Usability Research Applied to Immersive Interfaces
I’m a bit late on this, but there was awesome article in Boxes and Arrows this week titled Researching Video Games the UX Way. It’s a detailed write up of how Bolt|Peters performed usability testing on Spore.
The basic take-away is that the team had to rely on a much more open-ended…
Redesign OVI Store for Nokia N900
A few months ago (let’s say 7) before the release of Nokia N900, there wasn’t an OVI Store for this device. During one of those boring winter weekends with nothing interesting to do, I decided to draw a few ideas. I focused on how OVI Store would look for this particular device.
Beyond Frustration: Three levels of happy design | UX Magazine
By the title, I imagined this article was about happy designers and moving beyond frustration on the job — something I could use a bit of now and then. :)
It does touch on the part of a designer’s job that can be difficult and frustrating, the constraints, the pressures, the decisions that affect design decisions to the point where you almost forget what you’re designing for in the first place.
But mostly, Dana Chisnell, of usabilityworks.net, talks about three things you can take into consideration when designing an experience that will go beyond just making a site usable, and hopefully make users feel emotionally happy in some way for having used the site.
Beyond usability, this article discusses designs that encourage feelings of delight, deep engagement (flow), and add meaning to users’ lives, with some excellent examples and links for further research.
A Model for UX Career Growth. Read entire article: http://bit.ly/cvrwsj
The Local Maximum
In his latest article on 52 Weeks of UX, Joshua Porter once again nails an important aspect of UX:
One strategy we might employ is to optimize until we reach a point of diminishing returns: design until changes just aren’t having a big effect. Then, stop optimizing and return to other kinds of analysis to figure out the next steps. Conduct interviews. Do user testing. Give surveys, ask questions. Find out the biggest existing pain points instead of focusing on tiny design elements at this stage. Focus at the activity-level. What are people trying to accomplish? What are their higher-level goals? What aren’t people doing that we want them to? What big hurdles keep them from taking the next action? This level of insight will allow you to make those bigger changes.
If you’re a freelance, chances are good that you’re hired at the beginning of a project, or when it’s hopelessly stuck. You rarely get to the place where small change optimization reaches the point of diminishing returns.
The more important it is to keep an eye on it, so chances of innovation aren’t missed.
Good user experience isn’t just about good design. Learn how to create a positive user experience by being fast, open, engaged, surprising, polite, and, well… being yourself. Chock full of examples from the web and beyond, this talk is a practical introduction for developers who are passionate about user experience but may not have a background in design.
User Experience v Features
Functionality is commonplace and cheap; great user experience is rare and valuable. I buy UX, not features.
Short and sweet.
What happens when you combine a children’s book with an iPhone? Totally terrific tech for tots!
Interactive Collaborative Environment. More info here: http://www.futureinteractions.net/
The Laws of User Experience: Making it or breaking it with the UX Factor
UX: User Experience
Stunning print design for Nokia by Socio Design
(via septemberindustry)
Designing Forms & Data Integrity
If you’ve ever had to apply for something which requires credit history, then you’ve probably seen this type of form. Unfortunately, it’s almost always done badly.
Rich Amos has documented a more elegant, user friendly approach to this type of form. Ben Bashford and myself chipped in with some feedback based on our experiences.
