uxlove: Archive

Getting US only apps on your UK iPad/iPhone

So you’ve got yourself a shiny iPad a few weeks ahead of the rest of the UK… The self-satisfaction and smugness kinda wears off when you realise there’s not much in the way of apps for it in the UK store. Well, there’s a way round that (isnt there always?), It’s probably not all that official but it works. Here goes: Fire up itunes and log out of your current...

May 7th

Chiming in on the spec work debate

So anyone with half a brain knows spec work is bad, wrong, evil and all of that stuff, but I’m of the opinion that the real weight of the argument is actually being lost amongst all the cat-fighting and bitching. Working for free is obviously not a great idea and not a sustainable one either. But, pitch work will never go away and I think it’s ok for an agency to spend a reasonable...

Aug 26th

Microsoft - Will You Ever Learn?

Sometimes despite every effort not to come across as a drooling apple fanboy, Microsoft does something so hideously abhorrent it just can’t pass without at least some comment. Office 2010. That’s 2010 as in the same 2010 Arthur C Clarke wrote about as ya know… the future and all. And this is what the boys in Redmond have come up with. ...

Apr 30th

UX Cheat Sheet

I rustled this up as a little helper for me and my colleagues. Click the image to download a PDF.

Apr 15th

Digital user experience in print

Jacek Utko has got a whole lot of love recently on a global scale following his TED presentation. The Polish designer has been tearing up the eastern european newspaper industry breaking down traditional print ideologies and bumping readership as much as 100% in some cases following his redesigns. What’s interesting to me is that many of Utko’s redesigns follow a lot of similarities...

Apr 1st

Why definition is everything when it comes to...

If a definition needs defining then it’s not a definition. If there’s any room for interpretation throw it away and start again. If you as a User Experience professional can’t distill the message into one clear definition then how can you expect the user to make that interpretation? Definitions cannot be conceptual or describe something intangible, they need to be concrete. In...

Mar 27th

Tesla heading for a UX car-crash (literally) →

Touch Screen dashboard? Seriously? Don’t you think that maybe, just maybe you might want to be looking at the road? Not you know, like fumbling around with a touchscreen at 80mph. Buttons and knobs work well, you learn where they are, and instinctively work them without having to look to see what they’re doing. Too cold? turn knob or press right hand button a few times. Imagine that...

Mar 27th

Mindmapping software makes for a f*ckin awful IA...

Let’s get it out there. Mindmapping software is not a great tool for creating sitemaps. If i have to look at another spaghetti-lined abortion of a diagram again i think i might just stick two pencils up my nose and headbutt the desk. If i need to spend three hours tracing my finger around a diagram to establish the relationship between two pages then something is clearly broken. Stop it...

Mar 27th

User Experience and the Fixed Wheel bike

Anyone that has ever ridden a fixed-wheel bike or Fixie as the ker-azy kids like to call them, will testify to the fact that riding one is not generally an easy or pleasant experience. Having a fixed rear wheel offers absolutely zero to the effectiveness of a bicycle. I would in fact argue that it becomes a detriment to the process of getting around safely. But. It’s fun. The User...

Mar 27th

From the “beyond basic” school of UX no-no’s. Always remember to set DNS for your domain without the WWW. Just hit three sites in a row that had forgotten to. Bad.

Mar 25th

The real value of eye-tracking for UX evaluation?

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about the actual value that eye tracking brings to a UX evaluation. Maybe it’s because i’m mac-bound and to get any kind of eye tracking setup in place I either have to write it myself or venture over to the dark side and get me a windows box. But more and more, i’m starting to question the actual tangible value to a customer other than...

Mar 25th

Watch

Great proof of concept. I’ll be looking into pushing this further over the next few weeks.

Mar 25th

http://noahstokes.com/ genius.

Mar 25th