SXSW: CMS Admin UX

Steve Fisher. Success is when the technology blends into the background.

A site dedicated to the UX of Drupal 7: http://www.d7ux.org/.

Designing in the open vs. Just doing it.

Jane Wells. Works for Automatic contributing to WordPress admin UX.

http://make.wordpress.org/ui/

http://my.sxsw.com/events/event/843

#cmsux

SXSW: Reinvent the Wheel: Sketching your own Design Process

Chris Fahey of behaviordesign.com gave a somewhat high-level talk on how to rethink the approach to UX design. This would be good food for thought for any designer or information architect. I underlined the takeaways that Chris outlined on the last slide of his presentation.

Always keep space open the the general waterfall model for reinvention/revision of the concept. Plan to change the plan.

"Design is about solving problems - not about creativity and personal expression." -unattributed

Difficult to go from conservative to radical, much easier to go from radical to conservative.

We're pretty good at making things work, but not quite there when trying to make the applications interesting or fun to use.

Data-Driven Design. Google tests every design change with multivariate tests. Ex: testing 41 shades of blue for the link color on the results page. The decision to do that in-and-of-itself is an idea. http://stopdesign.com/archive/2009/03/20/goodbye-google.html

Data-Inspired Design. Ex: Designers did interviews with end users and created their own deliverables to share with the larger team.

Designers as Researchers. Get designers involved in the research.

There shouldn't only be process or path to the finish. Here's a nice visual of the UX design path http://findability.org/archives/000230.php. The idea of having a deck of cards that contain all the UX design process steps. You can use the cards to create your own process. Stephen Anderson: Mental Notes Cards getmentalnotescards.com

Sketch "Resolution Spectrum" - Gestures/Words to Functional Prototypes. Each project requires it's own process and UX deliverables. Consider the client. Information visualization can be a great tool to distill an idea for a client. Make up your own deliverable.

Periodic table of visualization methods/elements

Don't use templates when beginning a deliverable.

Tricks:

• Blank Canvas
• Exercise: What Is It? - Figure out what the final product is going to be.
• Thumbnail Quantifications: How many pages? etc.
• Least Wanted: What would you hate to see in the final product. What don't you like about your current site.
• User Persona / Flash Mob: a.) gather user research b.) brainstorm all the types, don't assume you have all the personas at the outset. c.) Find patters among these micro personas d.) define smaller/condensed personas to represent the group.
• Personality Characteristics: What's the personality of your product? Factual/statements vs. questioning and suggestive?
• Metaphors: Content, Social, Tools.
• Make up your own words.
• Sketching
• Sketching as prototype
• Listening: The Critique
• "Prototype as if you are right, listen as if you are wrong" -Diego Rodriguez
• Pair designing

Questions:

How to manage budget/brainstorm? Like Agile, have scrums frequently.

http://my.sxsw.com/events/event/640

#reinvent

SXSW: TIme + Social + Location: What's next in Mobile Experiences?

The title of this one kinda says it all. I had high hopes, but it fell short. I was hoping for some demos and at the very least interesting ideas from all players, but was left with a few interesting snippets from Naveen of FourSquare and nothing more.

Paraphrases from the seminar:

"Just hitting the critical mass of devices that easily support geo-location. Sharing is increasing popular and open (the progression from FB -> Twitter -> FourSquare)."

Realtime tracking is creepy.

The hook. How do you achieve the hook? Make it somewhat of a game. The points on FourSquare, drop-off/pick-up on Gowalla, progress bar on LinkedIn, etc. The want to get all the achievements on a game or get the most points of all your friends.

I'm unimpressed with these insights so far. I think Jesse Schell did a much better job communicating this in a video I watched last night: http://fury.com/2010/02/jesse-shells-mindblowing-talk-on-the-future-of-games-dice-2010/

Naveen Selvadurai (@naveen of FourSquare) didn't think that augmented reality out of home is going to provide viable interfaces in the foreseeable future.

There was a question about serendipity, specifically when checking a feed. It seems to boil down to controlled serendipity vs. social serendipity. Naveen seemed to think it's mostly controlled because algorithms control what to see in your feed even if you don't know it.

A question was asked about game mechanic fatigue. How do you keep users engaged? Naveen conceded that fatigue is inevitable, as it is with anything. But people come back. What about advertisers? The panel responded ideas like sponsoring, what's nearby, etc.

#timesociallocation

http://my.sxsw.com/events/event/5285

I kinda wish I'd entertained a guilty pleasure: http://my.sxsw.com/events/event/4995. This one was a dud.

SXSW: Jacks of all Trades or Masters of One?

This seminar was overview of how Generalist and Specialists fit into an organization. I was typing quite a bit during this one, so I'll leave you with the notes...

Venn diagram of Technology, Business, & Design: Specialists vs. Generalists

http://elliotjaystocks.com/blog/web-designers-who-cant-code/

Breadth vs. Depth

• Specialists are the perfect tool the the specific job
• Generalist takes care of what's needed

• A Specialist can keep up on current trends and techniques
• Generalists can ensure that execution matches intention. When working with others communication is key. Generalists are good at communication.

• A Specialist's thinking isn't limited by external constraints. They'll think outside the box (though inside they speciality)
• A Generalist can see the big picture in a project. Terry Irwin quote.

• Specialists can take advantage of specific market opportunities (SEO, UX, etc.)
• Generalists can easily pivot in their careers.

For Yourself:

• Do you feel the need to be the absolute best at something? Yes, specialist. No, generalists.
• Do you like handling things from start to finish? Yes, generalist. No, specialist.
• Do you like working alone on projects? Yes, generalist. No, specialist.
• Can you learn and understand foreign concepts quickly? Yes, generalist. No, Specialist.
• Are you competitive & a perfectionist? Yes, specialist. No, generalist.
• Do you want to work on the new, hip, sexy project? Yes, generalist. No, specialist.
• Do you need much variety in your career? Yes, generalist. No, specialist.
• Are you good at knowing when you're in over your head? Yes, generalist. No, specialist.
• Is job security a priority to you? No, generalist. Yes, specialist.

Team:

• Are you small? Yes, generalist. No, specialist.
• Do you have a decent process in place? Yes, specialist. No, generalist.
• Is that process more agile than waterfall? Yes, generalist. No, specialist.
• Is amazing execution you top priority? Yes, specialist. No, generalist.
• Can you keep a specialist busy for the length of the job? No, generalist. Yes, specialist.
• Do you need someone who can pitch in in various ways? Yes, generalist. No, specialist.
• Are you hiring a manager, exec, or very senior role? Yes, generalist. No, specialist.

Open question to anyone reading. Can a specialist manage a generalist?

Is a multi-specialist a generalist?

Moral of the story that began to come out during the questions: It doesn't really matter. It's all in how you see yourself.

#jacksofalltrades

SXSW: In Code We Trust

Although this wasn't the panel I was planning to attend (Mobile UX was full), In Code We Trust, which addresses technology's role (especially open source) in government, was pretty interesting. Here's some takeaways:

• When selecting a software solution for a project, it's important to make sure at least one open source solution is evaluated.
• Open source is best because the public can evaluate the code.
• Use contests to get help in generating solutions for as many platforms as possible.
• In government, there's a lot of data. The challenge is to organize and share the data in a user friendly way. Dashboards are a good example of this.
• By promoting open source you can build a community that interacts with the government day-to-day. An example would be making public requests open to the public...basically keeping everyone on the same page.
• To address the digital divide, multiple channels are used. SMS is typically the lowest common denominator for mobile.

Here's a few examples or references from the seminar:

• http://track.dc.gov/
• http://www.openmuni.org/
• http://open311.org/

Mobile Boarding Pass Fail

Nevermind the lightening delay at O'Hare. I want to talk about how my mobile boarding pass didn't work at O'Hare's Terminal 3 security or at the American Airlines gate.

I find the idea of a digital boarding pass quite intriguing, but after seeing the backup methods for identification verification, I'm a bit disturbed. At security, the TSA agent used the information below the QR code on the ticket (my name, flight #, etc.) and my ID to verify my identity. I'm not too worried about that, but there wasn't anything he put into the system to verify that the ticket was valid. I suppose I could have created by own digital ticket and gotten through security...

At the gate, Greg was wondering what would happen if the scan failed to work again. Surprise! Fail. All I had to do is give the attendant my last name and onto the plane I went. This is all kinda surprising considering the recent reemphasis on air travel security.

My previous experience with mobile boarding passes (Delta out of ATL Hartsfield) was just fine...

iPhone 3GS

first pic from the iPhone

I took the plunge. There was a time when I said that I didn't need a driver's license (Mom loves to recount this). There was a time when I when I said I would never join Facebook (Erin reminds me of this fact once in a while). And there was a time when I said that I'd never get an iPhone on AT&T's network.

Well, all that's changed. When Mom decided to take the family plan to AT&T for the sole purpose of getting iPhones, I caved and got the fanciest one on the market. So far I've been able to sync my Gmail contacts and all my music to the phone as well as set up several o f the popular apps.

I can see how having such a connected mobile device is going to be a game changer for me. All I can hope for now is for AT&T to quit being so restrictive of Google and for the AT&T service to continue to work in my apartment.

Invited to Google Voice

I opened Gmail yesterday to find a Google Voice invite. Prior to the invite I hadn't given the service much thought. I figured it was probably handy for someone with several different numbers to juggle or someone who wanted to keep an old number as well as get a new one? In any case, the reality of the interface is much more familiar than I'd originally thought.

Think Gmail for your voicemail (cause that's basically what it is). It takes no more than five minutes to setup and get acclimated. You can have the Google Voice number forward to any other phone number that you have access to. I've yet to fully explore the integration with Google Talk due to PC troubles, but I'd expect that Google's aiming for a Skype-like app.

One cool feature is the transcription of your voicemail into an inbox message. I can't it's all that accurate though. It transcribed this, "Hey Mike, eh, the cubs just struck out in the bottom of the third and the score's tied three to three so starting the fourth inning. Bye bye," to "hey mike either have a comes just truck out in the bottom of the 3rd tennis course tag 323 so starting before thing bye bye." A cool feature, but totally impractical if this is representative of the quality of transcription. All in all it's cool, but not that amazing.

IE8 finally working on my netbook

The netbook is back! I'd set it aside a few months ago after getting the MacBook from work. Don't get me wrong, I still used it, but just not quite as much. Then I foolishly decided to let Windows Update install IE8, and the crash-on-launch behavior of IE8 began. I got frustrated. There didn't seem to be a quick fix, and so I quit using the 1000HE (IE isn't my primary browser, but is easiest for me to check my work email).

Now that my main Windows box is still experiencing the sniffles from a full blown virus, I've returned to the netbook and am happy to report that IE8 is all better. As part of the repair process for the desktop I went through the Control Panel to reset all Internet Options to the factory settings. This proved to be the fix for IE8 on the 1000HE. If you happen to have a similar problem or hear of someone who does, suggest this simple solution. You'll loose all your customizatinos, but you should probably be using Firefox or Chrome as a primary browser anyway.

HTML5 Drum Kit

This is just cool.

http://www.randomthink.net/labs/html5drums/

Enough said.