I took a break during the fourth lecture to collect my thoughts and recover from the UX excitement. I used the time to create my Twitter account and then read the wikipedia entry on "Twitter" to try and understand what I got myself into. I still don't understand the hype (which coincidentally is my 6 word summary of Big D).
I caught the last few minutes of "Future Prood Designs + Presentations for THIS Generation" with Robert Wiseman. The only points I took from there was the idea of allowing your customers to decide your design. He used the image of employees walking across a grass field to work (what kind of business are we talking about?!) and then paving the rabbit trails that emerge. He didn't have an example of an application doing this, though.
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Big Design Lecture #3
It's interesting how otherwise innocent words can have profound meaning in professions. "Code Pink" for example comes across as almost a playful alternative to it's more serious big brother "Code Red." You don't see many medical dramas declaring Code Pink - imagining it is kind of silly. Yet if you walked into a hospital and ran up and down the halls yelling "CODE PINK!" you'd scramble the entire building. Code Pink in medical jargon means an infant has been stolen. Pretty serious...
Likewise in embedded programming "Design Patterns" holds a very reverent meaning due to the book of the same name written by the Gang of Four. Noone casually sits down to read it - they meditate on it!
Therefore when I saw the third lecture at Big Design would be on "Latest Design Patterns That You Should Know" by Bill Scott I penciled it in as a must-see. It wasn't as profound as those words would have it seem. These patterns were not as hard to understand and visualize as say the Visitor Pattern. Bill had lots of them that you would think would be common sense, yet he had lots of real-life examples of websites implementing just the opposite resulting in 'anti-patterns.' This form of presentation ("Here's what NOT to do") really connected with me. I enjoyed the talk, though I don't know if it's directly applicable to work.
Some examples of his design patterns:
1. Make it Direct
2. Keep it Lightweight
3. Stay on the page
4. Offer an Invitation
5. Show transitions
I would have taken more detailed notes, but the lady sitting in front of me turned around and scolded me for, "Doing work during the presentation." When I explained I was taking notes, she said the typing was very distracted and that I was a VERY rude person, despite my repeated apologies.
Likewise in embedded programming "Design Patterns" holds a very reverent meaning due to the book of the same name written by the Gang of Four. Noone casually sits down to read it - they meditate on it!
Therefore when I saw the third lecture at Big Design would be on "Latest Design Patterns That You Should Know" by Bill Scott I penciled it in as a must-see. It wasn't as profound as those words would have it seem. These patterns were not as hard to understand and visualize as say the Visitor Pattern. Bill had lots of them that you would think would be common sense, yet he had lots of real-life examples of websites implementing just the opposite resulting in 'anti-patterns.' This form of presentation ("Here's what NOT to do") really connected with me. I enjoyed the talk, though I don't know if it's directly applicable to work.
Some examples of his design patterns:
1. Make it Direct
2. Keep it Lightweight
3. Stay on the page
4. Offer an Invitation
5. Show transitions
I would have taken more detailed notes, but the lady sitting in front of me turned around and scolded me for, "Doing work during the presentation." When I explained I was taking notes, she said the typing was very distracted and that I was a VERY rude person, despite my repeated apologies.
Big Design Lunch
By this time I was ready for a break. As an embedded engineer I'm in the business of writing black boxes where numbers go in and numbers go out. There's no "user experience" and no customer I'm trying to pull in. I got to be honest, the first two lectures left me physically shaking after hearing how bad people are trying to suck me in to their product.
Needless to say, I needed a break. The Big Design conference catered boxed lunches. I grabbed one and set off to find a conversation to be a part of while I ate. The topic among my classmates was either how we finished up the last class or how Frailey's death-march of a project was wrapping up - neither one of which I had the stomach to sit and listen to. Feeling particularly brave I walked up to a table with two guys my age and asked if I could join them. They eagerly agreed and I sat down. Turns out these two guys were Garrett Dimon and Thor Muller - two speakers at Big D. If I was hoping for a light conversation that helped bring all this into perspective and let me digest the last three hours of lecture, it wasn't going to happen. At one point it occurred to me that these two (particularly Thor) talked really fast and non-stop. The conversation was all over the place. At one point I gathered Thor was a carear business starter - building a small company and selling it... starting another. He must be terribly important and very rich, but not much of a listener.
At one point he asked me what I thought of 'all this', (I assume he meant the last hour of hyper-babble) and I got the impression he was only using this as a launch pad to change the subject. I said I was an imbedded engineer who was on assignment at the convention. The look on his face made it look like something foul had briefly crossed his nose. Then realizing his face was showing his thoughts, he made a pleasant comment about me being the smartest person at the table and then resumed hyper-babble.
With the next track starting, I excused myself...
Needless to say, I needed a break. The Big Design conference catered boxed lunches. I grabbed one and set off to find a conversation to be a part of while I ate. The topic among my classmates was either how we finished up the last class or how Frailey's death-march of a project was wrapping up - neither one of which I had the stomach to sit and listen to. Feeling particularly brave I walked up to a table with two guys my age and asked if I could join them. They eagerly agreed and I sat down. Turns out these two guys were Garrett Dimon and Thor Muller - two speakers at Big D. If I was hoping for a light conversation that helped bring all this into perspective and let me digest the last three hours of lecture, it wasn't going to happen. At one point it occurred to me that these two (particularly Thor) talked really fast and non-stop. The conversation was all over the place. At one point I gathered Thor was a carear business starter - building a small company and selling it... starting another. He must be terribly important and very rich, but not much of a listener.
At one point he asked me what I thought of 'all this', (I assume he meant the last hour of hyper-babble) and I got the impression he was only using this as a launch pad to change the subject. I said I was an imbedded engineer who was on assignment at the convention. The look on his face made it look like something foul had briefly crossed his nose. Then realizing his face was showing his thoughts, he made a pleasant comment about me being the smartest person at the table and then resumed hyper-babble.
With the next track starting, I excused myself...
Big Design Lecture #2
The second lecture I attended was "The Art and Science of Seductive Interactions" by Stephen Anderson. This lecture really went hand in hand with the previous lecture even though they were in separate tracks. In fact, the lecturer user the first speaker several times as an example.
Stephen did, however, use lots of examples with his points. I was amazed at all these hot web-site everyone in the audience had heard of that I haven't. Examples: iLike, Sabre, Doppler
Again, this was a demonstration in how sausages are made.
Stephen did, however, use lots of examples with his points. I was amazed at all these hot web-site everyone in the audience had heard of that I haven't. Examples: iLike, Sabre, Doppler
Again, this was a demonstration in how sausages are made.
Big Design Lecture #1
The first lecture I sat in on at Big Design '09 was "What Makes The Click" with Dr. Susan Weinchenk. She was a psychology expert that walked the audience through understanding several quirks of the human brain and how to take advantage of that in design web applications. A few points she made:
1. Fear of Loss - The most primitive parts of our brain are more concerned about losing something we have than gaining something we don't have. This can be exploited by offering a product with all the features and letting the buyer remove them rather than giving them a base model and letting them add features. In the latter example, they'd be reluctant to lose the money for the upgrade.
2. The Bystander Effect - When placed in an uncertain situation ("which item should I buy?!") people tend to become followers. This is leveraged with user testimonials and buyer reviews.
At the end of the talk, I felt (as a customer) like I was let in on a secret I wasn't supposed to know about. Like walking in on a butcher while he's making sausages. Knowing your being manipulated and pulled in is such a turn-off, even when it's the subject of a lecture.
I chuckled thinking about what it would look like if we used these principles in the UI for the F-35. "An unknown entity has been detected. Click here if you want to learn more..."
1. Fear of Loss - The most primitive parts of our brain are more concerned about losing something we have than gaining something we don't have. This can be exploited by offering a product with all the features and letting the buyer remove them rather than giving them a base model and letting them add features. In the latter example, they'd be reluctant to lose the money for the upgrade.
2. The Bystander Effect - When placed in an uncertain situation ("which item should I buy?!") people tend to become followers. This is leveraged with user testimonials and buyer reviews.
At the end of the talk, I felt (as a customer) like I was let in on a secret I wasn't supposed to know about. Like walking in on a butcher while he's making sausages. Knowing your being manipulated and pulled in is such a turn-off, even when it's the subject of a lecture.
I chuckled thinking about what it would look like if we used these principles in the UI for the F-35. "An unknown entity has been detected. Click here if you want to learn more..."
Big Design Intro
This summer I'm taking a course in Service Oriented Computing. As a cold opener to the course, my class attended "Big Design '09" at SMU. This was an all-day conference that had multiple tracks talking about UX as it relates to software. What UX was they never said, but 10 hours of context clues makes me think it stood for "User Experience"
I'll save my over-all impressions for the end. What follows will be my summaries and impressions of each seminar I attended.
The Keynote Plenary was given by Norm Cox on "The UX Landscape" (again, never said what UX was :P) Norm gave a very interesting autobiography on his work with early computers using bitmap displays with the operating system. His work involved creating what could be thought of as the first desktop with icons. One of his most profound comments was that IBM recognized early on that the user interface is the most valuable touch-point between a user (customer) and the product.
At one point he talked about contracting with PizzaHut to overhaul their back-office system that instructed employees on how to build a pizza. This was extended to ensuring that when an order is taken, it's taken correctly. Although he didn't touch on it, this new UI was so simple that PizzaHut used it when they developed a web-service for ordering a pizza on-line. I know because I did that very thing not 3 days before the show. I remember thinking at the time, "This is a great setup they have here!"
Take-away points from his speech:
1. Beware the limitations of titles.
2. Be a 'jack of many (ui) titles, master of some"
3. Elevate and think strategically
4. Take advantage of opportunities.
I'll save my over-all impressions for the end. What follows will be my summaries and impressions of each seminar I attended.
The Keynote Plenary was given by Norm Cox on "The UX Landscape" (again, never said what UX was :P) Norm gave a very interesting autobiography on his work with early computers using bitmap displays with the operating system. His work involved creating what could be thought of as the first desktop with icons. One of his most profound comments was that IBM recognized early on that the user interface is the most valuable touch-point between a user (customer) and the product.
At one point he talked about contracting with PizzaHut to overhaul their back-office system that instructed employees on how to build a pizza. This was extended to ensuring that when an order is taken, it's taken correctly. Although he didn't touch on it, this new UI was so simple that PizzaHut used it when they developed a web-service for ordering a pizza on-line. I know because I did that very thing not 3 days before the show. I remember thinking at the time, "This is a great setup they have here!"
Take-away points from his speech:
1. Beware the limitations of titles.
2. Be a 'jack of many (ui) titles, master of some"
3. Elevate and think strategically
4. Take advantage of opportunities.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Striving for a Charlie Brown Christmas
One of the top five descriptions I'd use to describe my paternal grandfather is that he loved Charles Shultz's Peanuts comic strip. As such, I remember watching a "Charlie Brown Christmas" at an early age. As a child, there's always that initial excitement of watching a cartoon, (especially at the grandparents ;)) but I distintively remember being disappointed. The plot didn't make sense, the animation was horrible, and the humor was over my head. And that was probably the last time I watched it in its entirety until this week. It is quite possibly the best seasonal movie I've ever seen. If my mere recommendation of it now has your interest peaked, I found it all on YouTube.
For the last three or four years Christmas has been a really hard time of year for me. I feel wound up and anxious and trying to think of twenty things twenty people can get me is frustrating and feels somehow wrong. The cartoon addresses this in its opening line -
Charlie Brown tries to busy himself with holiday activities in the form of directing a Christmas play. I wish they would have developed the story on this Christmas play since it included an inn keeper, a Christmas Queen, and easy jazz music... Charlie Brown takes his job very seriously and becomes a bit of a task masker - the rest of the kids just want to dance to the jazz. Charlie Brown then tries to make it better with the infamous "Charlie Brown Christmas Tree" to which he is richly chastized. At his wits end, he cries out for someone, ANYONE, to explain the meaning of Christmas to which Linus gives his epic monologue:
I hope if you find yourself striving for things or activities this time of year, you slow down and remember the reason for the season. ;)
For the last three or four years Christmas has been a really hard time of year for me. I feel wound up and anxious and trying to think of twenty things twenty people can get me is frustrating and feels somehow wrong. The cartoon addresses this in its opening line -
"I think there must be something wrong with me, Linus. Christmas is coming, but I'm not happy. I don't feel the way I'm supposed to feel. I just don't understand Christmas, I guess. I like getting presents and receiving Christmas cards, and decorating trees and all that, but I'm still not happy. I always end up feeling depressed."
Charlie Brown tries to busy himself with holiday activities in the form of directing a Christmas play. I wish they would have developed the story on this Christmas play since it included an inn keeper, a Christmas Queen, and easy jazz music... Charlie Brown takes his job very seriously and becomes a bit of a task masker - the rest of the kids just want to dance to the jazz. Charlie Brown then tries to make it better with the infamous "Charlie Brown Christmas Tree" to which he is richly chastized. At his wits end, he cries out for someone, ANYONE, to explain the meaning of Christmas to which Linus gives his epic monologue:
I hope if you find yourself striving for things or activities this time of year, you slow down and remember the reason for the season. ;)
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