Archive for April, 2009

Analysis of Design Research data – book list

30 April 2009

I’m trying to put together a list of books in the UX and design space that have good coverage of the analysis of design and user research data. Here’s what I have so far (and please post any additional ones you think might be good).

Books:

Articles on analysing design research:

Couple of points: I haven’t read all of these, so can’t vouch for just how well they actually cover analysis; these are mostly recommendations from others. And, I’ll keep adding to the list as more responses come in, but feel free to add to the list via comments.

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A brief look at the UX of Microsoft’s IE8

21 April 2009

I recently took Microsoft’s new browser offering IE8 for a spin. It’s been a while since I had to code a Web site to run in browsers. These days I focus my attention on the design of products and services for people, and IE8 would have to be one of the most high-profile software releases we’ve seen recently so it seemed worth a look at least.

Microsoft has been putting a lot more effort into the user experience of its software recently. There are clear indicators of the fruits of this effort in Office 2008, for example. So here are a few points I noticed in my tour of IE8.

Installation

Microsoft products always fill with me with a sense of trepidation. The installation process never seems to go smoothly, and take longer than they feel like they should. Downloading and installing IE8 was no exception. Five clicks on a Download option and I was finally into the actual installation process. I’m sure there are good reasons for each of those clicks, but it just reinforces the opening perception that the product may be more trouble than its worth.

Getting Started

Somewhat surprisingly (see above), once the software was installed the set up process was exceedingly smooth. Importing settings and bookmarks from Firefox went off without a hitch and I was ready to use IE8.

Initial Impression

The interface feels cluttered and confused. The header area particularly is full of options and icons – most of which are either ambiguously labeled or not labeled at all. The positioning of these items didn’t feel to be based on any particular prioritisation so I was constantly searching for the right icon to do the thing I needed. This included simple tasks like stopping a page mid-load; going back to the previous page; and accessing the File menu.

Performance

The speed of load and page rendering in IE8 is excellent. Sites like the Sydney Morning Herald, News, and the BBC all loaded quickly and displayed flawlessly.

Tabs & Tab Groups

The tabs in IE8 work in a common sense fashion, meeting the conventions established over the past few years. But IE8 takes this idea one step further through the use of colours to indicate groupings of tabs. Opening a new tab via a link from an existing tab adds that new tab to the same group – displayed in the same tab colour. Using the New Tab command (Ctrl+T) creates a new tab and tab group.

It is easy to rearrange tabs – clicking & dragging; and to move a tab from one group to another – clicking & dragging a tab into an existing group. The tab thumbnail view is a useful feature – similar to that seen on the iPhone – but it could do with the addition of clearer group indicators (the coloured outline is too subtle).

Accelerators

The addition of the Accelerators to IE8 is an interesting one. Accelerators provide contextual functionality to any highlight piece of text. Functions include Search and Translate – configurable to your search engine of choice. If third-party developers produce more of these plug-in features, the Accelerators may become a very effective way to extend the functionality of IE8 without recourse to upgrades and software updates.

If you’re running a Windows machine IE8 is worth a look.

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New article for Johnny Holland: Deconstruction

14 April 2009

Deconstruction is one of the most frequently used and fundamental analysis techniques in our toolkit. It is used as both a preparatory technique to get research data ready for use in other ways; and a powerful technique in its own right as a method of isolating, exposing, and testing assumptions deeply embedded in our mental models.

One example of deconstruction is turning an interview transcript into a series of separate comments or answers to questions. Deconstruction is often used simply to prepare data for other analytic processes such as manipulation or summarization, or even abstraction.

Read the full article: Deconstructing Analysis Techniques: Deconstruction

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Johnny Holland appointment

12 April 2009

A couple of weeks ago now, after a trip to the US for IA Summit and presentation to SCAD, I was asked by Jeroen van Geel – managing editor of Johnny Holland – to join the editorial staff of the magazine.

I remember seeing the first articles to come out from Johnny. It seems like such a long time ago, but was only October 2008. The publication looked, felt, and read like a clear departure from sites like A List Apart, Boxes and Arrows, or UX Matters; much more in the style of Core 77.

The articles themselves were different, too. A focus on interaction design – of both digital and physical products – but also a look beyond current practice and a healthy balance between theory and practice. Articles on the theory of social interactions, fundamentals of interaction design, and analysis of design research, sit side-by-side with those on concepts for hybrid digital/physical environments, ‘intelligent’ widgets, and talking toys.

In the nearly six months since the magazine was launched over 100 articles have been published – including four of mine. But as an editor my responsibilities now expand to include identifying potential new authors, and helping them through the process of writing for the magazine. This is a really interesting challenge and has already forced me to think differently about the purpose and nature of discourse within our community, and the need for dissenting voices to be heard. So I’ll be trying to identify some fringe perspectives on interaction design (theory & practice) to publish in Johnny, as well as (trying to) identifying the new stars of the core.

If you have never read Johnny Holland before I can’t recommend highly enough that you do so. And if you think you’d like to contribute to the magazine, well, I think that’s great too. The first step is to get in touch with one of the editorial staff – the Kahunas – and we can take it from there.

Enjoy!

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IA Summit 2009 – A review in three parts

9 April 2009

Johnny Holland has published a three-part summary of my experiences at the recent IA Summit. You can read the articles here:
Day 1 Summary
Day 2 Summary
Day 3 Summary

But I thought I’d share a few thoughts in addition to the coverage…

The last point I made in my coverage of Day 3 was: The conference was a great experience, although I won’t be back next year. So that doesn’t seem all that up-beat, does it? I mean, if the conference was so great, why the hell wouldn’t I go back?

Well, as I wrote about earlier this year I’ve recognised for some time that I’m not an information architect although I had approached UX via IA as one of my primary methods. I’ve also noticed that the approach I take to my work is more aligned with interaction design than IA. So, since I can’t afford the time or money to travel from Australia to the US or Europe for conferences on my own dime more than one a year, it makes sense that the ‘one conference’ next year would be Interaction 2010 in Savannah, GA.

Back to the conference itself…

As much as I enjoyed the conference sessions, it was the conversations that took place around the conference that really made it a valuable experience. Over breakfast, during breaks, at lunch, at the bar in the afternoon, over dinner and back at the bar afterwards, the 5 days I was in Memphis were filled with one engaging conversation after another. It’s hard to describe just how invigorating these conversations were: whether they were about user experience topics, war stories from our workplaces, or gun control laws; they were wonderful.

This is the sort of thing you miss watching the presentation video, listening to the podcast or clicking through the slides. As much as those can help teach you something: it’s not the same as being there. Which is a back-handed of way of saying: “Come to UX Australia and experience the vibe first-hand :) ”

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