Five Sketches™

“A real human interface” shows a cognitive model of how a computer functions, using an actor: http://ping.fm/qNqPN #
Keith Raboid says eBay lost market share because social apps are more fun. A lesson for interaction designers? #UX #UE http://bit.ly/eZcyw #
Any publ’d usability-test results of the voice-search feature on Yahoo, Blackberry, Nokia, Win Mobile handsets? http://ping.fm/bxEt9 #
Mobile-phone […]

I was recently invited to join a design-specification review for a feature I’ll call Feature X.
As I listened to the presentation, I thought: “There are pieces missing from this spec.” When the time came for questions, I asked about the project’s scope. ”Your spec is titled Feature X, but I see very little X described in this document. What does X mean […]

Recently, one of the new-media gurus characterised Twitter as a place where people whine about the annoying or unexpected things that happen to them, in microblogs of 140 characters or less. Here are some examples:

davidcrow tweeted ”You can’t blame a guy for trying.” Ugh, you wasted 90 minutes of my day dude, and for trying to […]

If you’re creating user personas, How-To articles often tell you that you only need two or three personas at most. That’s fine for most web-design projects. However, if you are working on an enterprise-wide system that has modules for different types of professionals who each perform distinct and substantial tasks, then you will have a […]

Code of Conduct for companies who (want to) use Twitter: balance your crediblility and need for confidentiality. http://bit.ly/yJCt3 #
$15 airport fee? OK. In return I’d like: airport access by rail, a smile at security, free wireless, free bag carts, no-gouge food pricing. #
Good advice can be simple: IBM tells its blogging employees: “Stay away […]

During usability testing, I’m always fascinated to see how creatively users misinterpret the team’s design effort. I’ve seen users blame themselves when our design failed, and I’ve seen users yell at the screen because our GUI design was so frustrating.
Wednesday, the tables were turned.
I unintentionally “agreed” to let Facepoke—that social-networking site—invite everyone with whom I’d ever exchanged e-mail. Think about […]

Peter Merholz of Adaptive Path explained his view that customer experience is an investment, not a cost, in an article this week on Harvard Business Publishing’s site.
I adapted one of the “linking elephants” illustrations in the Merholz article by adding another row of boxes and text to illustrate what Merholz says: it is design that motivates […]

I was wondering whether the “design” of web sites and software is anything more than ”intermediation” (inserting a layer between the user and the raw data), whether “intermediation” is just a synonym for “information architecture,” and whether “design” must therefore be something greater—something that includes the emotional impact of the experience. Or is that last phrase merely another way to […]

On Agile product design, I read:
If you tell someone about a great idea, and they say “That’s a great idea,” it’s not a pattern.
If you tell someone a great idea, and they say “Yes, we do something like that too,” that’s a pattern.
 Exactly! That’s why I speak about Five Sketches™ at conferences and professional development sessions. And […]

Cookie usability. Cookies have affordance: the edge fits in toddler’s mouth for biting. The flat side only affords licking. #
Canadian airports with free wireless: Vancouver, Fredericton, Edmonton. Yay! Any others? #
You’re a usability nerd if your answer to “Why is cutlery always in the top drawer?” includes the words “taxonomy” and “statistically”. #
“We should not […]