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User Experience Is Your Brand, Dummy!

I'm loving this insightful article on the clash between corporate branding guidelines and actual user experience in UX Magazine. 

When corporate marketing departments dream of brand design, they only dream as far as they need. The expensive and time consuming process of extending the brand into an interactive concept is usually pushed off until it becomes absolutely necessary.

Unfortunately, by the time some serious rethinking is required, a lot of people have gotten stuck in the mud of static branding. It’s completely natural for companies to resist straying from the handful of predefined styles that were never meant to address web forms, widgets, calendars and menuing systems.

It describes the situation in many organizations spot on and also excels by not solely blaiming the marketing department for this problem. So if your work has the slightest to do with branding and communication go read it.

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Prototyping With XHTML And Javascript - Why On Earth?

In the past months I have come across quite a few UI-guys arguing that prototyping web interfaces should be done using  XHTML and  javascript. The underlying argument being that it's much easier to produce a fair representation of the final product if designers get into code mode.

At UX London Richard Rutter and James Box from Clearleft  held a workshop about wireframing. They gave a presentation on how they use html and javascript to go from paper to functional html-prototypes in an effort to mimic the ajax responses of real world web pages. The two designers said that the code needed wasn't that hard to learn and that you really ought to know how to build a web page, when you are an interface designer.

Admittedly they both seemed like very skilled designers and they definitely knew what they were doing. What's more I certainly agree that building a functional prototype will take you much closer to the target than static screen dumps. But I don't think designers need to know code much less be able to code a web page from scratch. It simply isn't their job and concentrating on it will eventually take their focus away from the core task of delivering great user experience. 

I also noticed a lot of worried frowns on the foreheads of Rutter and Box's spectators when they whipped out the actual code needed.

Now, I'm nearing 41 years of age and really don't need those extra frowns so I stay as much away from code as I can. In stead I use Axure RP which is an easy to learn wysiwyg tool that doesn't require any coding skills. All the same the software is able to mimic ajax functionality at any rate.

This means that I don't have to spend my time with divs, ids and scripting. I am able to simply drag and drop the desired functionality into place. If I went the extra mile and coded the application there is little doubt that programmers would frown at the result. In other words: My code would suck.

So why go the extra mile of the Clearleft people and code the darn thing from head to body?  Well, I think the main problem of many UI-designers is that they are Mac-people and as of now Axure RP is not available for Mac. I think it will be in the not to distant future. But until then if you really want fast results without code, you have to switch to a pc.

Disclaimer: I do not work for Axure, nor was I paid for this post. I am simply a happy customer :-)

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The Complicated Matter Of User Experience

Working with web communication can be a task containing many disciplines. But take a good look at The Spectrum of User Experience.

This little sucker of a model shows you just how complex and interwoven matters can be.

Via Adpative Path

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Is Card Sorting Via Web A Good Thing

The grand old usability discipline, card sorting, is now fully webified. No more low tech feel with all the little cardboard cards cramped in sweaty hands.

I haven't tried the service, so I don't know if this tool is actually useful. But it honestly seems like a bit much to take this process online, though.

Also, I think live user feedback is one of good things you gain from card sorting. So taking it online kinda defeats the purpose, doesn't it?

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Is Adobe Captivate 4 Flawed?

So I've downloaded Adobe Captivate 4 at work to evaluate whether it's the right tool to use for software demonstrations.

I'm still testing it, but I just had to write this warning: If you expect to find a program with the level of usability and stability that you're used to from Adobe you'll probably be disappointed.

The program is just not very intuitive to use. I have used it for two weeks now and still feel like a blind bat most of the time when using it (I am a fairly skilled Photoshop and Flash user).

The other thing, which is worse, is that the program seems to crash a lot.

I'll do some more testing and give you guys a review in detail later.

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Axure For Mac Is On The Way

Axure is reportedly working on an Apple OS version of their famed prototyping software. They have set up a web site about the matter at http://www.axureformac.com/.

No news about a beta release date yet, though.

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Customer Independence

Have you ever read The Cluetrain Manifesto? If not, do so, soon. It is an amazing book about the workings of the new marketplace. Or should I say "old market place" since the Manifesto will soon celebrate its ten year anniversary?

One of the co-authors of the book, Doc Searls, is still looking into customer independence and vendor engagement. In fact he has a entire blog on the subject over at Project VRM Blog

There among other interesting entries on the subject of vendor-customer relationship you'll find Searl's stab at a Declaration of Customer Independence:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all customers are born free, that they are endowed by the market with innate abilities to relate, to converse and to transact — on their own terms, and in their own ways. When sellers have labored long and hard to restrict those freedoms, and to ignore and insult the capacities enjoyed naturally by customers — by speaking, for example, of “capturing,” “acquiring,” “retaining,” “locking in” and otherwise “owning” customers as if they were slaves [...] it is the right of customers to obsolete the coercive systems to which both sellers and customers have become accustomed. We will do this by providing ourselves with new tools for leveraging our native powers, for the good of ourselves and sellers alike."

Go read more on Searl's blog.

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Why Wire Frames Need Design

UX professionals shouldn't be afraid of stepping on the toes of web designers! That is the message from Stephen Turberk over at UX'ers home turf Boxes And Arrows.

Turbek recounts how a black and white wireframe can often alienate it's audience because it is so far from looking like the real thing. This is especially a problem when conducting usability tests with wireframes, writes Turbek:

"Visual affordances, such as color and underlining links are key to using a site, and these cues make a significant difference in a usability test. Users cannot confidently predict how they would use a page if they don’t recognize links or can’t read what the page expects them to."

I tend to agree with Turbek and see a necessity for including such basic elements as logos,  brand colors and some graphics when wireframing. Otherwise the person or group who are giving feedback will be too far removed from the onset. Over time this practice has landed me quite a few comments from both UX colleagues and web designers who think I have stepped over the line. It seems to be the common perception that wireframes ought to be toned down - invisible almost! 

Like me, Stephen Turbek doesn't think so and puts it this way:

"Just because project teams understand the purpose of wire frames, that doesn’t mean everyone will. Similar to listening to someone sing out loud to his iPod: we only hear the singing, while the person hears the whole orchestra. Likewise, the test subject knows only that “the page isn’t going to look like what they see,” but what they see is all they have to react to."

Eloquently put!

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Voyeurism and luggage

Lost some luggage when traveling and never got it back?

Well, chances are that your suitcase got auctioned off, when the airline couldn't get it back to you.

But all is not lost. Here comes the web to save the day. Someone actually goes to these lost luggage-auctions buy the suitcases, opens them, photographs every single item within, and puts the pics on the web at  isthisyourluggage.com.

The whole thing is kinda weird and the site owner also admits that he/she possesses a "strange voyeuristic passion." But when you visit the site you realize that the photographs of strange peoples' clothes actually also speaks to the mini-voyeur within you.

Tip of the hat to Techcrunch for the story.

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Grid Or No Grid

Admit it. It can often be a quite boring experience to surf the many business sites on the web. They are all just so damn predictable using the same table-like grid design in communicating their messages.

The question is if there couldn't be others more diverse and effective ways of reaching the intended audience, design-wise.

Over at A List Apart web standards advocate and author Molly E. Holzsclag has some interesting thoughts on this topic. She basically concludes that web designers have not yet learned to design for the web!

"What we’re just beginning to understand—particularly those of us who come to CSS layouts after years of working with tables—is that the visual model for CSS is far more conducive to breaking out of the grid and designing for discrete, semantic elements."