The scariest interface contest

A little interface constest ...

"This week we’re taking entries for the scariest interface you’ve ever used. Leave a comment and a screenshot link. Feel free to show stuff that frightens you because of how it looks, works, or what it does. Then we’ll “interface your fears” (har har) by talking about how to improve ‘em.

The person who has the scariest interface, or comes up with the best fix wins something cool."   continued ...   (Via OK/Cancel)

HCI Halloween.

RNIB Media Briefing on Accessible PDFs

The importance and method of making PDFs accessible ...

"Mike Davies has posted his notes and recollections from an RNIB Media Briefing on Accessible PDFs, an event on the topic of PDF accessibility.

There is a lot of interesting information in Mike’s notes. A few things:

- There are currently few tools that can generate accessible PDFs.
- Adobe Acrobat 7 is compatible with screen readers, including the common Windows screen readers, VoiceOver on the Mac, and Copernicus on Linux.
- PDFs need to be tagged to be accessible.
- It is possible but time-consuming to make existing PDFs accessible.

Considering the huge number of PDF documents available on the web, and how often the information they contain is not available elsewhere, making them accessible to everybody is important. Especially for public sector organisations, which for some reason love posting information in PDF files (or even worse, Microsoft Word documents)."   continued ...   (Via 456 Berea Street)

PDF Example.

Mobile Web Design

Designing for mobile devices ...

"We’ve examined the mobile web landscape. We’ve covered four approaches to developing for it. Our discussion now shifts from that of concept to one of execution.

How do we designers and code slingers cope with the current state? What slings and what doesn’t? This article attempts to present technical advice on a superficial level. Some tips may surprise the reader; others may disappoint. But let’s be clear about one thing: We’re not aiming to publish a replete guide to advanced mobile development, but rather a starting point for mobile development — both practical and ambitious. Hence, a superficial treatment of the topic.

Given methods #1 (do nothing) and #2 (raw HTML) from Part Two require little instruction, we’ll focus on the latter two methods:
Handheld stylesheets and Mobile-specific sites."   continued ...   (Via Mobile Web Design)

Mobile Headings.

Usability Studies 101: Redesign Timing

When and how you should redesign a website ...

"Want to redesign your site but don't want to alienate current customers? NextStage's Joseph Carrabis's checklist will help you.

A reader of this column recently asked, "How often should a website be redesigned?" It wasn't the first time I'd heard that question, and I doubt it'll be the last. As we've devoted the last few columns to solving common design issue problems in uncommon ways, let's add this topic to the mix.

The question of redesign deals with branding, loyalty, product release cycles and related topics. We're going to look to the intersection of these items to come up with a single solution that addresses them all. The suggestions offered here are based on the research behind a three-year project developed for a Fortune 500 company in the workforce management business."   continued ...   (Via iMedia Connection)

Timing Website Redesign.

What Huiping Enjoyed about UI10

Comments about UI10 ...

"I am always curious what the smartest people in the industry are reading. While I look up to those smart ones, sometimes I wonder who they look up to? Who do they read and who do they listen to?

Some time in 2004 after reading a book called Content Critical, I concluded to myself that the guy who wrote the book Gerry McGovern is one of the smartest people in the web business today. So when an opportunity came up to hear him live in a two-day seminar in San Francisco, I jumped at the chance. During the break, I approached Gerry and asked who he read and admired in the web business today. He thought for a while and spit out two words, “Jared Spool.”"   continued ...   (Via UIE Brain Sparks)

UI10.

An asynchronous brain computer interface

New UI opportunities will result from this interface ...

"Researchers from Oxford University are developing a new asynchronous system to interface with the brain which will allow a more effective way to control wheelchairs or robotic arms with the power of the human mind. The Engineer Online writes that such an asynchronous brain computer interface (BCI) would permit a more precise and nuanced control of external mechanisms than existing synchronous BCI technology. This new system will use only one electrode and allow sophisticated controls over the speed of these external devices. Even if this new BCI technology is being designed to help severely disabled people, it could have other applications for the gaming and entertainment industries or even to control vehicles."   continued ...   (Via ZDNet, Roland Piquepaille)

Brain Computer Interface.

Should Nav be on the Left or on the Right?

A discussion on the merrits of left vs. right navigation ...

"On the often interesting Interaction Design Association discussion list, David Hatch from Macromedia asked if people liked their navigation panels on the left side better than on right side.

He shared some examples of right-side navigation — Macromedia and Sun — and of left-side navigation — Adobe, Microsoft, and IBM.

In his post, David stated that “industry standards” seem to prefer left-side nav, but his “inner child” likes right-side nav better. He wanted to know what the list membership liked better. Much discussion ensued."   continued ...   (Via UIE Brain Sparks)

Left vs. Right Navigation.

Design is communication. Use it as such.

Using design artifacts to communicate a vision ...

"The design of interactive products requires effective communication with end users. Each product (via its interface design) needs to “tell” users what features it offers (its utility), how to use those features (its usability), and why they should care (its desirability). Crafting the skills required to enable this type of communication takes significant time and effort. Experience designing, testing, and launching products builds each designer’s vocabulary allowing them to educate, engage, and enable users through interface design.

The same communication skills that help designers create effective visual and interaction designs for products can also play a significant role elsewhere in the product development process especially during early strategic work.

Most often, the first design artifact delivered to a client (business unit, stakeholder, etc.) is a mock-up. Though some might argue this is “getting real”, the “real” goals the mock-up is addressing are often not being communicated. This allows clients to dive into details of a specific screen design rather than address the larger context of the product. It isn’t a coincidence that it’s much easier to have an opinion on color or font size than it is to make a decision on product positioning."   continued ...   (Via Functioning Form)

A Design Artifact.

Usability, Information Architecture and web design commentary by Lyle Kantrovich

Marketing products with user centered design ...

"This recent Whirlpool Press Release is just one example of how a company that adopts and uses UCD (I know that Whirlpool has an active UCD/usability team) will create products that win in the marketplace. The press release shows that, by being user-centered, a company knows what product features or attributes have value to different audiences. Often these value points are learned when evaluating designs (e.g. in usability tests).

Here's an excerpt (note that Duet is a high-end model of Whirlpool front-loading washer and dryer):

"[T]he attribute that stands out most prominently with consumers may be the overall design of front loaders, and most prominently the features of the Duet(R). At the time it was introduced it was hailed for its sleek, sophisticated, user-friendly design, garnering praise from an impressive and diverse range of audiences, including the National Federation of the Blind (NFB), whose members appreciate the Duet(R) model's tactile and audible controls."   continued ...   (Via Croc o' Lyle)

Whirlpool Front Load Washer.

Never Get Involved in a Land War in Asia (or Build a Website for No Reason)

The importance of knowing the purpose of a website before deciding on features ...

"The formation of strategy isn’t one of the most popular aspects of web development, but it should be. Strategy narrows the focus and purpose of a project to make it as effective as possible. Strategy helps contain the scope of work, direct the content creation process, and provide tactical direction to information architects. It also allows designers to design instead of just making pretty pictures, and it keeps developers focused on the right features. And, once the website has launched, you can keep the strategy around to help market the site through SEM, SEO, and, uh, EIEIO.

This isn’t rocket science, nor does this need apply only to large commercial endeavors. A simple strategy can be adopted to help all ranges and types of websites. Big companies can use strategy to determine how best to educate new users about their products and make it easy to purchase them. Likewise, a non-profit can identify a sub-set of particularly generous contributors and create a section of their website that appeals to this audience. Blog publishers can use strategy to formulate an editorial direction that increases readership. And in some cases, this plan can help rein in a client who is eager to add additional features, widgets, and gizmos."   continued ...   (Via A List Apart)

The Purpose Driven Website.

Usability of GPS Receivers in a Sporting Environment

Usability issues with handheld GPS technology ...

"In spite of the growing popularity of GPS, there are many usability issues to be addressed. Outdoor sports like geocaching (a popular, high-tech sport of treasure hunting introduced to the public by GPS technology) involve getting out into nature where the user may encounter various obstacles and the GPSr must take all usage and behavioural aspects into account.

The use of handheld GPS receivers under hazardous conditions presents very specific usability problems that can lead to ineffective navigation and even compromise the user’s safety. We need to examine possible solutions to interaction problems in the use of GPS receiver in a sporting environment. Is it possible for a handheld GPS receiver to actively assist the user without distracting him or her from their main task?

In this brief overview of GPS technology within an outdoor sporting environment, we highlight some classical usability issues and suggest possible solutions to these issues."   continued ...   (Via Usability News)

Garmin Handheld GPS.

Attenuation and the suck threshold

A good article about designing UI's to help, rather than hurt, users ...

"How long do your users spend in the "I suck" (or "this product sucks") zone? Once they've crossed the suck threshold, how long does it take before they start to feel like they kick ass? Both of those thresholds are key milestones on a users path to passion, and it's often the case that he-who-gets-his-users-there-first wins.

Our O'Reilly editor Mike Loukides says our goal -- whether it's for product design or writing a tech book -- should be to focus on answering this question:

What is the minimum threshold at which the user can be creative? Followed by: Do whatever it takes to help them get there quickly."   continued ...   (Via Creating Passionate Users)

Point where you loose the user.

Hampshire College Website

Check the navigation on this site. Any interior page changes the orientation of the navigation as well ...

"Get a load of the home page for Hampshire College.

Top menu is ok. Flash menu on the left is invisible unless you run your mouse over the little orange arrows. Only then do you see the menu choices. I don't know about anyone else, but I don't have the patience to run my mouse over little orange arrows to see what's in the menu. And by the way, what the hell is that menu all about? Weird stuff.

Actually, if you don't have the Macromedia Flash plug-in, then you get a reasonably decent-looking site. The web designer also handles the No-Flash situation quite nicely.

Interesting use of "Mystery Meat Navigation." If you click on one of the orange arrows, you're taken to a subpage. To navigate to any of the other Mystery Meat subpages, you have to mouse over the orange arrows BUT this time the text is sideways. Great. Now I have Sideways Mystery Meat Navigation."   continued ...   (Via Web Pages That Suck)

Hampshire College.

It All Adds Up

This is the start of a developer series for the Office 12 UI ...

"Microsoft Office is more than a suite of applications. It's also an important development platform.

A change as big as the new Office 12 user interface has implications for developers. There are thousands of publicly available add-ins written to take advantage of Office. Many companies have also written their own suite of internal add-ins which extend Office to impressively integrate into their business systems.

The good news is that Office 12 provides an enormous opportunity for add-in developers. We've introduced a new model for extending the Office interface code-named RibbonX, which addresses directly many of the toughest issues facing Office UI developers today. Based on a declarative, XML-based model, RibbonX unlocks much of the power of the new UI in a straightforward way, whether you write in C#, Visual Basic.NET, C++, or VBA."   continued ...   (Via Jensen Harris)

Office12 Developer.

Good Designers Redesign, Great Designers Realign

A good distinction in design work. Like the difference between user interface design and graphics design ...

"By now it’s apparent that I’ve split us, the creatives, into two camps—and equally apparent that I prefer to wear Realigner team colors. Allow me to indulge in team bias by comparing the two.

The “redesigners” -
The Redesigners often rely on emotional responses to aesthetics in justifying a redesign. You’ll typically hear statements like these:

It’s been 2 years since our last redesign. Our current stuff just looks old. A redesign would bring new traffic to the site.

Too often, look and feel, color scheme, layout, and identity are presented as solutions to problems discussed in these conversations long before regard is given to other less-aesthetic issues that may very well be the root of the problem. The old warning against treating symptom rather than cause comes to mind.

The “realigners” -
In direct contrast to the Redesigners, the Realigners cite strategic objectives and user needs as reasons to consider a site overhaul:

Market trends have shifted. Should our website be adjusted accordingly? Our users’ needs have changed. Do we need to adapt? We’ve added 3 new sections and a slew of new content to the site over the last 12 months. Are we presenting content as effectively as we can? Our current website does little to convey the strength of our product offering. Does our online presence enhance or devalue our overall brand perception?"   continued ...   (Via A List Apart: Articles)

Realigned Web Page.

360 Electrical: Great design

A simple interface for a nagging problem. They rotate 360 degrees ...

"Gotta love simple solutions to common problems. 360 Electrical is one of the best I’ve seen in a while. Why didn’t anyone else think of that? Well done."   continued ...   (Via Signal vs. Noise)

360 Electrical Socket.

Usability Redux

Some interesting questions answered about Office 12 usability testing ...

"Q: What is "Send a Smile?"

A: There's a general philosophy Microsoft has been embracing more and more in all of our beta products, which is that people should be able to send one-off comments as easily as possible, while they're "in the moment." Windows XP had a "Comments?" link in every dialog box that let you tell us if the dialog was stupid. Previous versions of Office had the same thing.

Send-a-Smile is a related tool that goes a bit further. Anywhere, anytime, someone can click a "smiley face" to tell us they like something or a "frowny face" to tell us they don't like something. We get a lot of context (with the user's permission of course), including a screenshot, sometimes a short movie of the last 30 seconds, related documents, etc. There's another tool called the Office Feedback Tool (also known as "Ebert") which does a similar thing but with Thumbs Up and Thumbs Down.

All of these tools work on the principal that if someone has to open a newsreader, log onto a newsgroup, type a long message, and send it, we'll lose a lot of valuable feedback just due to complacency. The idea is to reduce the barrier to entry for sending comments so that we get more data from the "heat of the moment.""   continued ...   (Via Jensen Harris)

Office 12 Box.

INTERACT 2005: Hot Ideas for Interfaces in the Kitchen

New UI concepts for the kitchen ...

"A fire projected onto a heating oven? A blizzard raging every time the freezer is open? A blue light for the moment that the cold tap runs cold? Leonardo Amerigo Bonanni of the MIT Media Lab was presenting what he called "Cooking with the Elements" at INTERACT2005 in Rome.

Perhaps the single most inspiring application of ambient information this year, Bonnani's research looks at what happens if you represent the behaviour of the appliances in the kitchen in a visually meaningful way using augmented reality.

He ran through a history of, on the one hand, ambiguous ambient information design and, on the other, the addition of overly prescriptive visuals into kitchens (see the link to his slides below). He explained that limited elbow room and too much information can make following virtual cooking instructions projected into real space impractical and people were found better to manage with a paper recipe card. Then he showed how combining ambience and augmented reality could produce useful peripheral information to kitchen users."   continued ...   (Via Usability News)

Augmented Reality in the Kitchen.

Tipping the Scale (Why the UI, Part 5)

More on the UI decisions behind Office 12 ...

"One of the misunderstandings I've seen repeated around the 'net a number of times is that our team set out to "destroy the menu-based paradigms introduced by Apple."

Because it's not that menus and toolbars are bad or that the people who created them weren't smart. The problem is that Office has outgrown them. There's a point beyond which menus and toolbars cease to scale well. A flat menu with 8 well-organized commands on it works just great; a three-level hierarchical menu containing 35 loosely-related commands can be a bit of a disaster.

In short, we're not trying to destroy anything. Our goal is to create a new standard user interface for full-featured productivity applications. The original team who built Word or Excel couldn't have imagined how much their products would be able to do today. I want us to step back, to think through the question: "what kind of interface would they have built knowing how Word turned out?"

Let's take a more visual look at the scale issues facing Office. Here are a few charts, demonstrating the number of top-level menu items, toolbars, and Task Panes included in the product, from Word 1.0 to Word 2003:"   continued ...   (Via Jensen Harris)

Number of toolbars and Task Panes in Word, by release.

Intranet Portals Get Streamlined

An overview of the state of intranet portals ...

"An analysis of intranet portals found slimmer information architectures and a renewed emphasis on fresh content and useful applications. Past findings, including those on role-based personalization, were confirmed.

It's been almost three years since our last project assessing the usability of intranet portals. This is a good time to take a fresh look at portal design, since three years is also the average time between intranet redesigns.

To find out what's working now, we analyzed a new series of portal projects and compared them with the conclusions from the previous round.

In the larger scheme of things, three years is not much time, so it's not surprising that all of the findings from our initial portal project still hold. In fact, none of the forty-five best practices documented in the report's first edition have changed. Yes, we've gained many new insights, but what was good three years ago continues to be good today."   continued ...   (Via Alertbox)

Intranet Portal Example.

NextD Report on Design and Strategy Conference

Interaction design taking on more importance in the business community ...

"Perspectives on Design and Strategy: Points of view from the 2005 Institute of Design Strategy Conference", published by the Institute of Design, IIT offers interviews with several contributors on the subject of how design in starting to appear in general business strategy and what that might mean.

'Consumers now get angry when the interaction design of a product or service is not perfect. People used to think it was they who were stupid; now they say the offering and the company are stupid.

'But design knowledge is more than just methods of understanding users. Executives are using design in the early stages of their processes and in solving types of problems that traditionally have not involved designers. This is in stark contrast to the conventional model of the past in which design was involved late in the process, making decisions about visual form after engineering and marketing had defined the basic direction,' says Patrick Whitney, Director, Institute of Design, IIT, in his introduction."   continued ...   (Via Usability News)

Interaction Design.

A Drag & Drop Web Browser OS

Insight in to possible UI's for a browser-based OS ...

"Recent speculation about Web-based operating systems and the release of Flock (currently touted as the first Web 2.0 browser) got me thinking about what a Web browser-based operating system might look like. How could companies like Yahoo! and Google integrate their diverse product suites, which include Maps, Local Directories, Instant Messaging, Email, Calendars, Blogs, News, and more?

What stuck out for me was the ability to easily move content between services. For example, selecting and dragging text or images from a Web page directly into a blog post, an instant message conversation, or an email or perhaps dragging a point on a map to a calendar or directly into an email for easily accessible directions. This type of simplified sharing between Web services is illustrated in the following screen shots. I used LukeW Web OS to remain neutral but one could easily imagine Google OS, Yahoo! OS, or Mozilla OS."   continued ...   (Via Functioning Form)

Web-based Operating System.

NordiCHI 2006

Graphic design plays a minor role on the Web

The limited role of graphics in web-based user interface design ...

"The best websites are highly functional. They are task-focused. Graphic design has an important, though limited role. Don’t try and force the Web to be what it’s not.

Have you noticed the demise of the Flash intro? A couple of years ago, they were everywhere. I have asked thousands of people in some 35 countries what they do when they see a Flash intro. “Skip intro” is the universal reply.

A Flash intro is a fourth-rate attempt at a TV ad by people who won’t get a chance to design real TV ads. They were invented by graphic designers desperate to turn the Web into TV, and who wanted to look cool and win design awards."   continued ...   (Via Gerry McGovern)

Flash Introduction.