Re: [IxDA Discuss] Design Deliverables and Developers
Regarding QA: I'd say yes, you want to be clear for QA. But finding the right balance between explicit and concise is key. A cautionary tale: Once upon a time at my company we wrote air-tight docs. The docs were so explicit they left *nothing* to the imagination, and QA straight lifted them as test plans. You'd think this would be a good thing. But it wasn't. Our docs became very long and very detailed. A single product might have 700 pages of documentation. As the design morphed during production (as it always does based on user test results, etc) it became impossible to keep the docs 100% up to date. We tried hard to do it. Everybody was working crazy hours, nights and weekends -- just to update the docs! Then we hit the QA cycle. Our poor testers had to comb through 700 pages. Every time they hit a discrepancy between design and documentation, bam they had to log a bug. Even if the design essentially made sense. Then you're looking at 1000s of bugs (as a designer or project manager) and sorting them into doc bugs versus real bugs. Then there's the happy fun of going back and updating 700 pages of docs. When really, you don't want to even DEAL with the docs --- you want to spend your energy on building the best product. So, with too much focus on documentation, everybody's productivity is lowered and dev costs go through the roof. So, we've changed policy. Now we make sure to be concise. We are as detailed as possible wherever necessary. And we explain the GOAL of the design. Our Design Docs are radically shorter these days. It saves everyone time and money. And so far, we're managing to keep clarity on the designs just fine. For the record, I should say I work for LeapFrog toys. So we're not building web sites. We're building interactive books, games, toys, etc. Still, we have similar documentation issues to anyone creating digital products. Perhaps it's not as much of an issue for web based products. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=26800 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] Design Deliverables and Developers
I work for an in-house design team that collaborates with third parties. As designers, we get paired up with internal producers (assignments rotate), and then outsource to third-party developers. The producer manages the primary relationship, and the designers weigh in on key deliverables. What we do: 1. High Concept Powerpoint for Marketing and Other Biz Partners - Goal: Get Buy In - they want the top level to make sure we're on strategy - we include images to help them visualize the product - we include bullet point lists of key feature sets - we include preliminary user research data from qualitative testing Once there's buy off 2. Create Design Document Lite - Goal: Solicit accurate fair developer bids - We include enough detail to communicate the scope of the project, whatever it takes - We don't go deep into design details, because there's usually a time issue - Meanwhile, we keep refining the concept and user testing Select a winning bid, then... 3. Create Complete Design Document - Goal: Enable a Great Kickoff Meeting Create a Reference - Include as much detail as appropriate to communicate the spec But at this point it becomes a collaborative work and a conversation with the developer. The process is organic and it varies by project. Over-documentation is definitely a no-no to watch out for. You don't want to make your docs so detailed that you spend all your time updating them instead of communicating with your developer. Regular conversation is key. You want to stay on the same page. We used to document a lot more as a company, and would write docs that spelled everything out to the letter. But what we found is that the more we wrote, the less the developers read. You have to keep it simple. Pictures, labeled diagrams and prototypes definitely help. If you use text, bullet point it. No one likes to read paragraphs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=26800 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] d schools
Thanks Will and Jean-Anne for the thoughtful advice! JA, I'll definitely be contacting to hear more about your Berkeley iSchool experience. Thank you! Here's my specific dilemma (if anybody out there has an opinion!), and why I'm trying to figure out if I need to get an MFA/MS/M.Des degree: I work for Leapfrog toys as a senior designer. I've been designing (and sometimes producing) videogames, and interactive books and toys for them for 6.5 years. It's very idiosyncratic work. Building web sites is NOT part of my job. Instead I do a variety of things like: figuring out social play patterns for a toy, or what the UI should be for a videogame (and also how all the subleveling works, and the level design, etc; really designing the whole thing), or how to best marry the content interaction with the industrial design of a toy. And: I used to be a content person. I have a Master's degree in Literature, not design! I came to design organically by way of editorial. First I made magazines in the mid-late 90s (Game Developer mag), then I worked on web stuff in late 90s til the bust (Gamasutra.com, Macromedia.com), and I've been with Leapfrog since then. So I have 10+ years work experience, and I've learned design by making all sorts of interactive things. I've done tons of designs, scripts, experience flows, ethonographic research, user testing, etc. But I'm worried that elsewhere in the industry my content roots and experience designing interactive videogames/books/toys instead of web will provoke a tsk-tsk, can she really do interaction design? response. And heck, some days, I wonder myself. Do I have the skills I need? I suffer from self-doubt. I'm considered skilled at Leapfrog. But it's such an unusual place, making such unusual products. I wonder, some days, if my skillset is appropriate in the wider world. I've tried to make sure I skill up whenever I need to, by occasionally taking a class in say, the Architecture department at Berkeley extension, or a drawing class, or a class or two at the Multimedia Studies program over at SFState. And I read a ton. But I'm not sure this is enough. I want to be sure that I stay competitive, and can do design work for companies other than a toy company :) I can't stay at LF forever. I'd like to be hireable by an agency like IDEO or Jump or Adaptive Path one day, so that I can work on ALL SORTS of products or web projects -- and eventually lead a design team (sometimes I mentor/lead juniors here, and really enjoy that). I enjoy the project strategy work, too --- figuring out how to balance the design, business production needs. And I'd like to be able to use that elsewhere as well. I'm not sure those same agencies would think my skillset and background was appropriate. So, given that: 1. I have content origins 2. I haven't had to make a web site in 6.5 years 3. I have 10 years experience, including some web experience, and have designed lots of non-web interactive products 4. I'd like to be able to work for companies other than a toy company Do I need to go back to design school if I want to be hireable by a company that values great interaction design? Or do I just need to get my butt in gear and create an awesome online portfolio using as many of the latest web technologies, since I don't have to create web stuff for work? I'm curious what this list thinks :) On Thu, 1 Nov 2007 03:23:15, Will Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Chris wrote: The theory behind design thinking d-schools is, to me, this: Design is important. Too important to be managed by those fuzzy people who actually do design. It's time for designers to step aside and allow themselves to be led by a new generation of MBAs who have taken a couple of courses about design (but who don't do design). In all my reading on the ideas, theory, and processes of Design Thinking, my views are actually the opposite. I think it actually empowers designers and moves them up earlier in the process. Sure - some Design Thinking is being applied to business processes much in the way that TQM and all those other process aconyms became fads over the past 20 years. But - from the reading I have been doing, there is the opportunity such that designers/IxD folks are no longer downstream from the business analyst doing the problem definition and requirements gathering. Now designers are right up front helping to think within the problem space, exploring ideas, using abductive thinking (and teaching it to other team members), such that a plethora of ideas are generated well before requirements are solidified. Am I too starry eyed? After all my reading, I have begun to draft some ideas about a process (nothing new there :-), but to Dan and Chris' point - we only become design morlochs if we don't take control of the process. A few classes in design is not going to ingrain real strategic design thinking in any mba. There is simply no way that a semester can supplant 10, 15 years
Re: [IxDA Discuss] tangible interaction
Hi David, You might start by thinking about what kind of things you want to make, and then start researching the companies who make them. You'll find out pretty quickly whether it's a large or small market. Tangible interaction is (IMHO) the intersection between industrial design, interaction design and environmental design. You usually find it in museum exhibits/exhibit design, toys, and the kind of art you find at Burning Man and music festivals. Ideo, frog design and other large design consultancies play in this area, too. Such as when ideo redesigned the patient intake process for the Mayo clinic --- that project touched interaction/environmental design in a pretty cool way. I don't know this for sure, but my guess is that you'll find that the companies that can afford to hire folks in all the different disciplines are either large consultancies, or else small, punkrock design shops that are pursuing a funky product or two. -wesley Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe http://gamma.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines http://gamma.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .. http://gamma.ixda.org/help
