Pixel Handler

5/4/2009

Jeffrey Zeldman on Redesign, session 1

Be a strategic design partner, or else you will not influence the design ...do the research. —@Zeldman

Showing your strategy and flexing your authority...

• For navigation, use cards and ask the the client, or test group to put the cards in order.
• Use creative ways to focus on the user by creating visuals
  of your personas, carboard figures that you can address
  questions too. What would "Mac" want to see on the
  home page?
• Make your design solution work for the user's needs.
• Use a 'Content Stragegy'
  document and include an executive summary, to remind the client
  what is important with reguard to the site contents.
• Jeff uses an method to keep the conversations open, "Alzeimers
  Method" - dropping breadcrumbs or gentle reminders of
  previous conversations or the client's needs.
• Be sure to convey the meaning of design, talk about why
  the decisions were made, indicating what the client communicated
  was important.
• Handle criticism, go back to the user for the resolution.
  How will the user react?
• Jeff is happy to use pixels again instead of measuring layouts in ems; thanks to browser zoom.

Design is like music, when you (or the clients) see it you
say, "yeah that's us" or "no that's not us." —@Zeldman

Eric Meyer on Redesign of AnEventApart.com, session 2

My fingers start to itch to code it, is id done? —@Meyerweb

Comments from the CSS guru

• I still care about Internet Explorer 6, if my visitors use
  it.
• Minimize IE hacks no need to use separate stylesheet, *
  html, *+html, etc.
• It's ok to like margins again, when it comes to layout.
• Sometimes you may want to run CSS thru server side code,
  e.g. PHP
• Image replacement for lead-in graphics using <h1> element
• Push the limits with mark-up and style but roll back to
  what works and is accessible (HTML 5 / CSS 3)
• Some emerging concepts, microformats - hcalendar, may not
  be accessible so don't worry about using it now
• Eric Doesn't agree with Jeff on pixels, still uses ems for
  fonts (no universal page zoom for ems yet)

Balancing complexity– "I can make the markup more complex,
or I can make the CSS more complex, minimize complexity for
maximum gain (bandwidth wins)." —@Meyerweb

"Presentation never trumps semantics... well hardly ever." —@Meyerweb

Ethan Marcotte – Comps vs. Code, session 3

Lots of little leaps of faith. —Ethan (Airbag)

Ethan spoke about the redesign of W3C and fluid width (grid
based) layout. He used the same formula we use for em font
sizing. Target divided by Context (parent) equals Percentage/width
(use the long decimal value, let the browser truncate)

Advice from Ethan:

• Designers should share important features with developers
  early on.
• Learn from your mistakes
• Use: Son of suckerfish dropdown (CSS) menu
• When changing hands, communicate the details, this is where
  they are usually lost.
• Transitions in the process: Discovery > Design > Development
  > Delivery
• Focus on good typography not sexy graphics and hey-hey.
• Their is a difference between client-ready and coder-ready
  (comps or wireframes)
• Process should include designer review and developer reviews
• Communicate the details in whatever method works for you,
  but do it.

Fluid layout examples:

• vitabit
• clearleft
• simplebits
• search "fluild layout" on AListApart.com
• NYmag

Luke Wrobleski – Web Form Design, session 4

Forms suck. —@LukeWDesign

Luke spoke about best practices for form design and a clear
path to completion based on vast user research data working
at Yahoo

Question we should anwer for our users:

1. What do I need to fill in here?
2. Why do you need my ... email/username, etc.?
3. How can you help me

The form shouldn't be your master, you will control your
own destiny. —@LukeWDesign

Tara Hunt – Social Capital Equals Whuffie, session 5

You can either fake marketing with whufflie or realize that
the new marketing is whuffie. —@Missrouge

Five principals for raising whuffie http://slideshare.net/missrouge

1. Create amazing customer experiences
2. Throwing sheep
3. Lighten up
4. Embrace the chaos
5. Find your higher purpose

Connections plus time equals trust. —@Missrouge

Measuring your whuffie : Zipcar, Rating6, ScoutLabs

Kristina Halverson – Content First,
session 6

Content is not a feature. —@Halverson BrainTraffic.com

Content Strategy plans for the creation, publication and governance
of the content; everything on the web, text, data, info,
audio, video, etc. She swore everyone in with the statement,
"I will never again say launch, I will say lifecycle". She
advocated that we fight for quality content that is useful,
usable and enjoyable. She encouraged that web writers ask
journalistic questions; content demands resources and processes
to match up business objectives with user's needs.

Kristina's examples:

• Good: Mint.com
• Bad: Quicken.com

Jared Spool – User Interface Engineering, session 7

Ratio of reviewers to purchases is 1:1,300 – thanks the lunatic
fringe. —@JMSpool
uie.com/brainsparks

Revealing design treasures from the Amazon

• Great content strategy!
• Vote for reviews, "Was this helpful?"
• Button, "most helpful first"
• Don't be afraid of new ideas (goldbox hey buy this stuff!
  or diamond selecting tool)
• Redesign is a bad idea, simple changes overtime (iteration)
• Facebook redesign, 97% of users didn't like it
• Never forget about the business
• Amazon can make money selling iPods at cost, looks like
  a loss but with 'negative operating cycle' they use 'cash
  float'. Most resellers order very 45 days, Amazon depletes
  inventory in 20 days.
• Fun: 'Playmobile security checkpoint' & 'Tuscan Whole Milk'

Goal Time vs. Tool Time

Gloal Time:

When the user is improving the outcome of the experience

Tool Time:

When the user is moving forward with improving the outcome of the experience