May 2012
1 post
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The Shape of Design
A subset of the Foreward in a book I’m currently reading:
In that way, this book is not unlike a more ubiquitous tool and platform, the U.S. Interstate Highway System. Today, we take it for granted, mostly, but its numbering system at one point had to be designed. At a time when telephone poles lined dirt trails, Bureau of Public Roads employee Edwin W. James and committee were asked to...
March 2012
2 posts
1 tag
Out With The Old, In With The New
It’s becoming more and more difficult to find time to redesign projects that exist solely out of personal interest. This site, for example, serves no purpose other than to fill a space in the ether with my very own semblance of web presence. Similarly, it becomes more and more difficult (and unnecessary) to administer any form of custom blogging engine.
So it’s all gone (not really).
...
2 tags
Out With The Old, In With The New
It’s becoming more and more difficult to find time to redesign projects that exist solely out of personal interest. This site, for example, serves no purpose other than to fill a space in the ether with my very own semblance of web presence. Similarly, it becomes more and more difficult (and unnecessary) to administer any form of custom blogging engine.
So it’s all gone (not really).
...
February 2012
1 post
3 tags
January 2012
2 posts
2 tags
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December 2011
2 posts
1 tag
The Crazy One's →
A very well-done (and letter pressed) piece of artwork in remembrance of Apple’s core philosophy: Think Different. This refers to the infamous 1997 marketing campaign that started Apple’s march back to the top, led by Steve Jobs. Limited time offer!
And here’s Steve himself, reading his words.
2 tags
October 2011
1 post
1 tag
June 2011
2 posts
3 tags
Google Web Fonts v2 →
Looks great. A definite improvement.
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Enough is Enough →
I absolutely agree, but it’s hard to fathom the process required to get rid of them. The article is dead on, though, enough is enough.
May 2011
10 posts
1 tag
The Designer Designs →
A great response by Andy Rutledge in reaction to a recent 37signals post about designing in the open. As Andy mentioned, I was in agreement with Ryan Singer until he pointed out his solution to “designing in the secret.” Unfortunately, Ryan’s solution leaned toward micromanagement. And to top it off, micromanagement by anyone involved (non-designers included). As most designers...
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The Mythical Fold →
I agree completely, the fold is irrelevant in the traditional sense. Website visitors don’t mind scrolling, and often expect to. However, I still believe it’s important to keep interesting tidbits of a design near the top to give the user reason and desire to stay on the page (and by association, scroll), but maybe that’s a discussion for another time.
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Fight Through The Crap
It’s typical for all designers and creative people to hit a long-lasting wall where nothing they create seems good enough. It’s a defining period of time for a lot of careers, and if you’re going to make it in the design industry, it’s important that you fight through the crap.
Ira Glass puts this in perspective better than anyone else I’ve seen, so I’ll defer...
3 tags
The Instagram Square
All images posted to Instagram must be a squared crop before they can be uploaded. I personally think this was a brilliant move. Here’s why:
Squares are proportionally correct. There are no misalignments or elongated edges.
Forcing a user to choose a cropped square has somewhat of a Dribbble effect in that it demands the most interesting section of the picture.
Squares are predictable in...
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Unsolicited Redesigns →
I often come across sites and interfaces that make me question why something works the way it does, and I’ve often thought it’d be a fun experiment to try and improve that interface myself. But having not been there from the beginning, designing under the same constraints as the original designer(s), I rarely view it as fair or constructive. That doesn’t mean it still can’t...
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And What of Art Direction? →
Readability certainly has its place. But as a designer, I read mostly articles written by other designers, so naturally I enjoy looking at the craft behind the body. I lose this with Readability (along with Instapaper and RSS for that matter).
While Readability works as advertised today, we recognize that reading isn’t just about “data in”. Just as a great article can evoke...
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Design Is Never Done
Iterations are expensive if nothing comes out of them (and yes, sometimes that’s unavoidable). But reminding ourselves that design can (and will) always be updated helps promote a flow of constant improvements, even if they’re not perfect.
I find that asking “Is this an improvement over the last version?” instead of “Is this perfect?” yields a better release...
3 tags
The Current State of HTML5 Forms →
From Wufoo: “A web developer’s quick reference guide detailing today’s browser support for HTML5 form technologies.”
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WatchThis is an interesting approach/idea for an improved iOS notification system, which is arguably one of the big areas where iOS is lacking. The ideas are pretty sound, but I’m not sure I would enjoy all notifications clumped into a single place. For me, an email and a Facebook friend request are on two different priority levels, and I’m not sure it makes sense to treat them as if they...
April 2011
10 posts
2 tags
The Real Thing
Earlier today I watched Mike Matas: A next-generation digital book. If you follow him at all, you’ll know he’s an expert in design and UI, proven through his work on Mac OS and the iPhone. So naturally, before I started the video I expected his vision for digital content to be a good one. I was not disappointed: it was a really good one.
However, as good as the interactions and ideas...
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Cheap Magic →
A great post highlighting the recent Tweetbot app to perhaps get across a bigger point. This section was particularly spot-on:
Great design is tricky. It’s easy to pick apart decisions after an app ships and second-guess its creators. What’s harder — as anyone who has ever created something knows — is being the guy in the room who has to fashion those decisions from whole...
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Design Is Not The Goal →
A good post by Finch. This sums it up nicely:
I think form informing function is a great way to describe the intention of design. The form of what we design should influence behavior and have an affect on how we interact with a Website or application. If it looks great but is a pain in the ass to use, then what good is the design? The design should be invisible to a point. We should only...
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Wee Nudge →
A collection of sticky web topics to help “teach your clients about the mysteries of the web”.
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Design Isn't Hard Because Of CSS
I always seem to come across developers or young designers who believe the only thing preventing them from producing good design is learning CSS. Comments like “That’s simple, CSS is easy” or “I’d clean up the interface, but I don’t know CSS” completely ignore the core of what design is. Yes, CSS is incredibly easy. There are numerous tricks and, dare I...
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Designer's Poison →
Frank Chimero’s thoughts on the “One Day For Design” Twitter discussion sponsored by the AIGA. Very insightful.
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Put Down Your Crayons →
A great read on why design is more than picking colors.
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Progressive Enhancement Is Backwards
Progressive Enhancement is a well-known idea that web design should be a layered process, meaning a design should satisfy the least common denominator first and foremost (Internet Explorer), and then layer on enhancements for the browsers that support them. This was how I worked for a long time. But over the last couple of years I’ve been questioning it and actively doing the polar opposite....
March 2011
4 posts
3 tags
How To Integrate Chargify Hosted Payment Pages...
Chargify is a hosted service that handles the recurring billing aspects of running a subscription service on the web. Their slogan, “Build Your Business, Not Your Billing System,” pretty much sums it up. I’m using Chargify to handle the payment processing for Golf Trac.
There are essentially two ways to work with Chargify: 1) hosted payment pages or 2) their API. Option 1 means...
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UX is 90% Desirability →
Great post on why there’s more to product success than what’s on paper.
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Functional Apple Wireless Keyboard Designed With... →
This is pretty slick, albeit pointless. Love it.
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Formed Function Gets A New Face
I’ve had a new design for formedfunction.com about a day from completion for quite a while now. Over the weekend I wrapped it up and shipped it out. Here’s a shot of the landing page:
It’s best viewed in a webkit-based browser (Safari and/or Chrome), but any modern browser will do just fine.
Go to formedfunction.com
If you feel compelled to leave feedback, Twitter just may...
February 2011
6 posts
3 tags
The Design Cubicle: Advice To Keep You Sane &... →
Great points all around.
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“Good design, when it’s done well, becomes invisible. It’s only when it’s done...”
– Jared Spool
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Should You Judge A Book By Its Cover? Absolutely.
We’ve all heard it before, “don’t judge a book by its cover.” But why not? Because the creator didn’t care enough to make the cover representative of the content? I’ll need a better reason than that. In fact, that’s the exact reason why you should judge the cover.
Note: book, in this context, means a lot more than just books. It extends to anything that...
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Breaking The Web With Hash-Bangs →
This is a good article and a must read for developers who don’t already know why the #! (hash-bang) is a problem in application architecture and/or URL design.
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Redesigning Spaces →
I’m a huge fan of Spaces in Snow Leopard. I have 3 active spaces going at any given moment. I think this solution to the minor usability problems is spot-on.
The Shape of Design →
This is a potential book project by Frank Chimero. It seems that the concepts will be mostly motivational and/or inspirational, but he’s brilliant, so I’ll read it no matter what. It appears that he has successfully raised enough funding in 1 day (29 days early). I guess I’m not the only one who would read it!
January 2011
13 posts
2 tags
On Visual Hierarchy
Design isn’t about making something pretty, although that’s part of it. Design is largely about function. It’s about making an interface work so well that the user never stumbles. Much of a good UI depends on a notion called visual hierarchy.
Visual hierarchy, while it may sound technical, is really a pretty simple concept. By using color, contrast, texture, shape, position,...
2 tags
Maps in Golf Trac
So far Golf Trac has a little over 15,000 US golf courses. I’m thrilled to have that many courses in the system, but the thing about golf courses (unlike, say, email addresses) is that there can be duplicate titles. For example, take this set of search results for the keyword “stonewall”:
As you can see there are more than one. I knew this would be a problem from the...
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Frank Chimero on Whiteboard Accounting →
A neat idea for managing your finances, client work, and when to say no.
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Happy Cog: The Beginning of a Relationship →
The “dating” metaphor Happy Cog uses to choose client work is similar to how Wufoo thinks of their software. It seems to work well for Wufoo and I’m guessing it works just as well for Happy Cog.
I particularly like these two questions (as mentioned in their “First Date” section): 2) Are there opportunities to be creative while solving problems? and 4) Will our...
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A Few Noteworthy Books On (mostly) Design
I read several good books in 2010, I started two new books recently, I bought a few that are on deck, and I’m keeping track of some I’d still like to get. This is that list (the books are in no particular order).
Books I’ve Recently Read…
The Design of Design: Essays from a Computer Scientist by Fred Brooks
Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson
The 4-Hour...
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On Design Criticism: Out With The Negative, In...
Whenever something relatively large launches (like a Facebook update or New Twitter) there are always a slew of “haters” disrespectfully attacking the design from all angles. The problem is blatant disrespect is rarely constructive.
Take the whole Gap logo redesign ordeal. That was a prime example of how not to be. Other designers were mocking the logo with “Crap” (instead...