Ideas

=Ideas= //A place to post ideas about user experience, interaction, information and graphic design.// toc

**DECIDE Framework**
//Overview of Techniques//
 * observing users
 * asking users about their opinions
 * asking experts about their opinions
 * testing the performance of users
 * modeling the task performance of users

//__D__etermine the Goals// o Identify the best metaphor on which to base the design. o Check to ensure that the final interface is consistent. o Investigate how technology affects working practices. o Improve the usability of an existing product.
 * What are the high-level goals of the evaluation?
 * Who wants it and why?
 * The goals influence the paradigm for the study
 * Some examples of goals:

//__E__xplore the Questions// - What are customers’ attitudes to these new tickets? - Are they concerned about security? - Is the interface for obtaining them poor?
 * All evaluations need goals & questions to guide them so time is not wasted on ill-defined studies.
 * For example, the goal of finding out why many customers prefer to purchase paper airline tickets rather than e-tickets can be broken down into sub-questions:
 * What questions might you ask about the design of a cell phone?

//__C__hoose the Evaluation Paradigm & Techniques// o E.g. field studies do not involve testing or modeling
 * The evaluation paradigm strongly influences the techniques used, how data is analyzed and presented.

//__I__dentify Practical Issues// o select users o stay on budget o staying on schedule o find evaluators o select equipment
 * For example, how to:

//__D__ecide on Ethical Issues// - know the goals of the study - what will happen to the findings - privacy of personal information - not to be quoted without their agreement - leave when they wish - be treated politely
 * Develop an informed consent form
 * Participants have a right to:

//__E__valuate, Interpret and Present Data// - Reliability: can the study be replicated? - Validity: is it measuring what you thought? - Biases: is the process creating biases? - Scope: can the findings be generalized? - Ecological validity: is the environment of the study influencing it + e.g. Hawthorn effect
 * How data is analyzed and presented depends on the paradigm and techniques used.
 * The following also need to be considered:

Blueprint
[|Blueprint] is a CSS framework that provides an easy-to-use grid for web designs.

The Elements of Typographic Style Applied to the Web
[|The Elements of Typographic Style Applied to the Web]. It applies the principles of general good typography and uses CSS to achieve it for the web. A good reference to use on how to format the type for your site.

Periodic Table of Visualization Methods
[|Periodic Table of Visualization Methods] takes a look at all the different ways that different types of information can be organized, ranging from statistical data to showing of processes.

Infosthetics
[|Information Aeshetics] is a bookmarking tool for infographics and various visualization methods.

Interaction Design Patterns
[|Welie.com] has a library of user interface patterns based on user needs, application needs, and context of the site. It references examples while explaining the problem and solution, as well as when, how, and why you should use it. The site is a great resource for thinking about how users can interact with the site and determining which functions are appropriate.

Information Design Patterns
Web site: http://interface.fh-potsdam.de/infodesignpatterns/news.php Explores patterns and various ways of presenting information on the web. They provide examples for each approach. I

Adaptive Path
An audio interview with [|Peter Merholz], President and Co-founder of [|Adaptive Path.] media type="custom" key="3456510"

The Future of Image Search
[|Video lecture] with accompanying slides by Jitendra Malik, UC Berkeley, University of California. Analyzes the current image searching, and suggests potential ideas that could work. media type="custom" key="3460158"

What's First and Topmost, and Why it Matters
//Excerpt from __The Practical Guide to Information Design__ by Ronnie Lipton// We also tend to see what comes first, such as what's at the top on a filled printed page as more important than what comes after. So on a manual or newsletter page, for example, put the headline or title and the most important story first, where readers expect to find it. ... Faced with a text-packed page, people whose native language reads left to right tend to start at the upper left. Then we make our way as quickly as we can to the lower right of the page or spread in a kind of backwards N-shape. So place text along that natural eye path, because text generally takes the most motivation and effort for readers to follow. Save the lesser-traveled paths of the upper right and lower left corners for artwork, for which readers are more likely to go out of their way.

The upper-left starting spot also seems to apply to news Web sites, according to the 2004 Eyetrack III study by the Poynter Institute, the Estlow Center for Journalism and New Media at the University of Denver, and Eyetools. Although eye flow varies by what's on the page, the researchers found, eyes tend to start at the upper left before venturing to the right, then down. Eyes go first to big headlines and favored text, not photos. (But on the printed newspaper page, eyes stop first on the photos, according to the first Eyetrack study fourteen years earlier, which looked only printed newspapers.)

But findings differ because tests do (more proof of the risks in trying to apply other people's test to your situations). Janice Redish and other have found evidence of what's been called "banner blindness" in Web site viewers. She cites findings from eye-tracking studies and her own usability tests that show that people tend to enter towards the upper middle of a page, where they expect the content to begin. Why not left middle? There we expect to see "colored stuff (maybe ads or photos) that isn't content," she says. The apparent contradiction might stem from different types of Web site studied: news sites versus sites readers enter to do a task, such as download a passport application or register for a class.

What We Remember (All We Recall)
//Excerpt from __The Practical Guide to Information Design__ by Ronnie Lipton// We keep four chunks of information in short-term memory at a time (some researchers say as many as seven chunks, others as few as three). Retention and accuracy decrease as the number of chunks increases. Test it yourself: See whether and for how long you can recall a new phone number without writing it down. And unless you commit that phone number to long-term memory, you'll quickly replace it with the next contender for the space. (A TV spot for a breath mint built its premise on the limits of short-term memory: A woman writes her phone number in her breath's mist on a subway car window for a man she likes, but he misses the message because he doesn't have a pen and paper, unlike men around him, who eagerly take notes.)

Content that's grouped into logical subdivisions aids both perception and retention. That's why an office equipment catalog would group all lamps under one heading and all chairs under another, maybe with subsets under each category (desk or floor lamps, chairs with arms or wheels).

Another possible aid to retention is color in or near emphasized items. Just realize that type in color might have less contrast–and thus less legibility–than black type. Putting color near the type adds the memory-enhancing benefit of color without sacrificing legibility.

Also use well-placed, adequate space and contrast to help readers recall the content. It follows that the same clutter in the frame of prominence of the background that keeps readers from focusing on something will also keep them from remembering it.

Article on [|Mashups: The new breed of web app]
(2006) //Excerpt from said article by Duane Merrill// "Mashups are an exciting genre of interactive Web applications that draw upon content retrieved from external data sources to create entirely new and innovative services. They are a hallmark of the second generation of Web applications informally known as Web 2.0. This introductory article explores what it means to be a mashup, the different classes of popular mashups constructed today, and the enabling technologies that mashup developers leverage to create their applications. Additionally, you'll see many of the emerging technical and social challenges that mashup developers face."

E Roon Kang and Wii Remote Hack
A really lovely interactive new media installation piece! [|Write up soon!]

Bill Buxton : Design Experiences
media type="custom" key="3708067" When searching about User Testing and I found some videos about Bill Buxton. In the fall semester of Information Architecture we talk about Bill Buxton for a bit, about prototyping and sketching. This video was enlightenting in how people perceive the design/system.