April 2003
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Making the Web Work
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1 min read
Finally had a chance to take a serious look at Bob Baxley’s book Making the Web Work: Designing Effective Web Applications. It’s an overview of designing for applications – not just pages – on the web. Especially for beginning and intermediate students, it’s a solid set of lessons.
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The Programming Hurdle
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1 min read
Matt pens some thoughts on easier programming, interesting to me is anything Andy Hertzfeld has to say. After struggling with Pascal and C in college I decided to put my braincells to full time work on the human interface design side instead. I think easy programming simply becomes part of the interface; like recordable actions…
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Framejacked
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1 min read
Jeffrey Veen has some nifty glossary terms gleaned from a consulting gig. I especially like Framejack: v. to move a user horizontally through an architecture, switching the interface to another vertical, in the context of a single task. “If a user clicks on My Account while in the Checking vertical, they get framejacked to the…
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She Loves The Stuff
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1 min read
Her favorite time is just before the store opens. The brewing aroma the strongest, the morning light magical through the windows, the peaceful quiet outside. Today she [informally] inspects the shop, walking down a row of coffee barrels full of beans on both sides of her. Each is lovingly labeled. She stops at one, Columbian…
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William Gibson, Writing, and Blogging
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1 min read
Karlin Lillington reports that William Gibson will stop blogging. ‘I do know from doing it that it’s not something I can do when I’m actually working.‘ Does blogging and writing/working need to be two separate things? Does anyone who blogs regularly and then stops ever fail to pick it up again?
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Life Chair
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1 min read
Just sat in a Life chair in the Knoll showroom. I dare say it’s as comfortable as the Aeron, and manages this feat while avoiding the cyborg appearance. I guessed a simpler look would equal a lower price, but alas it starts at US $800. The array of fabric and color options might be worth…
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Moonbeams in Song
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1 min read
The Moonlighters’ Blue and Black Eyed. They sing to you. Heads up courtesy Toby and Derek.
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Photos from Vacation in Hamburg
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2 min read
Some curiosities seen in Hamburg, Germany: The U.S. Customs Services erected a kiosk to receive comments and suggestions… …but after booting up it awaits a password What new office buildings look like My First Sony. I love the three progressively bigger green buttons to adjust the volume. Oddly, the arrows on the rewind button point…
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On Holiday
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1 min read
…and leaving the technology at home. See you in about a week.
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Talking about Design
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1 min read
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The User’s Experience
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1 min read
At the IA Summit, Peter Merholz commented that one issue with the phrase user experience is that it’s often misused as synonymous with user interface. I’ve heard this as well, and feel it’s only a matter of time before we start hearing, ‘The user experience is too green, can you make it more blue?‘ Perhaps…
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History of Interaction Design Summarized
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1 min read
The best thing I’ve read lately – and possibly the best summary of interaction design I’ve seen – is Marc Rettig’s Interaction Design History in a Teeny Little Nutshell (PDF slideshow). On how computers should work for us instead of vice-versa: ‘I like to listen to “Morning Edition” on the radio in the mornings. Why…
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Finding Meaning
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1 min read
Matt exclaims, ‘From Dorelle Rabinowitz’ notes on the panel, at B&A comes the memebullet, for which I stop only short of using the blink tag to emphasise: “We talk about navigating when we mean understanding.” This is resonating so powerfully for me that my teeth are on edge.‘
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Ducks 2003
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1 min read
‘The conference will look at all facets of the product/service development life cycle and at all other facets of a business as decisions are made that affect the poultry experience…‘