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Testing testing this must be so interesting
xcited!” Get excited because we’re friends. Yay! Most years I got a lot of cards and I would feel great. I’d be on a high for a couple weeks. Hey, as a teenager, it’s important to be popular and liked. It made me want to be nice to people, to make more friends, to get more cards the next year. There was one year when I got two cards. Man I felt like a reject. I didn’t want to be nice to anyone. One friend…
Design Choices
A theme that has cropped up a few times in the last few weeks is the idea of, “Everyone else is doing it, so why can’t we?” The idea is that if another company has a feature on their website and that company making a lot of money, then that feature must be good. A few years ago, I repeatedly ran into this problem on a project. As a designer, it was incredibly frustrating to hear, “Company Sucko Barfo has this feature in their software, and I like their software, so let’s do what Company Sucko Barfo does.”
User Experience and Agile
Let me give you some background: A few months ago I had a phone interview and showed the interviewer some of my sanitized wireframes. He asked me how I wrote out the specifications so developers knew what should be implemented. I’m not sure I gave a good response then, but I’ve had time to think about it. My response should have been, “I worked with them the whole time, we had already discussed what was to be done and the intent, and they could ask me any questions while they coded.”
Usefulness of Personas in User Experience and Information Architecture
Creating user personas is a fantastic way to get stakeholders to focus during the design. You’re not just designing for people who like… well, everything… you’re designing for that particular someone who likes to do something particular. I always say, “Ask for what you want and you’ll get it. If you don’t ask, people won’t know what you want.” It’s the same with designing software: if a UX professional doesn’t know what the users want, then they don’t know what are they supposed to design.
Information Architecture Deliverables
In information architecture, there are a few deliverables meant to communicate the information design to all the stakeholders. Here’s a brief overview of what can be delivered on an IA project and why these things are important.
Testing testing this must be so interesting
xcited!” Get excited because we’re friends. Yay! Most years I got a lot of cards and I would feel great. I’d be on a high for a couple weeks. Hey, as a teenager, it’s important to be popular and liked. It made me want to be nice to people, to make more friends, to get more cards the next year. There was one year when I got two cards. Man I felt like a reject. I didn’t want to be nice to anyone. One friend…
Faceted Taxonomy Resources
Recently I wrote a paper on faceted classification (also known as faceted taxonomy). This paper focused on how to create a faceted taxonomy – not on how to search in a faceted taxonomy. Some of these resources are available for free on the web, so I thought I’d include them here for you: Berners-Lee, T. (1998). What the semantic web can represent. Retrieved October 9, 2010, fromhttp://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/RDFnot.html Denton, W. (2009). How to make a faceted classification and put it on the web. Retrieved October 9,…
UX Kickoffs
In recent projects, I’ve been struggling to set the right tone for the project. I mean, the project goes well once we get going, but there isn’t the right kind of kickoff that 1) gets the client excited; 2) sets expectations; 3) educates everyone; 4) builds a team dynamic within this group.
Design Choices
A theme that has cropped up a few times in the last few weeks is the idea of, “Everyone else is doing it, so why can’t we?” The idea is that if another company has a feature on their website and that company making a lot of money, then that feature must be good. A few years ago, I repeatedly ran into this problem on a project. As a designer, it was incredibly frustrating to hear, “Company Sucko Barfo has this feature in their software, and I like their software, so let’s do what Company Sucko Barfo does.”
