All posts from
May 2003

Usability Engineering Team

Added on 28 May 2003 Peter Bogaards
“The Usability Engineering Team provides consultation and support for software development teams to ensure that the software they create is easy to learn, easy to use and less costly to develop and maintain. We believe in following a User-Centered Design process that actively involves the users during all phases of the project. We are committed to providing highly effective interface designs that save time, save money and allow users to be more productive. We firmly believe in “making technology work for people.” – (NASA) – courtesy of iaslash

The Sociobiology of Information Architecture

Added on 27 May 2003 Peter Bogaards
“(…) the practice of information architecture remains primarily an institutional endeavor, driven by the needs of corporations, governments, and educational institutions. Today’s information architects are the heirs of yesterday’s scribes, clerks, and clerics: laboring to acquire, store, and disseminate knowledge for the sake of humanity, but ultimately in the service of institutions.” – (Alex Wright – Boxes and Arrows)

Design Rationale

Added on 23 May 2003 Peter Bogaards
“Even with advanced design tools, the design process typically produces a description of the desired artifact, but leaves little or no indication of the design rationale. We end up knowing what was designed, but often have no idea why it is the way it is, what motivated the particular design, what alternatives were considered and rejected, etc.” – (MIT Artificial Intelligence Lab) – courtesy of purse lip square jaw

Designers’ Roles in Communicating with Users

Added on 23 May 2003 Peter Bogaards
“From the users’ perspective, their experience is continuous. Your website, their browser, their computer, their immediate environment, and their life all interact and feed back on one another. What they understand affects not just what they can accomplish, but what attracts them to the product, and what attracts them to a product affects how willing they are to understand it. If a site is visually attractive, they may be more motivated to expend extra effort to understand and use it. If they feel it’s easy to use, maybe they’ll be motivated to use it more often.” – (Ann Light – Usability News)

Exploring Content Management

Added on 22 May 2003 Peter Bogaards
“For many, content management is a web-related term, referring primarily to the written content published on a website or stored within a related database. For others, content management is an extension of traditional document management services, the digital capturing of paper and virtual documents for standardized storage and retrieval.” – (Dirk Knemeyer – Thread Inc.)

CHI 2003: New Horizons, But What Are They?

Added on 21 May 2003 Peter Bogaards
“Yes, this was a ‘business CHI’ – despite, or perhaps because, of all the cross-cultural and emotional ballyhoo. The scientists were not at the front desk, but the designers – designers of enjoyable products, ranging from funny mobile phones and Alessi lemon squeezers to smart and ‘intelligent’ cars. Did they talk about computer programs? I can’t remember…” – (Gerd Waloszek – SAP Design Guild)