy will take advantage of that weakness. The challenge should be in using the tool *well*, not in using it *at all*. Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
In a way, we've seen this erosion of value happen before. The first Mac brought desktop publishing to the consumer - and to this day, we are inundated with poorly designed flyers and newsletters. On Fri, May 2, 2008 at 8:55 AM, Shep McKee [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In a way, we've seen this erosion of value happen before. The first Mac brought desktop publishing to the consumer - and to this day, we are inundated with poorly designed flyers and newsletters. Agreed - on the other hand - no matter how easy desktop publishing/design tools are - they will never replace a designer with a non-designer. in things that matter. You either know typography or you don't, and access to the entire adobe font folio doesn't replace training, education, and years of critique. When notepad was replaced by wysiwyg, the web proliferated with web sites -- 99.999% were complete crap. And even in the design community - many print designers with strong design backgrounds jumped on the web and made some of the most aesthetically pleasing and completely useless/unusable/inaccessible sites around (this continues now with agencies building flash sites like crack addicts). But to Mark's point - when I was doing extensive user research for a complex quantitative software package for risk modeling - many of the users did in fact take mastery of the very complex software package as a point of pride - and frankly didn't want me there doing contextual inquiry because they were frightened by the idea of the software becoming easier/simpler to use. The were well paid, and behaved almost like priests in charge of sacred rituals with their mystical ability to create probability curves out of ether through incantations and sacred rituals - they didn't want a protestant reformation of the process - their power gave them comfort. Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
[IxDA Discuss] Trying to educate my design team
Hello, all. I have been lurking for a while and finally have a dire need that I hope you all can help me with. I am currently trying to organize some 'lunch and learn' sessions in an effort to educate our design team on, well, designing more effectively for the medium. I have several things I plan to cover such as web standards, table-less design and how it can liberate the designer, using fireworks as a prototyping and comp tool rather than photoshop, do's and don'ts, among other things. I am looking for resources that might aid me in this- books, web articles, powerpoint or keynote presentations, etc. I've already compiled a small collection of such, but would like to pick the collective brain on this matter. Any suggestions? -- Michael Dunn FoolishStudios www.foolishstudios.com Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] IxDA Announces Downloadable Interaction 08 Presentation Videos
Nothing to do with your connection - I think some videos are missing in general - there is simply no flash video player or download links on the page - because of technical issues with the original recordings Cheers, Alex Sent from my iPhone On 2 May 2008, at 06:05, Kristopher Kinlen [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Maybe it is just my wonderful corporate Internet policy, but Jared Spool's video does not show up for me. Anyone else having better luck? On another note... what an amazing conference. Can not wait until next year! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=28623 Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] IxDA Announces Downloadable Interaction 08 Presentation Videos
Actually, not all presenters gave us permission to record or publish their presentations. Jared's presentation is one of those. No technical reasons. -- dave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=28623 Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] Trying to educate my design team
A couple of thoughts having been down this road... and this assumes (since you called them 'my design team') that you are managing or at least leading this team. Determine those skills, topics or ares that your team needs more awareness. Then assign them to members of the team and ask them to do the research, study the best of bread and the current and future directions... and report to the group. The lunch setting, brown bag or provided, can be very effective. The other direction is to bring in guest speakers. People that can speak to and demonstrate. One of my favorites is to invite in a professional story teller... 'cause what we often do is tell stories. IMHO - the worst thing you can do is to lecture your team about what they ought to be. It can be your initiative, but is much better if it comes from others. Maybe that is just my style of management... but it has always proven more effective. Mark On Fri, May 2, 2008 at 11:02 AM, Michael Dunn [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hello, all. I have been lurking for a while and finally have a dire need that I hope you all can help me with. I am currently trying to organize some 'lunch and learn' sessions in an effort to educate our design team on, well, designing more effectively for the medium. I have several things I plan to cover such as web standards, table-less design and how it can liberate the designer, using fireworks as a prototyping and comp tool rather than photoshop, do's and don'ts, among other things. I am looking for resources that might aid me in this- books, web articles, powerpoint or keynote presentations, etc. I've already compiled a small collection of such, but would like to pick the collective brain on this matter. Any suggestions? -- Michael Dunn FoolishStudios www.foolishstudios.com Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] linkedin groups
Search for somebody you know will be in the group (me, Dave Malouf, etc.) and look at their groups. Dumb, but reliable. Oh, and I'm in a lot of groups. None of them seem to mean anything, but I'm ever hopeful. On Thu, May 1, 2008 at 10:10 PM, Joanne Weaver [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: yeah, i wasn't able to search for the ixda group either on L.I,, so I did an advanced search for ixda, found a linkedin member that DID have the icon at the bottom of their profile, and clicked on the icon -- Barbara Ballard [EMAIL PROTECTED] 1-785-838-3003 Design For Mobile 22-24 September http://design4mobile.mobi/ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] Trying to educate my design team
Well, to elaborate, I am one of the leads, not necessarily THE lead, and I have been tasked to do this by THE lead due to my level of experience in both design programming. The team is actually eager to learn and I get a pretty steady stream of inquiries from them on a day-to-day basis which kind of prompted all of this. I certainly don't want to tell them they are necessarily doing anything wrong, I just want to help them do it better. A lot of them have a traditional design background and they just haven't been made aware of the nuances of designing for the web. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=28641 Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
In a way, we've seen this erosion of value happen before. The first Mac brought desktop publishing to the consumer - and to this day, we are inundated with poorly designed flyers and newsletters. Any creative area is largely 70% stuff that ends up in the trash, 3% brilliant. Same thing for websites, print and you tube videos. Remember the web when Netscape Gold came out? when every other letter was a different color. It was horrible, but things got better. But the web and video are social mediums, so it's not all about the design, it's about the information they make accessible to the rest of the world. I've taught Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash, Dreamweaver, and generally the learning curve is really steep, and in some cases beyond some of the users, so here I want application designers to obsess about what it is that those users do 80% of the time and adapt the UI for those workflows, adding the equivalent of design spellchecking (complimentary colors, layout etc) . For power users, who supply their own vision and technique, the raw functions should be exposed to them. Since I develop applications for kids these days what I talked with the Adobe team is treating complicated app traiining like that of a multi-level game. Good game design creates value and strategies incrementally, teaching how to move, fire. Don't expose more elements until a user has mastered the basics, unless they ask for it by name. The challenge here is then customer support and peer to peer communication becomes dvorak vrs querty, same elements will appear in different areas on different user PC. many print designers with strong design backgrounds jumped on the web and made some of the most aesthetically pleasing and completely useless/unusable/inaccessible sites around (this continues now with agencies building flash sites like crack addicts). Amen. This is a continual challenge for me working with top notch designers who work on a page rather than the interactive space. It's a blind spot to them and people who develop wireframes. were well paid, and behaved almost like priests in charge of sacred rituals with their mystical ability to create probability curves out of ether through incantations and sacred rituals - they didn't want a protestant reformation of the process - their power gave them comfort. I understand where they are coming from, but this is sad to me and short term thinking. People behind turbo tax on the web require the same guru skills, they just deliver them to engineering instead of a person. Troy. Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] linkedin groups
Hi all, The suggestion to include this with any kind of welcome message we provide when joining IxDA has been taken to the Board (thanks, Matt!). We should also talk about what it means to affiliate to IxDA and see how we can be taking more advantage of that even on the ixda.org site as well. Thanks for the great thoughts, Janna On Fri, May 2, 2008 at 12:40 PM, Barbara Ballard [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Search for somebody you know will be in the group (me, Dave Malouf, etc.) and look at their groups. Dumb, but reliable. Oh, and I'm in a lot of groups. None of them seem to mean anything, but I'm ever hopeful. Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
[IxDA Discuss] Twin Cities UX Meetup next Tuesday at MONTE CARLO (bring your side project to show others!)
Apologies for cross posting. And I might add that Kristi is being mighty optimistic about the use of the venue's patio - there have been rumors of snow this weekend. Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 15:39:18 -0500From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]: [EMAIL PROTECTED]: UX Meetup next Tuesday at MONTE CARLO (bring your side project to show others!) Hello UX folks -- The next Twin Cities UX Meetup group will meet May 6 at the Monte Carlo (located in the Warehouse District). I'm sorry to keep changing location, but I'm trying to find a good place with space that's reliably quiet (not an easy task). The Monte Carlo may be a good bet -- AND, they have a HUGE outdoor patio. The topic will be show us all your side projects in 10 minutes or less. Show us what defines Minneapolis' creative community -- everyone has a side project. At this month's MNteractive UX meetup, we want to see your side project - in 10 minutes or less. Bring your laptops, powerpoints, visuals, anything! As usual, a few local professionals who have worked on this topic will help jump-start the conversation. A big Thank you to Kevin Farner of Gomoll Research + Design for picking up the tab for our last meetup. Here are details of the meeting: Tuesday, May 6 5:00-7:00 p.m. NEW LOCATION: at the Monte Carlo in MInneapolis' Warehouse District: Located: 219 3rd Avenue North, Minneapolis, 55401 612-333-5900 http://twincities.citysearch.com/profile/5571399/minneapolis_mn/monte_carlo_bar_cafe.html Look for Garrick and the UX Meetup table sign If it's nice weather, look out on the patio If you have questions, please feel free to contact either myself or Garrick ([EMAIL PROTECTED]).We look forward to seeing/meeting you!Kristi Olson, Minneapolis UX ConsultantP.S. Please notify me if you'd like to no longer receive these messages. _ Windows Live SkyDrive lets you share files with faraway friends. http://www.windowslive.com/skydrive/overview.html?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_Refresh_skydrive_052008 Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] Trying to educate my design team
From: Michael Dunn [EMAIL PROTECTED] snip : 'lunch and learn' sessions in an effort to educate our design team on, well, : designing more effectively for the medium. snip ... Any suggestions? I don't know if your remit includes improving the content of the web sites, but if it does then may I suggest my editing process on www.editingthatworks.com This is designed as a 'lite' introduction to editing content for people who aren't professional writers and it might fit neatly into a lunchtime. Best, Caroline Jarrett [EMAIL PROTECTED] 07990 570647 Effortmark Ltd Usability - Forms - Content We have moved. New address: 16 Heath Road Leighton Buzzard LU7 3AB Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
I think it's much simpler than that: With products as big and powerful as many of the Adobe products, the complexity and richness of the features leads inexorably to a certain amount of complexity in the user experience. In order to simplify it, you have to remove/restrict/dumb down the feature set. Or streamline parts to be really good and you end up with inconsistency throughout the product, with users no longer able to leverage knowledge of one piece of the interface to another. Airplane consoles are hideously complex. Would simplifying them make it easier for more people to become commercial pilots? Would it serve the passengers and cargo well if some of the gauges were removed and the more powerful switches made harder to get at in order to have a friendlier interface? Or are they just kept complex to ensure that existing pilots keep their job seniority? (God, I hope not!) -- Jim -Original Message- From: mark schraad [EMAIL PROTECTED] I was reading about Microsoft having recruited Adobe's (think photoshop UI and more) Mark Hamburg to work on user experience. I don't find Adobe product o be particularly user friendly, but I do find them to be consistent and remarkably efficient once you get over a learning curve. I appreciate that approach a lot. I found my self wondering if, for professional tools, there is greater adoption, product loyalty and stickiness in leaving a certain amount of difficulty in the UI? The thinking goes... if the process is to easy, then everyone can do it and it erodes my (the professional user's) value in the marketplace. I know most people don't think much about economics and supply and demand on purpose, but self preservation is certainly prevalent at all levels. Thoughts? Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
On May 2, 2008, at 5:23 AM, mark schraad wrote: I don't find Adobe products to be particularly user friendly That's certainly a loaded term, isn't it? User friendly. Which user and what constitutes friendly? I found my self wondering if, for professional tools, there is greater adoption, product loyalty and stickiness in leaving a certain amount of difficulty in the UI? Another loaded way of thinking about it. Be careful. You can't have a good discussion approaching it this way. Photoshop is and never was intentionally made difficult. And to this day, I hate a few aspects of how it does things (and always have, even when I was working on it) but overall, it's still a world-class tool that has not been surpassed by anyone else trying to solve the same problems. To that end, Photoshop is actually pretty easy to a lot of things once you have learned how to use it. In fact, Photoshop got its start being easier to use than what else was available at the time, like Letraset ColorStudio. Over time, as Photoshop became a mission- critical production tool for a broad set of industries -- from print to the web to film to even NASA research -- it started to add more and more complicated features. As with anything that starts simply and adds more functionality, keeping it under control can become a problem. I personally think Photoshop has done a better job than most containing that feature bloat, while acknowledging that is does indeed have feature bloat. But Photoshop was going to add more features like it or not. The business demanded it. Users demanded it. And the nature of capitalism demands it. Given that, if anyone thinks they can make a rich, complicated, industrial strength tool easy to use and if that measuring stick is using anyone you may know who is not a professional in the particular industry the tool is designed for, I wish you the best of luck on that path to insanity. It's just an entirely inappropriate way to approach the design problem. Complicated things will always be complicated, by nature. Your task as the designer of such complicated features and tools is to not make them more complicated than they already are. But trying to make inherently complicated things easy to use is really just wishful thinking. And making them user friendly requires very specific metrics on who the user is and what they think is friendly. The thinking goes... if the process is to easy, then everyone can do it and it erodes my (the professional user's) value in the marketplace. I know of no one who has ever said that or thinks like that. Further, I can certainly tell you that no one on the Photoshop team ever thought along those lines. As for a related version of my opinion of this topic, I wrote about a long time ago: http://www.designbyfire.com/?p=10 -- Andrei Herasimchuk Principal, Involution Studios innovating the digital world e. [EMAIL PROTECTED] c. +1 408 306 6422 Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
[IxDA Discuss] JOB: JUNIOR TO MID-LEVEL INFORMATION ARCHITECT
In addition to the normal IA/interaction design skill set, this job will require a fair amount of documentation. We are looking for someone detailed oriented with experience writing Functional Requirements for both experiential Flash sites, and large scale e-commerce and portal sites. JUNIOR TO MID-LEVEL INTERACTION DESIGNER Responsibilities include, but are not limited to: - Work with clients to understand their business models and goals and help define strategy, content, and features for the design of their web site. - Analyze, understand and document audiences’ information and functional needs. - Define site architecture and navigation that serves as a blueprint of the site upon which all other aspects are built. - Create wireframes, site maps, schematics, process maps, feature lists, mockups, visual specification, personas, interaction design specifications and other artifacts to fully detail the intended user experience. - Be able to multi-task and work in a face paced environment. - Be knowledgeable on best practices, current trends, and emerging technologies in the field. This person will ideally have: - Minimum of 1-3 years as a user experience designer, interaction designer, information architect, or similar role. - A portfolio demonstrating ability to create usable products and clean documentation (wireframes, sitemaps, and flowcharts). - Excellent communicative, collaborative, and interpersonal skills. - Must be proficient OmniGraffle, Visio, Adobe Creative Suite. - Bachelors degree required, graduate degree preferred. ABOUT CREATE THE createthe group is the leading end-to-end eCommerce and software solutions provider for the Retail, Fashion, and Luxury industry. We have an immediate opening for the position of Software/Server support engineer- to work with our talented softwaredevelopment team in our New York office. As an Operations Support Engineer, you will setup, maintain and provide technical support for all levels of operation within the company. You will bring a proven level of problem-solving skills, and the ability to proactively identify and tackle a range of technical support issues. You will be a key asset in contributing to the growth and success of all internal and external systems deployments. Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
On May 2, 2008, at 6:26 PM, Andrei Herasimchuk wrote: The thinking goes... if the process is to easy, then everyone can do it and it erodes my (the professional user's) value in the marketplace. I know of no one who has ever said that or thinks like that. Further, I can certainly tell you that no one on the Photoshop team ever thought along those lines. Interestingly, I have met product developers who did say that was their objective, years ago. They were concerned that their customers, all craftspeople who were being threatened by a commoditization of their skills, would reject software that didn't have a learning curve to it. Interestingly, the inevitable simplified software came about and, sure enough, the crafts went mostly obsolete. In all the cases I'm aware of, the developers are no longer in business. Complexity takes two forms: Tool complexity and domain complexity. Tool complexity can (and is often) rendered simpler through advances in interfaces. Often it's through the elimination of excessive features and options, to core functionality. While this does reduce the options available to the user, the reduction is often in the form of fringe functionality. Domain complexity is more difficult. Here is where serious process re- engineering needs to take place. The going-back-to-the-blackboard-and- rethinking-the-core-processes kind-of approach. Reducing tool complexity does open the user to faster productivity, but often still requires similar skill levels for the core skill. (A simpler drawing tool doesn't help you draw any better, only more efficiently.) Reducing domain complexity brings new capabilities to users who previously couldn't master the skills. Think WYSIWYG database tools (ala Access or Filemaker) replacing the previous code-based generation (ala DBase or IDMS). Think desktop publishing replacing previous typesetting activities. Of course, bringing capabilities to people without the formal skillsets results a flurry of crude activity, such as the ransom-note style publishing we saw in the early '80s. However, this flurry often seems to die down once people realize that it does matter what you do. Good examples and guidance such as templates help with this. I think it's unlikely you can make something too easy. However, sometimes making it easier requires serious advances in the design approaches. Jared Jared M. Spool User Interface Engineering 510 Turnpike St., Suite 102, North Andover, MA 01845 e: [EMAIL PROTECTED] p: +1 978 327 5561 http://uie.com Blog: http://uie.com/brainsparks Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it to easy?
Certainly the reduction of complexity and commoditization of function pushes the differentiation (for the pro) to the what to do, and not the 'how to do' - as exemplified by the scores of pixel pushers editing frame-by-frame film effects (think ILM). And that is not necessarily a bad thing for some professions. My point was more to the influence of marketing and position as it effects the user interface. It certainly has not hurt the adobe suite of products. As distasteful as this may be to many idealogs in the UI world, the sustainability of a product, and its positioning amongst lead users (most often the professional users) is an important consideration. After all - continued improvement to the product should not, but sometimes does, shorten the adoption and longevity of that product. Mark On May 2, 2008, at 7:31 PM, Jared M. Spool wrote: On May 2, 2008, at 6:26 PM, Andrei Herasimchuk wrote: The thinking goes... if the process is to easy, then everyone can do it and it erodes my (the professional user's) value in the marketplace. I know of no one who has ever said that or thinks like that. Further, I can certainly tell you that no one on the Photoshop team ever thought along those lines. Interestingly, I have met product developers who did say that was their objective, years ago. They were concerned that their customers, all craftspeople who were being threatened by a commoditization of their skills, would reject software that didn't have a learning curve to it. Interestingly, the inevitable simplified software came about and, sure enough, the crafts went mostly obsolete. In all the cases I'm aware of, the developers are no longer in business. Complexity takes two forms: Tool complexity and domain complexity. Tool complexity can (and is often) rendered simpler through advances in interfaces. Often it's through the elimination of excessive features and options, to core functionality. While this does reduce the options available to the user, the reduction is often in the form of fringe functionality. Domain complexity is more difficult. Here is where serious process re- engineering needs to take place. The going-back-to-the-blackboard-and- rethinking-the-core-processes kind-of approach. Reducing tool complexity does open the user to faster productivity, but often still requires similar skill levels for the core skill. (A simpler drawing tool doesn't help you draw any better, only more efficiently.) Reducing domain complexity brings new capabilities to users who previously couldn't master the skills. Think WYSIWYG database tools (ala Access or Filemaker) replacing the previous code-based generation (ala DBase or IDMS). Think desktop publishing replacing previous typesetting activities. Of course, bringing capabilities to people without the formal skillsets results a flurry of crude activity, such as the ransom-note style publishing we saw in the early '80s. However, this flurry often seems to die down once people realize that it does matter what you do. Good examples and guidance such as templates help with this. I think it's unlikely you can make something too easy. However, sometimes making it easier requires serious advances in the design approaches. Jared p Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
Re: [IxDA Discuss] can we make it too easy?
Hi all, This conversation reminds me a lot of my sound engineering days. The advent of digital technology, with its soundcards, cheap mics, synthesized instruments and computer-music software programs did change the lives of many sound engineers and studios around the world. But the tool does not make the man. It didn't take long for most artists to realize that being a jack-of- all-trades means doing most everything half-right. Or half-wrong... So they turned back to the pros for engineering, and stayed true to their calling, that of being a performer. In the design world too, I think that same cycle is bound to happen. Not that there will not be exceptions... - ld Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://www.ixda.org/help
