User-Centered Design for Fully Mobile Devices

Added on 16 November 2004 Peter Bogaards
“This paper introduces a lot of taxonomies to help understand different form-factors and mobile usage contexts. It is arguing for the application of a User Centered Design process for mobile devices, and presumably within IBM. They strongly differentiate the differences with Fully Mobile Wirelessly Connected (FMWC) devices. A number of examples of UCD activities are given. In particular the effects of context are shown with examples and the need for task-analysis that includes the surrounding activities is promoted.” (Mobile Community Design)

The Sphere of Design

Added on 15 November 2004 Peter Bogaards
“The web design community thankfully seems to be wrapping up the ‘design vs. usability’ argument. In case you missed it, the conclusion was: ‘Not either/or but both, and it depends.’ Design leaders have proved that web sites can be both usable and beautiful, but we lack a vocabulary to talk about this new standard. The question now is not ‘Which is most important?’, but ‘How do we deliver what’s most important?’ This article introduces the ‘Sphere of Design’, which is a simple conceptual model that illustrates the relationship and trade-offs between ‘looks’ and ‘works’.” (Ben Hunt – Scratchmedia)

Setting the scope for light-weight Web-based applications

Added on 15 November 2004 Peter Bogaards
Unfinished version of an essay on ‘Web applications’. – “The light-weight, Web-based applications (‘webapps’) of this essay are small, platform-independent programs that are downloaded on demand and execute inside a client program, such as a browser. They are thus like Java applets, but more ‘script-like’ than ‘program-like’ and therefore easier to write in many cases (though harder in others). They have a clearly separated user interface, that allows webapps to be easily adapted to different devices.” (Bert Bos – The W3C Workshop on Web Applications and Compound Documents Position Papers)

S1000D: International Specification for Technical Publications utilising a Common Source DataBase

Added on 15 November 2004 Peter Bogaards
“This specification has been produced to establish standards for the documentation of any civil or military vehicle or equipment. It is based on international standards such as SGML/XML and CGM for production and use of electronic documentation. In addition, it defines a Common Source Data Base (CSDB) to provide source information for compilation of the publications and for use in electronic logistics information systems to deliver modules of information direct to the user.”

Science in the Making: Understanding Generative Research Now!

Added on 13 November 2004 Peter Bogaards
A conversation with Liz Sanders and GK VanPatter – “So much of what is talked about today under the name of co-designing or human-centered innovation is still based on the expert-driven model. Informed ethnography is just not enough to support human-centered innovation. Participatory design practices together with an attitude adjustment are needed. Experts design for people. In the future we will be designing and innovating with people, not just for them.” (NextD Journal)

The End of Usability Culture

Added on 11 November 2004 Peter Bogaards
“Usability culture has unquestionably made the Web a much more usable place. Given the way the Web generally worked just five years ago, the role of usability and related disciplines to the evolution of the Web was vital. But usability culture has steered the Web development ship long enough. It’s time for a new approach. To understand the urgent nature of making that shift, we need to understand how we got where we are today.” (Dirk Knemeyer – Digital Web Magazine)

Topic Maps: The Inventor’s Perspective on Subject-based Access

Added on 11 November 2004 Peter Bogaards
“Starting in 1992, Michel Biezunski and Steven R. Newcomb created, named, standardized and pioneered the application of the Topic Maps paradigm. Biezunski and Newcomb serve as co-editors of the ISO 13250 Topic Maps standard. They also co-founded TopicMaps.Org, where they co-edited the XML syntax (the ‘XTM Specification’) that was added to the 2002 version of the standard.” (Luminary Lectures – Library of Congress) – courtesy of peter van dijck

Oops! They Forgot the Usability: Elections as a Case Study PDF Logo

Added on 9 November 2004 Peter Bogaards
“An election is a perfect usability case study. It bring together large numbers of diverse voters, an unfamiliar interface and an outcome that shapes the future of our society. With such a seeming simple task, usability was not on the curriculum for elections officials. However, despite the focus on technology and security, it was poor information design and usability in the 2000 Palm Beach ballot that taught us all new words like ‘chad’ (hanging or pregnant).” (Whitney Quesenbery)

Design to Research: It Takes a Team, and Atoms are Better Than Bits

Added on 8 November 2004 Peter Bogaards

Presentation – “This show-and-tell session describes the results of combining three points of view: (1) It is useful to manage design projects as a collaborative work of “translating research into design. (2) It is useful to manage the design process not as a series of activities, but as a chain of milestone artifacts, each of which requires collaboration by the whole team to complete. (3) Collaboration is better, and therefore translation better accomplished, when the milestone documents are created in large-scale physical form using walls, paper, ink, tacks and glue, rather than digital form.” (Marc Rettig – about, with and for) – courtesy of louise ferguson