“(…) addresses the critical area of 3D user interface design – a field that seeks to answer detailed questions that make the difference between a 3D system that is usable and efficient and one that causes user frustration, errors, and even physical discomfort. The authors present practical information for developers, the latest research results, easy-to-follow guidelines for the UI designer, and relevant application examples. While there are quite a few books devoted to user interfaces in general and to 2D user interface design in particular, 3D user interfaces have received significantly less attention.” (Doug A. Bowman et al.) – courtesy of nooface

“The world can be divided into two basic categories: people who like chocolate, and people who like gummies. Chocolate is serious, sexy, and secretive. Gummies are fruity, cheerful, and transparent. Whereas chocolates are often shaped as simple cubes, bars, and domes, gummies masquerade as worms, sharks, strawberries, coke bottles, teddy bears, cartoon characters, and more. Gummies promise a bright world of postmodern illusion, while chocolates imply a dark modernist sublime. It looks like the gummy people were behind the visual design of Apple’s OS X.” (Ellen Lupton – Voice: AIGA Journal of Design)

“The manner in which files are visually organized, all according to the popular desktop metaphor, concur with conditions applicable twenty years ago. Over time, these conditions, technical as well as user oriented ones, have radically changed. The desktop metaphor has not. This article is an offspring of personal reflections over too much time being spent traversing file structures and organizing windows in the user interfaces of today’s modern operating systems.” (Christian Lagerkvist) – courtesy of nooface

A 80 mins. video of Jef Raskin’s talk entitled ‘What’s wrong with the state of interface design today?’ – Make sure you have the proper codec. (Microsoft Multi-University/Research Laboratory) – courtesy of vuk cosic

“Welcome to an exciting new development in our organization: an interactive Bulletin Web Site. You not only can read about the latest developments at SIGCHI you can participate in those developments via discussions, letters to the editor, and your own articles. Likewise, articles can be read on line, printed out or sent via e-mail.” (ACM SIGCHI)

“These guidelines are intended to help guide you through the obstacles that confront Mac OS X developers. They cover different aspects of the design process and offers tips on how you can use Mac OS X features effectively in your design.” (Apple Developer) – courtesy of vanderwal

“The lack of focus on user interface design causes users to prefer proprietary software’s more intuitive interface. Open Source software tends to lack the complete and accessible documentation that retains users. Developers focus on features in their software, rather than ensuring that they have a solid core. (…) If Open Source software wishes to become widely used and embraced by the general public, all issues will have to be overcome.” (Michelle Levesque – First Monday 9.4)

“Various styles for writing use cases are presented with examples and discussions of their relative advantages and disadvantages, particularly their consequences for user interface design and software usability. Essential use cases, a variant employed within usage-centered design, are contrasted with conventional use cases and scenarios. For the most efficient support of user interface design and particularly for large, complex projects, a highly-structured form of use case has evolved. New narrative elements and relationships among use cases are introduced. These include means for expressing partial or flexible ordering of interaction, relationships with business rules, as well as a clarification of the often misunderstood concept of extension that recognizes two distinct forms: synchronous and asynchronous extensions.” (Constantine & Lockwood, Ltd.) – courtesy of guuui

“Overly complex interfaces significantly impact usability and must be avoided. While there are plenty of studies researching this issue and plenty of data to point to how complexity hurts a product, in order to truly address the root of problem, designers must understand where complexity originates.” (Design by Fire)

“We present a new tangible interface platform for manipulating discrete pieces of abstract information, which attempts to combine the benefits of each of these two alternatives into a single system. We developed interaction techniques and an example application for organizing conference papers.” (The Open Video Project)

Four designers share their (re)visions (Wired) – courtesy of lawrence lee

“(..) a program for GNU/linux that enables users to specify any kind of action in a very uniform way, with an artificial intelligence that aids you while you are composing the action, by showing you only the relevant options. segusoLand features a completely new user interaction paradigm called ‘reciprocal list narrowing’. You won’t find it anywhere else. Some people would call segusoLand a ‘desktop environment’, some a ‘file manager”, some a “start menu’ … it is difficult to classify it because it is quite innovative.” (Maurizio Colucci – segusoLand) – courtesy of nooface

“My answer is: It’s a craft that takes its wisdom from science, its inspiration from art and the design disciplines, its possibilities and limitations from software technology and corporate culture, and its directions — ideally — from the users.” (Gerd Waloszek – SAP Design Guild) – courtesy of ben hyde

“Yo — this is an OK/Cancel exclusive; for the first time in history: HCI and hiphop together. For your educational pleasure; now check this while I wreck with some buttons and levers; give me 10 seconds and I’ll start this endeavor” (Tom Chi and KC – OK/Cancel) – courtesy of design by fire

“Twenty years ago, Pacifica resident Jef Raskin was a 40-year-old software designer and writer for Apple Computers. He was also a cutting-edge thinker, (he still is, by the way), who imagined a world of connected computers providing infinite bits of information to people sitting at home in front of user-friendly machines. He imagined those machines would be named after his favorite fruit – the Macintosh apple, and that they would have a very simple, graphic interface; designed to be used the way humans think and work, not the way machines do.” (Chris Hunter – Pacifica Tribune) – courtesy of lawrence lee

“The interface between humans and computers still suffers from many deficiencies. Multimodal systems using multibiometric elements, multimodal interfaces and multisensor systems are beginning to alleviate many of them.” (Juan C. Dürsteler – Inf@Vis!)

“Consistency is one of the golden rules of interface design. There can be no question about this. It’s important on many levels. When applied effectively in a design, consistency creates a foundation for a user to interact with the product in a predictable manner. Consistency creates usage patterns, offering users the opportunity to succeed in the face of an unknown feature encountered for the first time.” (Andrei Michael Herasimchuk – Design by Fire)

“Project Looking Glass is being created to work with the Solaris and Linux desktop environments using Java technology. When completed, it will work alongside applications designed for a 2D window system, without application modifications.” (SUN Microsystems) – courtesy of nooface

“(…) I certainly believe more than ever that there is room for those with qualifications and experience of customer centred design principles in the position of Analyst. However, finding those with the power and faith to appoint these people to an analyst position will continue to be a difficult task.” (David N. Clarke – Usability News)