All posts about
User experience

User experience is about how a person feels about using a product, system or service. (source: Wikipedia)

The Promise of Using UI Patterns for Large Software Packages Revisited

Added on 26 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“In this case study, we reflect on how a UI pattern-based design for building standard business software affects the user experience and the user-centered design process. We learned that pattern-based design does not optimize the user experience per se. Additional factors, such as user-centered design, prototyping tools, and management support determine the success or failure of the pattern-based approach. Interweaving the factors in the right way is a prerequisite for success.” (Annette Stotz and Udo Arend – SAPDesignGuild)

Intentional Communication: Expanding our Definition of User Experience Design

Added on 26 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“Design and content. Content and design. It’s impossible (and stupid) to argue over which one is more important than the other – which should come first, which is more difficult or ‘strategic’. They need each other to provide context, meaning, information, and instruction in any user experience (UX).” (Kristina Halvorson – interactions XVII.3)

Industry trends in prototyping

Added on 20 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“Prototypes are meant to be a cost-effective way of experimenting with ideas. They are generally considered part of the pre-planning phase, rather than part of the construction or manufacturing process that results in the final product—although obviously the discoveries made during the process of prototyping should ultimately both inform and shape the construction process.” (Dave Cronin ~ Cooper)

Ubiquitous Service Design

Added on 19 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“Decades later, these concepts remain relevant, and yet we must adapt for new contexts. As Glushko and Tabas explain, today’s service systems may include interrelated sub-systems (e.g., person-to-person, self-service) across multiple locations, devices, and channels; and customer satisfaction is influenced by the extent of integration and consistency across those channels.” (Peter Morville ~ Semantic Studios)

CHI 2010: Growing the UX Management Community

Added on 19 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“As User Experience matures as a discipline and grows in influence in the business community, UX leaders need to support one another by sharing their insights with their counterparts in other organizations, as well as with the educators molding the next generation of UX leaders at universities offering Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) programs. Indeed, the success of UX design and research initiatives within organizations depends significantly on how UX leaders position their teams and partner and build support with other senior leaders in their organizations.” (Jim Nieters ~ UXmatters)

The Process Police

Added on 19 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“No process guarantees success. If there were a process that guaranteed happy users everyone would be using it. Nobody gets it right every time. Design doesn’t work like that. It’s iterative, responsive, ever-changing. You have to react as much as plan. You have to change your process on the fly to react to the marketplace. That’s why we need to optimize for what’s most important, a happy user, and do whatever it takes to make it happen, process be damned.” (52 Weeks of UX)

IA Summit 10: Whitney Hess Keynote

Added on 16 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“In her keynote closing the 2010 IA Summit, Whitney asks if our work is just our job or our passion. To really make the difference we seek, our practice needs to be our calling. The UX community is united because of a common mission: We empower people to become self-reliant and more resourceful, organized, social, and relaxed. We don’t do it for them, they do it for themselves.” (Jeff Parks – Boxes and Arrows)

The perils of persuasion

Added on 16 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“The success of UCD has sustained demand for user experience design skills, and the land rush has continued in 2010. UX is becoming a cookie cutter add-on for digital agencies and I rarely meet a web designer now who doesn’t claim UX proficiency, although not all can articulate what that means. And it’s not just the designers: I also see back-end developers, SEO professionals and marketers rapidly appending these two magical letters to their CVs.” (Cennydd Bowles)

Using a Collaborative Parallel Design Process

Added on 5 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“Genetic algorithms essentially mimic evolutionary biology to find optimal solutions. Initially, they select a population of solutions based on some evaluation criteria, then use some subset of that population—the fittest members—as breeding stock for the subsequent generation of solutions. This process continues for multiple generations, each getting closer to an optimal solution. This article describes my experience with parallel design and discusses how to make parallel design more collaborative.” (Mike Myles – UXmatters)

Service design goes mainstream

Added on 1 April 2010 Peter Bogaards
“Reading with interest an unfolding flameup at Design for Service caused by Jeff Howard’s post entitled UX Rockstars need not apply. The gist of the conversation is a few folk getting all hot under the collar about disciplines and domains. Especially the emerging challenges in the US by this new fangled idea of Service Design and it seems to be freaking people out. Which is a good thing in my book. The argument was instigated by sweeping statement from an interview with Jesse James Garret of Adaptive Path, that went like this (…)” (Paul Sims – Made by Many)

Case study: Agile and UCD working together

Added on 31 March 2010 Peter Bogaards
“Large scale websites require groups of specialists to design and develop a product that will be a commercial success. To develop a completely new site requires several teams to collaborate and this can be difficult. Particularly as different teams may be working with different methods. This case study shows how the ComputerWeekly user experience team integrated with an agile development group. It’s important to note the methods we used do not guarantee getting the job done. People make or break any project. Finding and retaining good people is the most important ingredient for success.” (James Kelway – Boxes and Arrows)

Leonard Cohen versus Jesse James Garrett

Added on 26 March 2010 Peter Bogaards
“I think we should be called information architects and that it’s easier to talk about IA with people outside our field in terms of A than to talk with them about UXD in terms of X or D. Mr. Garrett thinks we are now and have always been user experience designers, that UXD is easier for muggles to understand, and that those of us who specialize in and choose the titles of IA or IxD are either fools or liars.” (Dan Klyn – Wildly Appropriate)