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The 2008 Bad Usability calendar is here!
Matt / January 29, 2008, 6:32 pm
Multitasking slows you down
Matt / January 28, 2008, 5:58 pm
You may have seen this linked in several other places already: “The Autumn of the Multitaskers”:
This is the great irony of multitasking—that its overall goal, getting more done in less time, turns out to be chimerical. In reality, multitasking slows our thinking. It forces us to chop competing tasks into pieces, set them in different piles, then hunt for the pile we’re interested in, pick up its pieces, review the rules for putting the pieces back together, and then attempt to do so, often quite awkwardly. (Fact, and one more reason the bubble will pop: A brain attempting to perform two tasks simultaneously will, because of all the back-and-forth stress, exhibit a substantial lag in information processing.)
This idea isn’t new, but it’s always good to have incorrect conventional thinking challenged. Think of all the different ways software interrupts and asks you to multitask: IM conversations, Outlook & Gmail email notifications, not to mention temptations to interrupt yourself such as RSS readers or, uh… posting to the company blog.
37signals wrote a good post awhile back about the productivity benefits of disconnecting.
Lettering Grows in Brooklyn
Caleb / January 26, 2008, 3:23 pm
For all you typophiles out there, Paul Shaw, a calligrapher and typographer highlights the dying hand-lettering of Brooklyn. I’m partial to the ones in Greenpoint (mostly cause of my GP pride), but the things he has to say about Havemeyer and other parts of Williamsburg are nice too. (via laugharn)
The CMS Myth
Matt / January 24, 2008, 12:22 pm
This looks like a good one to add to your RSS reader.
The CMS Myth strongly believes in the power of web CMS to be a key enabler for achieving online success. We recommend and deliver web CMS systems every day. Done right, a web CMS can be the nucleus of your web strategy and lift up all of your online marketing initiatives.
Yet for every “market leading” CMS, for every brilliant online strategy and web application, there’s a misguided effort or an ill-conceived approach ready to derail your web initiative. The goal of The CMS Myth is to help you avoid those landmines.
A couple of recent posts from their blog:
Found via InfoDesign
Feltron 2007 Annual Report
Matt / January 17, 2008, 6:05 pm
Linked from this post on Adaptive Path’s blog: Feltron 2007 Annual Report. It’s a personal year-end review, visualized and designed instead of written.
When programmers leave their desk…
Mike / January 17, 2008, 9:47 am
…and get politically involved, you wind up with this.
Account sign-in mistakes to avoid
Matt / January 14, 2008, 11:28 am
From Jared Spool’s excellent webiste, User Interface Engineering. Check out the links for detailed descriptions of each mistake:
Account Sign-in: 8 Design Mistakes to Avoid
- Having a Sign-in In The First Place
- Requiring Sign-in Too Soon
- Not Stating the Benefits to Registering
- Hiding the Sign-In Button
- Not Making “Create New Account” or “Forgot Your Password” a Button or Link
- Not Providing Sign-in Opportunities at Key Locations
- Asking for Too Much Information When Registering
- Not Telling Users How You’ll Use Their Information
8 More Design Mistakes with Account Sign-in
- Not Telling Users the Requirements for Username and Password Up Front
- Requiring Stricter Password Requirements Than The NSA
- Using Challenge Questions They Won’t Remember In A Year
- Not Returning Users to Their Desired Objective
- Not Explaining If It’s The Username or Password They Got Wrong
- Not Putting A Register Link When The Sign-In Is An Error
- Not Giving the User A Non-email Solution To Recover Their Password
- Requiring More Than One Element When Recovering Password
new keyboard
Caleb / January 8, 2008, 3:30 pm
From the makers of the optimus maximus keyboard, comes the optimus tactus
I don’t really know if I would be able to type comfortably without the click, but I would get a kick out of being able to change everything on my keyboard. This whole touch screen thing is really just getting out of hand.
at least the price of the maximus is down to under $500
Pagination examples and good practices
Matt / January 7, 2008, 1:33 pm
A supplement to a conversation that has come up a couple of times: Pagination Gallery: Examples and Good Practices
The author lists seven keys to good pagination:
- Provide large clickable areas
- Don’t use underlines
- Identify the current page
- Space out page links
- Provide Previous and Next links
- Use First and Last links (where applicable)
- Put First and Last links on the outside
There are tons of screenshots of both good and bad pagination, which makes this a great reference.
