SU: Make Design Usable & Accessible

Make Touch screen applications Accessibile and Usable

2009-04-06T17:28:00.004-04:00

Google Labs have have created Speech Enabled Eyes-Free Android Applications, which makes touch screens accessible for visually challenged. You can find API here to Create applications for Android for visually challenged. The Eyes-Free Android Project is also home to the Text-To-Speech (TTS) Library for Android. Its the challenge again for Apple Iphone & Windows 7 and we can see more innovation in this space. Here is the youtube channel for "Eyes-Free Android"

First product to check Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0

2009-04-05T09:39:00.029-04:00

Now you can check website Accessibility compliance with WCAG 2.0. Deque World Space is the first product to support WCAG 2.0 (Web content accessibility guidelines).

You can generate accessibility reports for your website for free in Deque.com. To get the report, provide an URL or attach the file or paste your code - you will get the report instantly. You have option to check accessbility compliances as per the section 508 and WCAG 2.0 guidelines.
Another efficient feature in the enterprise version of Deque World space is "Spidering". World Space spider's a single page or an entire website based on the link depth (up to 25 level) you specify for the site. Parallely World Space does analysis of the spidered page and generates the summary report with three graphs as shown here. The graph will represent Extent, instensity and the Nature of the problem in your website. Reports can be generated in various format.

Apart from the consolidated Graph report, you can also have the detailed report and developers report. Detailed reports talks about the each and every violation of section 508 and wcag 2.0. Along with every finding, you can see a link called fix - that links to the view & the design mode of the html page. Worldspace helps you to Remidiate through a efficient wizard approach.

You can also find the WCAG 2.0 analysis of your HTML page or file or code here.

Register for worldspace webinar and enjoy the only tool which supports wcag 2.0 guidelines.

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines - WCAG 2.0

2009-03-05T11:04:00.009-05:00

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 has defines how to make Web content more accessible to people with disabilities. It is an upgraded version of WCAG 1.0. WCAG 2.0 guidelines helps resolving various disabilities, including visual, auditory, physical, speech, cognitive, language, learning, and neurological disabilities.

Wcag 2.0 & Technologies

WCAG 2.0 is designed to apply to a broad range of technologies including Javascript/Ajax, Flash, PDF.

Four Principles of WCAG 2.0

Principle 1: Perceivable

Perceivable - Information and user interface components must be presentable to users in ways they can perceive.

Principle 2: Operable

User interface components and navigation must be operable

Principle 3: Understandable

Information and the operation of user interface must be understandable.

Principle 4: Robust

Content must be robust enough that it can be interpreted reliably by a wide variety of user agents, including assistive technologies.

Tool for wcag 2.0: www.deque.com

Usability is No Longer Enough

2008-11-10T18:11:00.000-05:00

The next wave of the information age is about designing for persuasion, emotion, and trust (PET design™).

You still need good usability if people can't find something they can't be persuaded by it but soon usability will no longer be the key differentiator it has been. It's often not enough to design a website that is easy to navigate, understand, and transact on. Just because people can do something doesn't ensure that they will.

The future of design is about creating engagement and commitment to meet measurable business goals. Whether your site is e-commerce, informational, or transactional, you must motivate people to make decisions that lead to conversion. This could be getting people to: * buy a product * sign-up for a newsletter * donate to a cause * ask their doctor about a drug * vote for a candidate * invest in your company

The interactive online environment offers far more opportunities to influence decision making than traditional advertising or marketing channels. Yet understanding people's subtle emotional triggers requires a rigorous set of new techniques, the results of which can even conflict with classic usability best practices.

How NOT to conduct a usability test

2008-11-10T18:05:00.002-05:00

Funny video I saw on You tube of Charlie Chaplin. They test some product with Charlie on a new product. This is really funny - but how not to test a product.

Bill Gates at World Usability Day

2008-11-10T18:04:00.001-05:00

Blogger posting from iPhone

2008-07-12T08:22:00.003-04:00

Continuing the same post from the top. Means - I couldn't able to go to last line of this text area. Because the scrollbar is missing. The blogging in blogger with iPhone is annoying. This is the summary of this blogpost - just write a small feed with iPhone without an image.

(I wanted to add this line in bottom of this blog post. Couldn't able to scroll) To add a bulleted list to blogger in iPhone, add an html tag as we do coding in a notepad.

Am writing this blog post from iPhone. Trying following features:

Bold - when I pressed bold from the above tool menu in edit mode, it added the span tag with bold style attribute On touch of return key outside the span tag, I can use the next style item.

Italics - works same way as bold. On touch of italics icon, blogger gaveinline style as style = fontstyle: italic. the

Adding URL - on touch of a URL link icon gives a modal window and the url can be entered like this Suggest Usability

Spell check - works as similar to working in a computer. Shows a red underlined bold text for spelling mistakes. On click on those red text shows a callout with spelling options. I selected one among the options. Red text turns to green. I had to go to a editable mode for other manual check. It is also easy to learn.

Adding images - adding image in blogger through an iPhone is really a hectic. Choose file option is disabled. Adding an image path from web add it to the top of the page. I could not able to move it to anywhere on the page.

How to create Sign up forms?

2008-05-31T14:35:00.009-04:00

Signup forms is to create a permanent relationship between user and site.

Other experts articles on how to create sign up forms:

Problems with sign up forms by Luke Wroblewski, which was recently published on A List Apart:http://www.alistapart.com/articles/signupforms
Jared Spool on Sign up forms: UIE:http://www.uie.com/articles/account_design_mistakes/http://www.uie.com/articles/account_design_mistakes_part2/and
Adaptive Path:http://www.adaptivepath.com/ideas/reports/signup/
and from Bokardo:http://bokardo.com/archives/designing-for-the-social-web-the-usage-lifecycle/

Video of Google Factory Tour of Search including announcement of Google Health

2008-05-21T15:09:00.001-04:00

CFP: ICT, Society and Human Beings 2008

2008-04-27T11:50:00.002-04:00

-- CALL FOR PAPERS - Deadline for submissions (last call): 12 May 2008
--

IADIS INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ICT, SOCIETY AND HUMAN BEINGS 2008
Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 22 to 24 July 2008
(http://www.ict-conf.org/)
part of the IADIS Multi Conference on Computer Science and Information Systems
(MCCSIS 2008)
Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 22 to 27 July 2008
(http://www.mccsis.org)

* Keynote Speakers
Professor Margaret Tan, Deputy Director, Singapore Internet Research Centre, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
Professor Simone Fischer Hübner, Karlstad university, Sweden

* Conference background and goals
The effects of ICT on humans comes in focus in the conference but also the interaction between ICT – Individual – Society. Interaction and Effects - both are important. Changes in behaviour, perspectives, values, competencies, human and psychological aspects, feelings are all of interest. Computer Science and IT related disciplines work more and more together with various behavioural sciences: Cognitive effects and changes, Motivational and emotional changes, Organisational and institutional changes, Societal changes, Value changes and new lifestyles, experiences from Child psychology and Development psychology. In general all types of research strategies are encouraged and especially cross disciplinary and multidisciplinary studies. Case studies, broader empirical field studies, theoretical analyses, cross cultural studies, scenarios, ethnographic studies, epistemological analyses.

* Format of the Conference
The conference will comprise of invited talks and oral presentations. The proceedings of the conference will be published in the form of a book and CD-ROM with ISBN, and will be available also in the IADIS Digital Library (accessible on-line). The best paper authors will be invited to
publish extended versions of their papers in the IADIS Journal on Computer Science and Information Systems (ISSN: 1646-3692).

* Types of submissions
Full and Short Papers, Reflection Papers, Posters/Demonstrations, Tutorials, Panels
and Doctoral Consortium. All submissions are subject to a blind refereeing process.

* Topics related to ICT, Society and Human Beings: are of interest. These include, but are not limited to the following areas and topics:

- Globalization and ICT (Main area)
- Globalization processes
- Glocalization processes
- Values, norms
- Labour market (outsourcing,integration, mobility)
- Universal access
- Virtual worlds
- Global villages
- Rethinking economical and social theories
- Human capital theory
- Sustainability, Democracy
- Global catastrophes
- Vulnerability

- Life role and ICT (Main area)
- Citizen’s role
- Professional role
- Leadership role
- Private role
- Virtual roles
- Home of the future
- Mobile life
- Role conflicts

- Desirable goals (Main area)
- Integration
- Humanization
- Reducing poverty
- Bridging the digital gap
- Freedom of expression
- Democratization
- E-cooperation
- Peace
- Sustainability
- Wellbeing Health
- Human welfare
- Quality of life

- Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) (Main area)
- ICT applications and systems contributing to desirable goals (see
track below)

- Life environment and ICT (Main area)
- Psychosocial environment
- Work environment/Work place:
- Work content – Work tasks
- Organizational structure
- Decision support systems
- Human-human communication
- Power structure-formal and informal
- Leadership
- Career patterns
- Influence/participation
- Working hours and salary/compensation
- Work pace/work load Physical and ergonomic conditions
- Learning and knowledge growth
- Home Environment
- Public Environment
- Private Environment
- Virtual Environment
- Virtual (on-line) communities
- Organisational Design and Management
- Psychosocial work environment

- Effects on humans (Main area)
- Analyses of impact as well as technology contributing to desirable
human qualities
- Psychosocial impact
- Life styles
- Human needs (meaningfulness, belonging, autonomy, confidence)
- Happiness and fun
- Wellbeing and health
- Dependency
- Identity
- Integrity
- Trust – security – privacy
- Addictiveness (games)
- Availability
- Motivation
- Human memory
- Cybersickness
- Stress (over- and understimulation)
- Workload
- Fatigue
- Love and Relationship
- Skills and competencies:
- Creativity
- Problem solving
- Social competence

- Perspectives (Main area)
- Social and psychosocial
- Cross-cultural
- Theoretical
- Gender
- Class
- Rural – urban
- Multimodal
- Economic
- Ethical

- Actions for reaching the Good Information Society (Main area)
- Individual level
- Communities ( physical and virtual) level
- Governmental level
- International level
- Civil society and social change communities
- Design of societal systems - rethinking

* Important Dates:
- Submission deadline (last call): 12 May 2008
- Notification to Authors: 30 May 2008
- Final Camera-Ready Submission and Early Registration: Until 13 June 2008
- Late Registration: After 13 June 2008
- Conference: Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 22 to 24 July 2008

* Conference Location
The conference will be held in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

* Secretariat
IADIS Secretariat - IADIS INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ICT, SOCIETY AND
HUMAN BEINGS 2008
Rua Sao Sebastiao da Pedreira, 100, 3
1050-209 Lisbon, Portugal
E-mail: secretariat@ict-conf.org
Web site: http://www.ict-conf.org/

* Program Committee
ICT, Society and Human Beings 2008 Conference Program Chair:
Gunilla Bradley, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden

General MCCSIS Conference Co-Chairs:
Piet Kommers, University of Twente, The Netherlands
Pedro Isaías, Universidade Aberta (Portuguese Open University),
Portugal
Nian-Shing Chen, National Sun Yat-sen University, Taiwan

Committee Members: *
* for committee list please refer to http://www.ict-conf.org/committees.asp

Marissa Mayer at Google Press Day Paris

2008-04-27T09:33:00.001-04:00

better late than never :)

Marissa Mayer, VP, Search Products and User Experience, gives an A-Z of search explaining how Google is working to ensure all its users get access to fast, relevant results, at Google Press Day in Paris on June 19, 2007.

14 Website Usability Guidelines from ISEDB

2008-04-26T23:31:00.000-04:00

Sites that are designed to sell products and/or services must go the extra mile to enhance the visitor's engagement with the website. Shopping cart abandonment (shoppers abandoning their carts before deciding to pay for the "items" they've added to their cart) can result in a significant loss in potential sales. But much of that can be reduced when the shopping process is streamlined and geared for shopper satisfaction. more...

Donald A. Norman, 2006 Benjamin Franklin Medal

2008-04-25T08:19:00.001-04:00

Don Norman is the author or co-author of fourteen books, including the seminal The Design of Everyday Things, and his recently released The Design of Future Things.

Dr. Norman is cofounder of the Nielsen Norman Group, an executive consulting firm that helps companies produce human-centered products and services, Professor at Northwestern University, Prof. Emeritus of the University of California, San Diego, and co-director of Northwestern’s Segal Design Institute; founded by Crate & Barrel creators Gordon and Carole Segal. He has been Vice President of Apple Computer and an executive at Hewlett Packard. He was President of the Learning Systems division of UNext, an early, online education company.

He serves on many advisory boards, such as Chicago’s Institute of Design and Encyclopedia Britannica. He is a fellow of many organizations, including the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has received the Benjamin Franklin Medal in Computer & Cognitive Science from the Franklin Institute (Philadelphia), honorary degrees from the University of Padova (Italy) and the Technical University of Delft (the Netherlands), the “Lifetime Achievement Award” from SIGCHI, the professional organization for Computer-Human Interaction, the Mental Health award for contributions to Business from Psychology Today, and the Taylor Award for outstanding contribution to the field of Applied Experimental and Engineering Psychology from the American Psychological Association.

Blog on photoshop express

2008-03-27T17:08:00.005-04:00

Adobe has launched the online version of photoshop express for free. There is no download required for photoshop express unless if you have lower version of flash player. Flash 9 works fine with express. At present this version of online photoshop express won't replace the photoshop application. In future, adobe might move the features one by one.

Our experience: In the high speed connection, uploading of photos took time. Otherwise they have cool features in online photoshop express.

Do a test drive: https://www.photoshop.com/express/index.html?bypass&wf=testdrive

FAQ: http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/webforums/forum/messageview.cfm?forumid=74&catid=684&threadid=1344716&enterthread=y

Learn features available in online Photoshop Express: To learn these techniques, visit http://www.photoshopexpresstechniques.com/

Crop & Rotate—Turn it, straighten it, crop out the background.
Auto Correct—Automatic, one-click, optimal lighting and contrast adjustment.
Exposure—Change the brightness of the photo.
Red-Eye Removal—Removes red eyes caused by some camera flashes.
Touchup—Remove scratches and other imperfections.
Saturation—Ramp up the colors to blinding brightness, dampen them down to black and white, or anywhere in between.
White Balance—Ever notice how people look different inside an office with the ugly fluorescent tubes, as opposed to outside on a bright sunny day? Adjust the white balance and you change the type of lighting in the photo.
Highlight—The brightest parts of a photo are the highlights. This control lets you brighten or darken just the brightest part of the photo, without affecting the darker parts (we call those the shadows).
Fill Light—If you take a shot facing into the sun, your subject can end up too dark due to the camera’s automatic exposure adjustment. Fill Light brightens the dark area without overbrightening the background.
Sharpen—It’s like putting in your contacts. Suddenly everything comes more into focus.
Soft Focus—It’s like taking your contacts out. Soft Focus creates a subtle blur for artistic effect.
Hue—This one changes all the colors in a photo at once.
Black & White—Control how the colors are converted when you change a photo to black and white.
Tint—Imagine instead of black and white, you want red and white, or pale brown and white for that old Western look.
Sketch—Makes any photo look like you drew it yourself.
Distort—Stretch, twist, bulge specific areas of your photos.

Pattern Library for Interaction Design

2008-03-06T22:22:00.004-05:00

While creating a complicated form or multi-step Indicators or want to know different type of form validation or visual framework, its always interesting when we look at the pattern libraries used. Below are the list of website which has some nice collection of interaction patterns. For each pattern - get the answer on what?, when to use it?, why and how?

Designing Interfaces - http://designinginterfaces.com/

Yahoo! Design Pattern Library - http://developer.yahoo.com/ypatterns/index.php

Welie - http://www.welie.com

UI Patterns - http://ui-patterns.com/

Interaction Design Pattern Library for Games - http://www.helpyouplay.com/

Mobile User Interface Design Patterns http://patterns.littlespringsdesign.com/~newlsdpatterns/index.php/Main_Page
This site is a wiki, with few patterns for handheld devices

Web Patterns - A UC Berkeley Resources for Building User Interfaces
http://groups.ischool.berkeley.edu/ui_designpatterns/webpatterns2/webpatterns/home.php

Show-Hide Sections

2007-12-14T16:45:00.000-05:00

Expand All modules & Collapse all modules: These interactions are useful while we have more widget based sections in a single page.

Complext Data-table design

2007-12-12T14:10:00.000-05:00

In this table structure, data is stacked. Even without grid structure design, data is not clustered. By having first look, the data looks confusing. With in seconds its very simple in mapping with the label and the data. Look at the screenshot below, mapping is done a nicer way. Label "Quantity" is bold, even the quantity in numbers is maintained bold. High & Low attributes under the label "Intra day" is stacked and this is also very easy while reading. This screenshot is from one of the stock exchange website. This forms look simple to design, but its not.

Sorting Data in a table

2007-12-10T15:50:00.000-05:00

This screenshot is from batch mates. Its a nice way of showing the sorting and alphabetical listing. These types of interactions will be useful in New Yahoo mail, where all the contents are shown in a single page without pagination.

Avoid RadioButtons - New interaction in Digg Submit page.

2007-12-07T05:52:00.000-05:00

Digg has come up with the new interactions on submit link page. In the previous design, the radio button were used to choose a topic.

In the latest version, radio button has replaced with Text Highlighter. It is good, but has bug.

Behaviours:

User can click directly on topics.

Even in previous version of topic selection, user can click on topics. HTML has option of linking Radio button and topic next to it by providing "label for" attribute. By which instead of clicking over radio button, user can click on topic to select the option. Mostly advance user know about it. With my experience I can say that 80% click only on radio button even by providing "label for". By having this label for and ID activated in HTML, we can say that radio button is accessbility fixed. For example, check the submit page(below screenshot) in digg, you can click on image to choose the media.

On mouse over the row highlights with blue background with a border top and bottom. This is controlled via css. But surprisingly in Internet explorer, this widget looks plane, you can see that in 2nd screenshot.

On click of the category, the color of the cateogory changes blue. In Internet explorer, topic turns to Bold and you have click one more time ouside the widget to get the background color for the topics.

Text highlighter is nice and easy to use in this .

Text Highlighter is controlled via css & javascript. This interaction wont work, If javascript disabled in browsers setting.

Firefox - Text highlighter looks neat and color variances are also properly used.

Internet Explorer: In IE the page looks disturbed and above explained styles are disappeared. This is a bad coding from DIGG development team.

SIMS 141 - Yahoo! Search

2007-12-01T14:44:00.000-05:00

Search Engines: Technology, Society, and Business. The World Wide Web brings much of the world's knowledge into the reach of nearly everyone with a computer and an internet connection. The availability of huge quantities of information at our fingertips is transforming government, business, and many other aspects of society. Topics include search advertising and auctions, search and privacy, search ranking, internationalization, anti-spam efforts, local search, peer-to-peer search, and search of blogs and online communities. The Instructor, Dr. Marti Hearst, is an associate professor in the School of Information at UC Berkeley, with an affiliate appointment in the Computer Science Division.

Designing Invisible Interfaces

2007-11-29T19:06:00.000-05:00

Designing Invisible Interfaces - An Approach to User Experience for Software No One Wants to Use

Most interface designers assume that users actually want to use their software. But what if focusing on the software is the last thing a user should do? Pathfinder Development introduces the concept of designing "Invisible Interfaces" for this type of user, and illustrates our point with examples from a recent project for health care providers

Need Interaction Designer in Bangalore

2007-11-24T12:42:00.000-05:00

Muthu is looking for a Interaction designer with 3-5 years of experience. Contact Muthu at muthuonlinegmaildotcom

Rajesh,

If you know any good interaction designers with 3-5 years experience can you please ask them to mail their resumes to me. The opening is for a fortune 100 product MNC - (Multi National Company) Bangalore with established usability practices.

thanks
muthu

Example of Paper Prototype in Mobile Computing

2007-11-16T13:20:00.000-05:00

Nice example of paper prototype use in mobile computing, I don't understand the language, but its good.

An application for your PDA to meet new people at the University.
Benito, Luca, Francesco, Silvia

3 More Jobs Posted

2007-11-15T00:11:00.000-05:00

-- More Jobs --

Pecha Kucha Night - Washington DC

2007-11-13T20:40:00.000-05:00

Pecha Kucha Night started in Tokyo, Japan in February 2003 by Klein Dytham architecture as a place for young designers to meet, network, and show their work in public. This forum has
spread to over 80 cities across the world.

Please join us for the launch of Pecha Kucha Night in Washington DC, Sponsored by Smith Group

Thursday, November 15, 6:30 PM - 8:30 PM

The International Square Center
1850 K Street, NW Suite 250 - Atrium Terrace

RSVP by November 12 : rsvp[at]capitolpechakucha[dot]org

Network and draw inspiration :
10 presenters x 20 images x 20 seconds
For more information - www.pecha-kucha.org
info[at]capitolpechakucha[dot]org

Lets meet at DC event :-). If you are coming by train, get down at Farragut West/North metro station. Give me a call if you have any questions: 202-352-4159

3 more jobs

2007-11-11T12:57:00.000-05:00

More Jobs:

Which platform/technology to choose for mobile

2007-11-07T21:31:00.000-05:00

A process for making a key early mobile development decision: which platform/technology to choose. This presentation is from Barbara Ballard of Little Spring Desings

Have a look at Mobile interaction design blog by Morten.

3 More Jobs

2007-11-07T21:15:00.000-05:00

Mobile Usability Testing

2007-11-07T20:51:00.000-05:00

How to take your usability testing skills and expand into mobile usability testing. This presentation is from Barbara Ballard of Little Spring Desings

Online lessons on Interaction Design

2007-11-07T15:01:00.000-05:00

These are the institutes which offer online lessons.

Graduate Certificate in HCI by Iowa State University
http://www.hci.iastate.edu/Academics/cert-program.php

Online course on UTs by Ohio University
http://www.online-learning.com/course_use_desc.html

Two more job for Interaction Designer

2007-11-07T05:42:00.001-05:00

Los Angeles UX Meetup "What drives your design?"

2007-11-06T19:35:00.000-05:00

Please join us this Thursday for our November LA-UX meetup. We have a fun agenda lined up for the topic, "What drives your design?" (led by Matthew Hays).

Food and beverages provided by our host, Yahoo! (Burbank).

Full details at the meetup web site. Please RSVP if you plan to
attend: http://ia.meetup.com/55/calendar/6109597/

When: Thursday, November 8, 2007 at 7:00 PM

Where: Yahoo! Burbank
3333 W Empire Ave
Burbank, CA 91504

--Weston Thompson
IA - The Capital Group
westontt[at]gmail[dot]com

InfoD-Cafe: Lansdown Lecture - Heartlands: heart-rate, GPS, Gameplay - 21 November 2007 - London

2007-11-06T19:21:00.000-05:00

Summary
+ Heartlands: heart-rate, GPS, gameplay
+ Rachel Jacobs of Active Ingredient
+ Date: Wednesday 21 November 2007
+ Time: 5:00pm for one hour
+ Location: Middlesex University, London, EN4 8HT
Cat Hill Campus: Room 137
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Enquiries
Stephen Boyd Davis: s.boyd-davis@mdx.ac.uk
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Heartlands: heart-rate, GPS, gameplay
----------------------------------------------------------------------
What is happening to media? -- the implications of an award-winning world-first pervasive game. A unique game/artwork that uses live heart-rate and GPS to build each player?s personal game experience.

Media are changing, becoming pervasive and physical instead of being confined to conventional screens like TV, cinema and PCs. Rachel Jacobs and her colleagues at Active Ingredient, a Nottingham based new media company, have developed a world-first pervasive game which recently won the firstNokia Ubimedia international award in conjunction with the Mixed
Reality Lab at Nottingham University. The work originated in a Wellcome Trust-funded
project while Rachel was a postgraduate in the Lansdown Centre and has received world-wide attention. The Centre welcomes her back to Middlesex to reflect on the project and draw out issues for the future.

The original project: http://lansdown.mdx.ac.uk/dragons/

----------------------------------------------------------------------
About the speaker
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Rachel Jacobs is an artist, consultant and project manager, coming from a background of dance, performance and visual arts. She has been based in Nottingham since 1991 where she co-founded Active Ingredient. Rachel is responsible for the creative delivery and project management of the work.

She has also worked as a lecturer and workshop facilitator. Rachel was awarded an MA in Electronic Arts from Middlesex University in 2006 and has co-authored papers about her work with Active Ingredient, Middlesex University Lansdown Centre for Electronic Arts and the Mixed Reality Lab at University of Nottingham.

Active Ingredient have developed a reputation over 10 years specialising in interactive media. They attempt to unlock everyday magic from the rigid systems of new media, their innovative approach to new technologies has led them to national and international success in the public, academic and commercial sectors.

Active Ingredient: http://www.active-ingredient.co.uk/
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Venue
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Room 137
Middlesex University
Cat Hill
Barnet
Herts EN4 8HT
United Kingdom

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=en4+8ht&ie=UTF8&ll=51.644
269,-0.147951&spn=0.007523,0.016308&t=h&z=16&om=1

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date and time
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday 21 November at 5pm
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Stephen Boyd Davis
Reader in Interactive Media
Head, Lansdown Centre for Electronic Arts
Middlesex University, Cat Hill, Barnet, Herts EN4 8HT
United Kingdom
Tel 44 (0)20 8411 5072
.............................................................
The Centre's Web Pages are at http://www.cea.mdx.ac.uk/
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3 More New Jobs

2007-11-06T14:30:00.000-05:00

Boston Social Face2Face - UI12 2007 Conference

2007-11-06T07:45:00.000-05:00

What. IxDA Boston will be holding a social gathering of IxDA professionals from across the country that will be attending the UI12 2007 in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

When. Monday, November, November 5th, 5.30pm - ??

Where. From the hotel lobby Boston Marriott Cambridge Hotel @ 5.30pm walk down Broadway, right on Amherst - then walk over to Tommy Doyle's Irish Pub
1 Kendall Square # 100, Cambridge, MA 02139.

Who. All IxDA members. Even if you are not attending the UI12 conference, but are a member of IxDA, and can find your way to Kendall Sq. Cambridge ? please do come.

RSVP, Questions, etc send to wkevans4 at gmail dot com

See you @ IxDA Interaction 08 | Savannah
will evans
user experience architect
wkevans4 [at] gmail [dot] com

Call for Papers - Techshare India 2008 - Breaking the Barriers

2007-11-05T07:34:00.000-05:00

Techshare India 2008 – Breaking the Barriers is the first ever accessibility conference-cum- exhibition bringing the entire ecosystem; the government, the corporates, the NGOs, the disabled, the product companies, and the education providers under one roof.

Techshare India 2008 will be held on 4^th and 5^th February, 2008 at New Delhi, India .

Highlights of Techshare India 2008
We envisage Techshare India 2008 as a milestone that would bring a revolution in the society for including people with disabilities in the main stream.

First "2-day Accessibility Conference-cum- Exhibition" in India
Organizing committee featuring international bodies such as Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB), UK
500 plus delegates from government, non-profit, education institutes, and corporate from across the globe
50 plus speakers, 4 Tracks, 6 accessibility workshops
State-of-the- art experience lab showcasing assistive technology
Exhibition with 25 plus stalls displaying assistive aids pan disability

Call of Papers
We invite you to submit abstracts to present at the Techshare India 2008 conference before the 30^th November, 2007. All abstracts will be reviewed by the Organizing Committee.

For submission procedures and suggested topics please visit our call for paper page at http://www.barrierb reak.com/ callforpapers. php

Please visit our website at http://www.barrierb reak.com/ techshareindia. php for updates, announcements, and more information on Techshare India 2008.

Thanks & Regards
Pooja Nahata | Strategic Account Manager

BarrierBreak Technologies

India: +91 (22) 2686 0485/86

Cell: +91-98207 25102
USA : +1 (781) 452 0677
Web: http://www.barrierbreak.com

Call for posters: World Usability Day

2007-11-02T07:39:00.000-04:00

World Usability Day is coming on November 8, and once again events are being planned all around the world to raise awareness of usability. The Usability Professionals' Association (DC Metro Chapter), the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society (Potomac Chapter),
and the Society for Technical Communication (Washington, DC chapter) will jointly host a panel session, along with a reception and poster display, highlighting the issues and opportunities in making electronic health records usable for health care providers and patients.

Read more about the event at:
http://www.upa- dc-metro. org/events/ 2007/11-08- 07.htm

We are now seeking posters for the interactive poster session to be held during the opening reception. This is your chance to:
• Show off your late-breaking results, new ideas or concepts in an informal, visual and interactive manner
• Discuss your project and gain insights from interested and knowledgeable colleagues
• Raise your profile in the DC usability community

Posters should preferably be related to both usability and health care.

How do I submit a poster?

1. Send an email to the poster session coordinator at:
secretary@upa- dc-metro. org
with your full name, affiliation, poster title, and a 100-150 word abstract. Poster descriptions will be reviewed by the UPA DC poster committee, and will be approved within a few days.

2. Register for the event online:
http://www.upa- dc-metro. org/events/ 2007/11-08- 07.htm

3. Arrive 15 minutes before the event start time. Your poster must be
sized appropriately to rest securely on the supplied 2 x 3 foot
easel.

4. Come ready to discuss your case study or research project with
colleagues.

Event details:
Date and time:
November 8, 2007 (Thursday)
6:00-7:00 p.m. - Poster session and reception (light refreshments)
7:00-9:00 p.m. - Panel presentations and discussion

Location:
NRECA Conference Center
4301 Wilson Boulevard
Arlington, Virginia
Five minute walk from the Ballston (Orange line) Metro stop.

One more job posting

2007-11-01T23:47:00.001-04:00

Interaction Designer, Portland

CFP - FLOSS Usability Sprint V

2007-11-01T20:37:00.000-04:00

- What: Sprint #5 for improving the usability of FLOSS
- When: Friday Nov 2nd - Sunday Nov 4th, 2007
- Where: Google, Mountain View, CA, USA

- You can participate!

- Mozilla
- Chandler will be attending!
- Our sponsors rock!

The fifth FLOSS Usability Sprint will be held on November 2-4, 2007 at Google in Mountain View, California. At the sprint, open source developers, usability practitioners, project managers, and users will gather to discuss methodologies for improving the usability of Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) and to apply those processes towards specific projects. The goal is two-fold: To improve the usability of the participating projects, and to catalyze greater
shared understanding and ongoing collaboration between the usabilityand open source communities.

This will be our fifth sprint, after throwing successful sprints in February and August 2005, October 2006, and March 2007 . This upcoming sprint will have the added bonus of being the first organized by the community itself! As always, our focus will be on working with a fantastic set of free (libre) / open source (FLOSS) software projects, focusing especially on users from nonprofit organizations. This year, we'll also spend some time organizing our first remote usability sprint.

If you are a usability practitioner, FLOSS developer, or user and are interested in participating, please fill out our application at Floss Usability.

Free one-day Microsoft UX conference in Seattle area, November 8, 2007

2007-11-01T20:29:00.000-04:00

On November 8, 2007 Microsoft is hosting a one-day UX conference as part of the World Usability Day

Leading Microsoft UX professionals will discuss challenges of doing UX in a technology-driven company and best UX practices. The event will take place at Microsoft campus in Redmond, WA, USA.

Registration is free.
Register now to attend on-site
Remote participation will be possible via online conference. Details of on-line participation will be available and posted here next week.

Conference program:
1. Dennis Wixon (Research Manager, MS Games) and August de los Reyes (Sr. UX Designer)
Making Emotions Work for You: Revolutionizing the theory and practice of Emotional Design.

2. Donna Flynn (Research Manager, MS Mobile and Embedded Devices)
Impactful Ethnography: Integrating deep insights across company divisions.

3. Monty Hammontree (UX Director, MS Developer Division)
Data Modeling and Conceptual Sketching in the Development Process.

4. Everett McKay (Sr. Program Manager, MSWindows)
New interaction guidelines for Windows applications -- the Windows Vista
User Experience Guidelines.

5. Cynthia Shelly (Sr. Program Manager, MS Windows), Annuska Perkins
(Sr. Accessibility Strategist, MS Windows), and Tira Cohene (User Researcher, MS Windows)
Creating usable interfaces for people with disabilities (including us all as we age and lose visual and aural acuity and dexterity!)

6. Andrew Kirby (Director, National Health Service Common UI Project, UK)
Learnings from the Healthcare Industry: Trends, challenges and directions for best principles across this frontier.

7. Arnie Lund (UX Director, MS IT) and Mary Czerwinski (Research Area Manager, MS Research)
Beyond functionality: What we know about human attention and retention capabilities

if you have any questions, email Lada Gorlenko. email ID is: Lada[at]acm[dot]com

Position for UX Lead

2007-11-01T02:23:00.000-04:00

Job/Sr. UX Lead/Boulder, CO/Recruiter/Full-time

Application design in health care domain

2007-11-01T02:15:00.000-04:00

Microsoft has developed what they call a Clinical UI guidelines document.

Here is an article about it:
http://www.examiner.com/p-37868~Microsoft_Helps_Developers_of_Clinical_User_Interfaces_Improve_Efficiency__Patient_Safety_With_Free_Toolkit.html

World Usability Day 2007 -- RTP, North Carolina -- Nov. 8th

2007-11-01T02:12:00.000-04:00

RTP World Usability Day 2007
============================
Join UX professionals from around the Triangle area for an Interactionary (live design competition), keynote speech, food, drink, and fun!

Time: 6:00 - 9:00 PM
Date: Thursday, November 8th, 2007
Place: Ruvane Auditorium at GSK, RTP, NC

Please RSVP Online: http://tinyurl.com/3cudwf

Organized by Triangle UPA

Keynote Speaker
---------------
"Web Leadership through Client Focus: Client Perspectives as Drivers of Innovation and Integration"

Anthony D. Hall, Ph.D.
Senior Technical Staff Member and Manager
Global Web Strategy and Enablement, ibm.com
IBM Corporation

Anthony D. Hall is a Senior Technical Staff Member and Manager on the Global Web Strategy and Enablement team, ibm.com, IBM. He leads deep software modeling of cross-enterprise web experience architecture, exploration of future intelligent adaptive web experiences, and
primary user research on IBM's external global web experience. Anthony is responsible for driving best practices in user research to enable IBM's clients to easily accomplish their goals and have a satisfying experience on ibm.com, for both today and tomorrow.

More Info: http://tinyurl.com/23x4n9

Interactionary
--------------
Last year GSK won the professional and all-around competitions, and NC State won the student competition. This year we're trying something a little different. Mixed teams of students and practitioners will compete head-to-head in a live design competition.

Simply put, the Interactionary is a live team-based design competition. Teams are given a design problem and 10-20 minutes to design a solution to the problem. Teams then present their design to the audience, and the judges.

Sponsors
--------
A big thanks to all of the sponsors that are making this year's World Usability Day celebration possible!

Premier Sponsor: GSK
Partner Sponsor: Lulu.com
Gold Sponsors: Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina, Insight
Silver Sponsors: Lenovo, Hesketh, Capstrat

Two more jobs

2007-11-01T01:59:00.001-04:00

MULTICONF-08 Call for papers

2007-10-31T11:11:00.000-04:00

The 2008 MULTICONF (website: www.PromoteResearch.org ) will be held during July 7-10 2008 in Orlando, FL, USA. We invite draft paper submissions and session proposals. It consists of the followingevents.

International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Pattern Recognition (AIPR-08)
International Conference on Automation, Robotics and Control Systems (ARCS-08)
International Conference on Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, Genomics and Chemoinformatics (BCBGC-08)
International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems and Web Technologies (EISWT-08)
International Conference on High Performance Computing, Networking and Communication Systems (HPCNCS-08)
International Conference on Software Engineering Theory and Practice (SETP-08)
International Conference on Theoretical and Mathematical Foundations of Computer Science (TMFCS-08)

Dasher: information-efficient text entry

2007-10-31T02:07:00.000-04:00

Keyboards are inefficient for two reasons: they do not exploit the redundancy in normal language; and they waste the fine analogue capabilities of the user's motor system (fingers and eyes, for example). I describe a system intended to rectify both these inefficiencies. Dasher is a text-entry system in which a language model plays an integral role, and it's driven by continuous gestures. Users can achieve single-finger writing speeds of 35 words per minute and hands-free writing speeds of 25 words per minute. Dasher is free software, and it works in all languages, and on many platforms. Dasher is part of Debian, and there's even a little java version for your web-browser. http://www.dasher.org.uk/

World Usability Day - Michigan (Nov 8 2007)

2007-10-31T01:46:00.000-04:00

The MSU Usability & Accessibility Center and the Michigan Usability Professionals' Association (MI-UPA) are joining over 170 other locations in 35 countries to promote World Usability Day. This is also MSU's Fifth Annual Usability & Accessibility Event.

The focus for World Usability Day 2007 is healthcare. Whether it's new medical devices or technologies; drug research, approval, or delivery; patient forms or medical records sharing; emergency disaster planning; increasing the functionality of hospitals; or everyday healthcare delivery, EVERYONE is affected by usability in healthcare.

DATE: Thursday, November 8, 2007
TIME: 8:30 a.m. - 4:15 p.m. (reception to follow)
LOCATION: Kellogg Hotel & Conference Center, East Lansing, MI
COST: Free
REGISTRATION: http://outreach.msu.edu/events/default4.asp
MORE INFO: http://usability.msu.edu/conf2007.asp

SESSIONS:

"Designing Usable Healthcare Web Applications"
Speaker: Jason Withrow, Business Analyst, University of Michigan Health
System, and Faculty, Washtenaw Community College

"Winning with Usable Software in Life Science Research"
Speakers: Richard Sheridan, President, Menlo Innovations, and Jennifer
Baird, President and CEO, Accuri Cytometers

"Healthcare Usability--Code Blue!"
Speaker: Shane Lovellette, User Experience Products Manager, TechSmith
Corporation

"Patient Safety and Usability: Experiences in the Department of Veterans
Affairs (VA)"
Speaker: Janine A. Purcell, Cognitive Engineer, VHA Bar Code Resource Office

"Codeless QA Testing: A Revolution in the Automated Testing Tool Market"
Speaker: Sumanth Muthyala, Usability Engineer-Technical Lead, Ergin Salih,
TestPartner Development Team Lead, and Jim Brennan, TestPartner Product Manager, Compuware Corporation

"Making Sense out of Health Insurance Benefits Selection: Case Study with a Web Tool"
Speaker: Laurie Kantner, Vice President of Client Services, Tec-Ed, Inc.

"Designing for Older Adult Users of Web, Mobile, and Handheld Technologies"
Speaker: S. Ann Becker, Professor, Management Information Systems and Computer Science, and Director, National Center for Small Business Information, Florida Institute
of Technology

Burton A. Bargerstock
Director, Communication and Information Technologies
University Outreach and Engagement
Michigan State University
55 Kellogg Center
East Lansing, MI 48824-1022
Telephone: 517/353-8977
Fax: 517/432-9541
E-mail: bargerst[at]msu[dot]edu
WWW: http://outreach.msu.edu

World Usability Day - Innovations in Healthcare in New Jersey

2007-10-30T20:10:00.000-04:00

Celebrate 3rd Annual World Usability Day, Nov 8, The Conference Center at NJHA, Princeton

Date: Thursday, November 8, 2007
Time: 5:00 PM to 9:00 PM

Place: Conference Center at NJHA
760 Alexander Road
Princeton, NJ

www.conferencecenternj.com

Program: wud.usabilitynj.org
Demonstrations of innovations from Rutgers U. , Princeton U, Siemens Corp, and others

Keynote speakers L. Keller (MISI), M. McConaghy (IMC2), Dr. J. Deutsch(UMDNJ),

Expert panel with presenters from usability, medical, and business enterprises

Event: Free and open to the public.
Princeton - October 12, 2007 - We all want better healthcare. We all want our healthcare to keep up with new technologies. What innovations are meeting these demands? For answers, join members of IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society and UsabilityNJ, the New Jersey chapter of the Usability Professionals' Association for World Usability Day, on November 8, 2007. This year the focus in New Jersey is usability for innovations in healthcare.

"Usability engineering has a major part in improving healthcare in New Jersey. Usability specialists are responsible for making products that are easy to use, whether the product is for a physician, such as electronic prescription handling, or for a consumer, such has someone in a rehabilitation program," says UsabilityNJ event chair and New Jersey resident Alice Preston. "This event brings together professionals in human factors, engineering, computer science, and medicine to meet with students, innovators, and the business community."

For more program details, visit wud.usabilitynj.org and
http://www.worldusabilityday.org/ .

About UsabilityNJ: UsabilityNJ, the New Jersey chapter of the UPA, hosts professional and educational events through the year; visit ( www.usabilitynj.org ). UPA is an international, non-profit, professional
association with more than 2000 members in the US and 50 other countries. Members are specialists in evaluating and designing products that are easy to learn and use. For more information, visit www.upassoc.org .

About IEEE-Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society: EMBS has been
serving the needs of Biomedical Engineers throughout the world since the
early 1950's and through its leadership is striving to develop new ways to
serve its members with workshops, publications, and distinguished lecture
series. For more information, visit www.embs.org .

CONTACT:
Mary Smith
908-654-3243
msmith@usabilitynj.org

www.usabilitynj.org

FAQ on Screen Reader Accessibility Testing

2007-10-30T16:52:00.000-04:00

Paul Bohman has framed a FAQ on Screen Reader Accessibility Testing. Paul Bohman speaks on following question in webaim. Please go through this interesting webaim-article.

What are the benefits of testing web content with screen readers?
Should I always test my web content for accessibility using a screen reader?
So if I don't know how to use a screen reader, I shouldn't even try?
What are the main differences between the way sighted users and screen reader users access web content?
Then how do screen reader users experience web pages?
So how do I know which of all these methods screen reader users are going to use on my web content?
What kinds of things would make it hard?
How can I learn all the screen reader keyboard shortcuts?
Wait a minute! How many screen reader programs do I need to learn?
How big are these "slight differences," and do designers have to take these differences into account when they design content?
Do you really expect developers to keep track of all of the differences like that?
So should I test my content with all the screen readers?

And More ...

Student wins design awards for stove

2007-10-30T16:32:00.000-04:00

This is very interesting and about the design.
Media Credit: COURTESY OF RUSSELL HENNING
Russell Henning's backpacking stove, the Phoenix, includes a stove, stand, fuel, and wind screen, which can be assembled into one piece or taken apart.

When SJSU graduate Russell Henning created a portable backpacking stove for a senior project in the spring of 2006, he had no idea that the environmentally friendly cooker would go on to garner international recognition and become an award-winning design.

BraunPrize and Red Dot, two international organizations dedicated to finding and acknowledging innovative designs, selected Henning's design as part of their exhibitions. The latter also presented a 2006 Red Dot award to Henning for his backpacking stove. more...

two more Job Opportunity

2007-10-30T15:17:00.001-04:00

User Research firms in India

2007-10-30T15:09:00.000-04:00

Avenue A | Razorfish, a US based interactive services firm, is looking to contract with an Indian user research firm (preferably in Delhi/Mumbai) for local research in India.
Interested firms may approach Shiv Singh for details at Shiv[dot]Singh[at]avenuea-razorfish[dot]com

Thanks to muthu on sharing this info.

Invitation - Nokia's Mobile Rules! - Business Plan and Application Competition

2007-10-29T19:33:00.000-04:00

Hello Mobile Developers and Entrepreneurs,
Nokia's Premiere Business Plan and Application Competition is counting down.
www.mobilerules.org

SCOPE OF THE COMPETITION
The goal of the competition is to seek out the developers and entrepreneurs who are creating new value, new revenue and services for mobile workforces and the mobile lifestyle. The Mobile Rules! is a “two-track” competition:

Track 1: MOBILE APPLICATIONS
Categories are Multiplayer/ Connected Games, Multimedia, Enterprise and Infotainment.We are looking for new applications that use the unique enablers of the Nokia Platforms. Applications will be judged on uniqueness, design, ease of use, and overall end-user experience. Important note: don't let categories restrict your ideas; it's your application that counts.

Track 2: MOBILE BUSINESS PLANS
The main focus areas of the business plan competition are “Communication and sharing”, “Internet innovation and mobility” and “Human and green applications”, but there’s no limitation to your plan – as long as it’s about mobile business. Plans are judged on novelty value and innovation, market potential, customer adoption, revenue opportunity and investor value.

COMPETITION TIMELINE
Business plan submission deadline is November 16, 2007
Application submission deadline January 25, 2008
Finalists announcement February 15, 2008
Award ceremony mid-March 2008

Download MobileRules2008 Competition Details pdf (486KB):

PARTNERS

BlueRun Ventures
CMEA Ventures
FinNode
Nokia Corporation
Nokia Growth Partners
Orange
SK Telecom International
SVASE
Swisscom
Vision Capital
ZEF Solutions
SINA Mobile
Palo Alto Software
IDEO
Accel

MEDIA AND COMMUNITY PARTNERS

Red Herring
Mobile Game Developer Magazine
TechCrunch
LIVEdigitally
Stirr
VentureBeat
GigaOM

WAP Design Course: London & NYC, December 2007

2007-10-29T19:20:00.000-04:00

Scott Weis will be teaching a "WAP Design" full-day course in London and New York this December, and to get 10% discount on the course fee (Discount Code: IXDA).

This course is for designers who want to know how to design for today's phones, using today's mobile browsers. It is filled with examples and exercises geared to ready designers for immediate success.

WAP Design includes XHTML, CSS, and .mobi issues in a designer-focused course covering the following topics:

WAP Overview
WAP, including XHTML, CSS, and .mobi
Successful and Unsuccessful WAP Sites
Requirements Gathering for Design
Competitive Analysis of Desktop and Mobile Web Sites
Mobile Design Patterns
Expert Design Guidelines
WAP Design Toolbox
Wireframing
Paper Prototyping

London: 3 December, 2007
New York: 11 December, 2007
Register: http://usableproducts.com/training
Discount Code: IXDA (10%)

Scott Weis
President, Usable Products Company: http://usableproducts.com,
+1.212.929.8599
Author, Handheld Usability: http://handheldusability.com

6 more Job Postings

2007-10-29T12:24:00.000-04:00

NYC IxDA - The 7-Minute IxD Soapbox

2007-10-28T23:54:00.000-04:00

NYC IxDA - The 7-Minute IxD Soapbox

IxDA New York is pleased to invite you to:

The 7-Minute IxD Soapbox (a.k.a. Pecha Kucha)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Tuesday, November 13th at 6:30pm
Location provided on RSVP - send mail to nyc-rsvp (at) ixda (dot) org.

At this fast-paced event, we're giving seven people a chance to share their ideas ? for just seven minutes each. The only rule is that topic must relate to interaction design. Of course, if you simply prefer to take it all in, you're welcome to participate as an audience member.

TOPICS
Anything goes, as long as it's related to interaction design or user experience. Present some of your work; talk about a design problem you're facing; rant about a device you don't like; effuse about your favorite product; share some results from a usability test; question the value of market research in product development; relate an experience with redesigning a product. If you don't want to soapbox alone pair up with a friend or colleague. Heck, you could even do a
parody of your favorite IxD guru, if you're so inclined! If it's something you're interested in, chances are very high we're interested too.

GOAL
To connect people in our diverse and powerful community who are interested in having their interaction design neurons stimulated. This event will be an extraordinary grab-bag of local voices. Practice yourspeaking and presenting skills! Spark some debate! Make new friends and enemies! Gain new insights!

FORMAT
Speakers may use presentation slides, show off short multimedia, demonstrate something online, or just shoot from the hip. Just make sure it's 7 minutes and no longer. After the seven soaps, we'll hold Q&A and/or discussion. Caveat: Nomenclature debates about our roles and what we call ourselves as practitioners (IA, UX, IxD, HCI, CHI, UCD, etc.) will be reserved for anyone wishing to go to the nearest pub *after* the event.

RSVP
If you'd like to present or attend, please send email nyc-rsvp (at) ixda (dot) org.

Only 7 slots are available for the soapbox; they will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis. RSVP today!

Like the idea, want to present, and trolling for inspiration? Check out these links:

* http://lists.whatwg.org/pipermail/discuss-interactiondesigners.com/2007-July/018114.html
* http://www.pecha-kucha.org

(on behalf of MJ)
--
David Malouf
http://synapticburn.com/
http://ixda.org/
http://motorola.com/

New French list on Web Accessibility

2007-10-28T23:40:00.000-04:00

Accesstech, a new mailing list, has been launched today and subscriptions are now open.

This new space for discussions in French is open for all. It aims to be a forum on all questions related to the implementation of Web accessibility, namely concerning official standards and guidelines related to WCAG, RGAA (Référentiel Général d’Accessibilité pour les Administrations), etc., as well as concrete application cases (for example, video captioning).

We will be also discussing all related issues that impact on accessibility, namely, evolution of mark-up languages and their impact in the field (for example, HTML5).

In short, it is a space for mutual help and understanding as well as technical intelligence on the issue of Web accessibility (the Charter is not limited to the aforementioned objectives, we are in the process of defining it).

This mailing list wishes to be complementary to the French list Accessiweb (<http://list.accessiweb.org/mailman/listinfo/accessibilite-numerique_list.accessiweb.org>), which is a list that discusses more general matters related to Web accessibility, such as legislation, social developments, etc.

To subscribe to the Accesstech mailing list, please visit the subscription page and provide your e-mail address at:

http://www.netaccessible.com/accesstech/

-In French-
Accesstech, une nouvelle liste de discussion sur l'accessibilité Web a été lancé aujourd'hui et les inscriptions sont maintenant ouvertes.

Cet espace d'échange francophone est ouvert à tous. Il vise à être un lieu de discussion traitant des questions de mise en place de l'accessibilité du web, notamment dans l'interprétation des normes officielles (RGAA, WCAG, etc.), ainsi que de cas concrets appliqués (sous-titrage de vidéos, par exemple).

On y discute aussi de tous les sujets connexes qui impliquent l'accessibilité, notamment l'évolution des langages et leur impact sur le domaine (par exemple HTML 5).

En bref, c'est un espace d'entraide autant que de veille technique sur le sujet de l'accessibilité numérique. Bien sûr la charte de cette liste n'est pas limitative (nous sommes en train de finir de la rédiger).

Cette liste est complémentaire à la liste ()
qui est plus généraliste et qui traite des enjeux de l'accessibilité numérique pour les personnes handicapées d'un point de vue légal et général.

Pour s'inscrire à Accesstech, rien de plus simple, il vous suffit de vous rendre sur la page d'inscription et de fournir votre adresse mail:

()

--
Catherine Roy

www.catherine-roy.net

World Usabiity Day in Chicago: November 8th

2007-10-28T23:38:00.000-04:00

Hi everyone, if any of you are in Chicago that week, and several of you will be for the dux conference, then join us for World Usability Day at the Intercontinental Hotel!

To register, visit: http://www.chicagoupa.org/WUD2007/

The 2007 Chicago event will focus on the user experience within health care.
We will offer presentations and other activities that focus on the usability
of all aspects of health care, including morning speakers and afternoon
collaboration tanks.

Some topics to look forward to:

--Usability of Drug Packaging and Labeling
--The usability of digital imaging technology
--Desktop to Handheld: Discovering Workflow
--Designing for a Better MRI Patient Experience
--Advanced Concepts in Usability for Healthcare
--Interacting with Software and People - at the same time
--Evaluating Healthcare Websites for Emotional Momentum
--Play with Your Life: Interactive Healthcare Design Games

For more information, visit: http://www.chicagoupa.org/WUD2007/

Thank you again to our sponsors:
Human Factors International
Pathfinder Associates
User Centric, Inc.
GE Healthcare
Stay Informed Studios
-----------------------------------------------

Event Info:

What: World Usability Day Chicago 2007
When: November 8, 2007 - 7:30am-5:30pm, cocktail reception to follow ( cash
bar)
Where: Intercontinental Hotel, 505 N. Michigan Ave.
Who: Experienced practitioners, medical professionals, students and all
supporters of usability
Cost: Free!
More Info:
http://www.chicagoupa.org/WUD2007

-----------------------------------------------

Please send questions to: WUDchicago@gmail.com
For information on the Chicago event visit:
http://www.chicagoupa.org/WUD2007

--
World Usability Day Chicago 2007 Planning Committee
Chicago Usability Professionals' Association chapter
http://www.chicagoupa.org
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/CUPA-Announce/join

Register for the UMO2007

2007-10-27T23:11:00.000-04:00

Register for the UMO2007::the National Conference on Designing for User Experience at Hyderabad, India

Hi Friend,

I am writing to you on behalf of UMO, Hyderabad, India. UMO is a non-profit organization working towards design awareness and exchange of design sensibilities through interaction between designers, IT industry and design sensitive consumers. It is a forum dedicated to discussing, improving and promoting the work of the Usability, HCI and Interaction design community in India.

On November 30, 2007; UMO and allied organizations in India will join communities across the world to mark the celebrations for World Usability Day 2007 ( www.umo.in/umo2007) in Hyderabad, India. World Usability Day is a world wide self-organized event with the goal to promote the fields of Usability Engineering and User-Centered Design. The event is designed to raise awareness about the importance of ' Good Design for Better Living'. Eminent people from the academia, industry, business and governance will be sharing their views and insights on this day.

Since UMO's World Usability Day 2007 is first of its kind and scale in India and having participation from international speakers, we are confident that you would be interested to support us in organizing this event and making it our 3rd successful event in a row in three years. Kindly get registered at www.umo.in and honor the event to make the World Usability Day 2007 at Hyderabad an awareness generating and difference making success. UMO would appreciate if your esteemed organization supports you by sponsoring your registration. Please find the event details enclosed here with.

Looking forward to your response soon.

Regards,
Kaladhar Bapu
UMO2007-coordinator

------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- ---
Registration Details:

Conference : on 30th Nov.2007 (8.30am to 6.30pm)
Venue: Indian School of Business, Hyderabad
Registration fee Rs. 3000/-
Early Bird discount: Rs.2500/-( 31st Oct'07)
Group discount: Rs.2500/- each(If more than 3 registrations)
Volunteer discount: Rs.2000/- (UMO volunteer)
Full time student: Rs.1500/-

------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- ---
Workshops: 1st and 2nd of Dec.2007 (9.30am to 5.30pm)
Venue: To be announced
Registration fee Rs. 3000/-

We have two tracks in workshops. Participant can choose one of them.
Track 1: Organization and Structuring of Information( 2 days)
by Prof. Ravi Poovaiah, HOD, IDC, IITBombay.

Track 2: Eye tracking and usability evaluation (1day 1)
by Dr. Jon Dodd, CEO, BunnyFoot, UK
Track 2: UX Foundation: Fundamentals of User Experience Design (day 2)
by Kaladhar Bapu, UX, Microsoft
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- ---

Confirmed Speakers so far,
1. Jon Dodd, Director and Co- founder, BunnyFoot, UK
2. Ravi Poovaih, Head, IDC, IITBombay
3. Anil Jampala, Vice President, Satyam, President, Hysea
4. Anirudha Joshi, Prof. Interaction design, IITBombay
5. Poosapati Parameshwar Raju, Artist and Art historian
6. Nanda Kumar Birudavolu, Architect and Designer
7. Dr.Neeraj Raj, Director, MedRC, E- learning
8. Eric Schaffer, CEO, Human Factors International
9. Apala Lahiri Chavan, VP, Human Factors Asia

Important links
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- ------------ --------- --------- --
Organized by: UsabilityMatters.Org
Theme: Design Innovation in Health Care '
Event Date: 30th November 2007
Venue: Indian School of Business Auditorium, Hyderabad, India

Audience: Usability & UI Design Professionals, UI Developers, Software Quality/Testing/ Documentation Professionals, Project Leads/Managers, Practice/Global Heads, Human Factor Engineers/Specialis ts, Designers, Architects, Enthusiasts & Design Sensitive Users
Event Highlights
------------ --------- --------- ------------ --------- --------- ---
UMO -Boycott Bad-Design Contest'07
UMO is holding this competition for identifying Bad-Designs as part of our activities towards the World Usability Day-2007. Participation is open to everybody from every country in the world, and from any background- designers and design sensitive consumers!
------------ --------- --------- ------------ --------- --------- ---
UMO -International Cartoon Contest'07
The UMO-3rd International Cartoon Contest'07 is organized by UMO towards the World Usability Day. Participation is open to all cartoonists from every country in the world.
------------ --------- --------- ------------ --------- --------- ---
UMO –Change Makers
The UMO-ChangeMakers Award is patronaged by UsabilityMatters. Org to mark the celebrations of the World Usability Day and UMO2007. All the qualified entries will be presented on 30th November 2007 on the conference day.
------------ --------- --------- ------------ --------- --------- ---
www.umo.in/umo2007
usabilitymatters.org,
plot no.12, penthouse,icrisat colony,
road no.11, jubilee hills,hyderabad. 500 045
ph: +91-0-9849301500
usa: (213)2912586

2 More New Jobs

2007-10-26T02:14:00.000-04:00

Flex Architect - Satyam Computers Services Ltd.
Senior Manager, Interaction Design / User Experience - Leading Retail Store

UX BarCamp: A Night at The Matrix, 11/10-11, Fremont, CA

2007-10-26T01:52:00.000-04:00

User Experience BarCamp: A Night at The Matrix

Because of the user experience focus of this BarCamp, BayDUX is promoting this event in
the local user experience community. Silicon Valley Web Builder (SVWB) is the primary organizer of this event. Their description of the event follows below.

November 10th: 6:00pm until Midnight
November 11th: Midnight until 4:00pm

The BarCamp theme is inspired by the movie "A Night At the Museum." Instead of spending a night at a Natural History Museum like the story in that movie, SVWB invites you to spend a remarkable evening inside The Matrix at Hurricane Electric, the world's largest data center, for 24 hours.

SVWB would like to make this BarCamp a fun social event as well. We will party and hack code on Saturday night from 6pm until midnight. So, you should bring your camping chairs and camping gear. The event will wrap up around 4pm on Sunday afternoon.

We will accept up to 500 hardcore hackers to stay overnight. However, you can also sign up just to participate on Saturday evening and/or Sunday during the day as a hacker, watcher, or speaker. Regardless, you will need to submit your free registration on Eventbrite in advance. For the latest news regarding this event, check the associated BarCamp Wiki Page .

Here is a link to directions to the location:
http://www.baychi.org/calendar/20071110a/directions/

Interaction Design course in IIT Mumbai

2007-10-25T00:12:00.000-04:00

IIT (Indian Institute of Technology) is one of the prestegious institute in World. IIT is offering course on Interaction Design.

Is this course for Interaction design or Industrial design. Because in your subject line it says Interaction design but the application brochure says Industrial design. Even the sample questions are more related to Industrial design.

The MDes course very much covers interaction design. The details of the courses for interaction design masters are at http://www.idc.iitb.ac.in/academics/Interaction-design-course-credits.html .

"Industrial Design Centre" or IDC is the name of the design department in IIT Bombay. Currently, we offer four masters programmes in product design, visual communication design, interaction design and animation, in addition to a PhD in design.

The Common Entrance Exam for Design or CEED is a common design aptitude test for PG entrance to not only these four programmes in IDC, IIT Bombay but also to design programmes in IIT Delhi, IIT Guwahati, IISc Bangalore and IIT Kanpur. CEED tests things like visual perception ability, drawing skills, logical reasoning, creativity and communication skills which are common to all streams of design.

Like GATE, CAT etc. CEED is only a qualifying exam, and those who pass CEED need to apply for specific disciplines in specific institutes. In case of interaction design in IITB, selected candidates are called to appear for another test followed by an interview. This second test is more specific to interaction design.

Please contact Mr.Anirudha Joshi for more details. Anirudha Joshi is a faculty member in the Industrial Design Centre (IDC), IIT Bombay.

Events: Relating SEO and PPC to Quality Content

2007-10-24T11:14:00.000-04:00

Event: Relating SEO and PPC to Quality Content

When: Thursday, Nov. 1, 2007, 6-8 p.m.

Join us as DC Web Women continues it's Web 2.0 series on optimizing content & your online identity. On Thursday, Nov 1st, learn key components to search engine optimization (SEO) & pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns.

Our guest presenters will address a wide range of SEO issues, including the relationship between strong online traffic & quality content. Expect a dynamic, timely program and great menu.

Co-presenters:
Deborah Ager http://www.clickwis dom.com
DCWW's Internet marketing columnist

Deborah's search engine optimization skills have placed quality websites into Google's top five organic search results on a regular basis. Her background includes direct mail marketing and fundraising for clients such as Habitat for Humanity, The Central Park Conservancy, and Operation Smile. She writes an Internet marketing column for DC Web Women and has a book of poems scheduled for publication in 2009.

Leslie O'Flahavan http://ewriteonline .com

Leslie is co-founder and partner in E-WRITE. With E-WRITE, she has helped thousands of people learn to write well for online readers. She has delivered customized writing courses for marketers, executives, demographers, customer service agents, help desk staff, web content
contributors, government employees, activists, and teachers. She is co-author of Clear, Correct, Concise E-Mail: A Writing Workbook for Customer Service Agents.

Location: The American Public Power Assn., 2301 M St NW (3rd Floor), Washington DC 20037. (on 23rd St., not M St.)

Cost: $15

This event is open to anyone!

RSVP: http://www.evite. com/app/publicUr l/jillmfoster@ gmail.com/ dcwwseo

Questions? Contact info@dcwebwomen. org

More info:
http://www.dcwebwom en.org/happening /meetings/ 20071101. html

Open University : People-centred designing

2007-10-23T20:31:00.000-04:00

One of the primary considerations in all fields of design is 'usability' and, increasingly, the phenomenon of 'user-centred design'.This unit provides you with an introduction to the principles and procedures of design usability through the critical evaluation of selected products.

http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=2830&ONEML=OLNL05&MEDIA=OLN507

MDes in Interaction Design and CEED 2008

2007-10-23T20:25:00.001-04:00

IIT Mumbai - Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai -
The Industrial Design Centre offers a 2-year Masters programme in Interaction Design: http://www.idc.iitb.ac.in/academics/interaction-design.html

The admission process for the next year has already started. The CEEDexam is one criterion for admission. Please note that the last datefor issue of application and last date of receipt of completedapplications for CEED 2008 is 29th October 2007. More details are at http://www.iitb.ac.in/ceedapp/ceedAdmissionLinks.jsp and http://www.iitb.ac.in/~pge/ceed2k8/brochure.pdf

Front-End Web Developers

2007-10-22T22:14:00.000-04:00

BESTICA Inc is looking for 3 front end web developer/coder for its leading client in LA area (in the middle of Hollywood). It's a contract and contract to hire position.

Please send your resume at the earliest, if this position does not suits you please pass on this position to your friends and colleagues if they are interested in this

Front-End Web Developers

Hiring requirements
* XHTML, JavaScript, CSS, DHTML, AJAX
* cross browser & platform compatibility (IE & Fire fox on Win & OSX)
* standards-based, scalable, clean, and organized code
* experience with intensive in-page interactions and depth
* timely responses and open communication-fast & accurate, a great
personality
* Action script, PHP, JSON are optional

Great if you have experience working on music and/or community sites. A passion for music (as either an artist or a fan).

Please fill this template and forward it back with your resume.

Name:
Skill:
Years Used:
Expertise Level:
Last used
Years - web development/coding
Years Java Script
Years , CSS
Years in DHTML
Years in AJAX
Years in cross browser & platform compatibility (IE & Fire fox on Win & OSX)
Which one - mention
XHTML
Years Action script,
PHP
JSON
Any Relevant Professional Certifications?
Current Salary/ Rate?
Desired Salary/ Rate?
When are you available?
Are you eligible to work in the US without sponsorship?
H1b, Green card, Citizen

Thanks,
Neelu
Manager / IT Recruiter
mailto:neelu@bestica.com> neelu@bestica.com

www.bestica.com
Bridging the IT Talent Gap
210 858-5747 (O)
210 979-1652 (C)
210 745-1631 (F)

Microsoft's "mind reading" patent

2007-10-22T21:59:00.000-04:00

Microsoft is applying for a patent to monitor user's brain waves in order to determine the effectiveness of user interfaces. Researcher Desney Tan from Microsoft is working on this project, and he was one of Technology Review's TR35 honorees.

This is the url at BoingBoing: http://www.boingboing.net/2007/10/15/microsofts-mind-read.html

Here's are a couple of articles I've written about Desney Tan's research:
http://www.technologyreview.com/TR35/Profile.aspx?Cand=T&TRID=629
http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/18962/

Team Lead - Product Development

2007-10-22T00:04:00.000-04:00

Are you passionate about the latest web technologies?
Do you want to build innovative products that will impact millions of people?
Do you want to work in a Silicon Valley-like startup environment?
Are you ready to face a new challenge everyday?

GeoBeats is looking for an exceptionally strong technical leader who will lead company's web 2.0 product development. You should be self motivated and ready to take on any challenge thrown at you. You must be passionate about building great products through the application of cutting edge technologies. You would work with a close knit team of experts in different technical and strategic domains.

Designation: Team Lead - Product Development
Location: New Delhi, India

Responsibilities:

Responsible for building dynamic and interactive web applications and new innovative features
Strategically evaluate and implement new technologies that result in compelling consumer products
Engage in all aspects of development - coding, testing and quality assurance
Float inventive ideas to make the product best in its category
Direct, build, and mentor rest of the product development team

Ideal Requirements

Extensive technical expertise in latest web technologies
Knowledge of Internet applications and protocols
Rapid prototyping and product development
Strong sense of usability aspects of web products
Exceptional analytical, communication and organization skills
Hard working and flexible in order to finish tasks with pressing deadlines

Specific Technical Requirement & Expertise
The ideal candidate would have expertise in the latest web technologies. Some of the required technologies are:

· LAMP
· Flash, Action Scripting, AMF
· Rapid development frameworks
· AJAX
· XML, HTML,DHTML, CSS, Java Script

Experience and Education

3+ years experience in developing consumer based websites
Led web product developments
B.E/B.Tech/ME/ M.Tech/Phd

Compensation
We offer an attractive salary plus a performance- based salary growth. Stock options depending upon candidate performance

About GeoBeats
GeoBeats is a premier broadband video network that sits at the intersection of internet, video, and travel. Through the innovative application of current and emerging web technologies, GeoBeats is creating the next generation of travel video network. The company partners with some of the world's largest online companies and has been covered in media groups like NBC.

To Apply or For Information Contact:
Vishesh Bajaj - jobs@geobeats. com, visheshbajaj@ geobeats. com, 09818888599

Information R/evolution

2007-10-19T12:39:00.001-04:00

This video explores the changes in the way we find, store, create, critique, and share information. This video was created as a conversation starter, and works especially well when brainstorming with people about the near future and the skills needed in order to harness, evaluate, and create information effectively.

Download Hi-res of this video. Also visit Everything Miscellaneous

Form fields - Exceptions

2007-10-18T14:23:00.000-04:00

When we provide the width of text field especially to date field, we usually give values 11 or 16 pixel width based on the date format. But there are scenarios like shown below (screenshot from picasaweb) width of the text box is extended to maximum for design purpose. To make the design prettier width of date field is extended equal to other text fields and pages looks neat. These are exceptional scenarios.

While creating complicated forms we are lot more concious on spacing and providing width to form elements.

Subscribe to Suggest Usability | Mails I Read in Google reader with your gmail ID.

Taking Lead in IxDA-DC

2007-10-17T10:16:00.000-04:00

Opportunity for DC crowd to take the lead of IxDA. This is the mail from Alok to group. Interested people can contact Josh.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's been a a long time I took the lead on starting a DC chapter for IxDA, I have not been able to spend the required time for this and don't see my existing commitments changing in next several months to allow more time.

We have a great membership of close to 40 people here, and there is a lot that can be done.So if anyone is interested in taking over the lead for this chapter, please send a note to Josh Seiden at local@ixda.org.

Not sure how much I should be able to pass on the controls to this yahoo group to the
selected person..

Regards
Alok Jain

Senior Interaction Designers - New York City, NY - R/GA - Full Time

2007-10-15T14:28:00.001-04:00

R/GA is seeking seasoned Senior Interaction Designers to join its
Interaction Design team in New York City.

About R/GA:
http://www.rga.com
Named Adweek's Interactive Agency of the Year and included in
Advertising Age's "Agency A-List, " R/GA's culture is associated with
creative excellence, innovation and collaboration. Emphasis is placed
on quality of work, team spirit, and the ability to partner well with
clients and other agencies. The company prides itself on being able to
stand above the crowd because of its talent and trust.

Duties and Responsibilities:
In addition to being outstanding designers, Senior Interaction
Designers must have strong leadership skills and be able to inspire a
team of interaction designers, juggle multiple projects, and work
closely with clients. They must be able to provide systematic design
insight across a range of related projects, be self-motivated with
strong internal and client communications skills.

Requirements:
Qualified candidates have 3-5 years experience developing interactive
products, a thorough understanding of user-centered design principles,
client presentation skills, writing skills, and experience organizing
complex information. Familiarity with principles of Web development as
well as Adobe InDesign and the Microsoft Office Suite is essential.

Education Requirements:
Undergraduate or postgraduate degree in any of the following: HCI,
Interaction Design, Industrial Design, Computer Science, Media
Studies, Graphic Design, and/or related fields.

Please send your resumes to mark.shewmaker@rga.com

User Experience Designer (2 FT openings)

2007-10-15T12:56:00.000-04:00

*Daily Responsibilities*

- Create effective, efficient, and engaging user experience designs,
primarily for Web-based content and sites.

- Coordinate design and implementation in development teams, acting
as user advocate and product champion on each team.

- Facilitate and lead discussions between functional and technical
stakeholders to implement design that achieves usability and
accessibility objectives within project timelines and budget.

- Demonstrate and apply subject matter knowledge of design principles
to create effective, efficient, and engaging products.

- Apply understanding and insight of standards-based design and
emerging technologies (e.g., social media, rich Internet
applications) .

- Apply understanding and experience in designing and testing sites
that meet Section 508 standards and accessibility objectives.

- Conduct ongoing outreach to teach customers, teams, and other
stakeholders about user experience design.

*Requirements*

- 3-5 years experience in human factors, information architecture and
user experience design

- Demonstrated ability to produce high-quality user requirements,
information architecture, sitemaps, wireframes, designs, and
supporting materials (Please bring samples to interviews)

*Required Skills*

- Work with client stakeholders to define usability objectives and
performance measures.

- Perform user goal and task analyses to build personas, scenarios,
requirements, and test scripts.

- Interview users and conduct user research to determine user needs,
user expectations, and product usability.

- Lead / Facilitate customer and internal stakeholder meetings for
requirements gathering.

- Develop effective information and navigation architecture to
promote user's ability to navigate and find needed content. Ensure
room for growth as content grows.

- Create and present high-quality customer-facing deliverables to
include concept documents, sitemaps, wireframes, and storyboards.

- Create and present developer-facing work products, such as
taxonomies, navigation and page flow diagrams.

- Plan, design, and conduct usability tests using goal-based
scenarios and performance metrics.

- Define and design effective surveys to gather information and
feedback from users and stakeholders.

- Understand, apply, and promote research- and application- based
usability standards and best practices.

- Demonstrate and apply knowledge and understanding of Section 508
standards and accessibility objectives.

- Review existing designs and products. Provide clear, actionable
recommendations for improving usability and human factors of design.

- Experience with: Visio or Axure as well as Photoshop or other
graphics program.

- Basic understanding and experience with content management systems,
portals, and/or other frameworks.

- Basic understanding and experience with HTML, XHTML, CSS, and basic
JavaScript as needed to provide clear design recommendations and
simple mock-ups.

*About SRA*

SRA is a leading provider of information technology services and
solutions - including strategic consulting; systems design,
development and integration; and outsourcing and managed services –
to clients in national security, civil government, and health care
and public health. SRA International, Inc. has been recognized by
FORTUNE magazine as one of the "100 Best Companies to Work For" for
the seventh consecutive year.

Please send resumes and any questions to Kate Walser
(kate_walser@ sra.com)

iPhone Human Interface Guidelines

2007-10-02T22:58:00.000-04:00

Apple has published an iPhone Human Interface Guidelines
document. Guidelines has details on user environment, principle and guidelines for iphone content, metrics, layout guidelines and tips.
Apple’s iPhone presents a revolutionary user interface and interaction model. Users can view webpages, use web applications, and use built-in iPhone features, such as the email application, the iPod, and the digital camera, wherever they go. Safari on iPhone, a unique implementation of Safari, is the application users use to browse the web on both iPhone and iPod touch. more ...

PDF version is available here.

Google's Recipes Search

2007-10-02T14:13:00.000-04:00

How to cook something delicious? am hungry now? How long will it take to cook for my number of guests? How much fat my food has? How to make a Italian food with more of protein and less of sodium?

These are the questions arise in our mind very often. Now Google has answers for these in their newly launched service by Google in Recipes search.

Its a dream search to any one. At present you won't get results with all criteria selected, but will be a good resource for recipes in future, say in weeks. Google's Recipe search is simple and intuitive. For e.g. click on any "drop down" menu and see the wonderful space savers. Its a multi select list item and to save space check box is shown under the drop down. This type of form interaction is also used in iPhone. This saves ton of space by replacing a long list of checkboxes. Tiny URL to Google Recipe search: http://tinyurl.com/2ox7xw

Another Interested point here is more option appears next to search button in selection of few criteria in drop down. More option appears after the search button. Its a nice way to show prominence to the fields showing it as optional.

Google recipe search for is contextual. User will get recipe based on cooking Keywords, cuisine, main ingredient, course, preparation time, meal type, servings, calories, total fat, total carbs, sodium, cholesterol, source, saturated fat, fiber, protein.

Google recipe search is yummy yummy!!!

Web Developer / User Interface Developer

2007-10-02T05:32:00.000-04:00

Daily Responsibilities

Develops the code for the User Interfaces for in-house, custom Web-based applications using CSS, XHTML, JavaScript, JSP and Struts (preferred).
Produces designs for new and enhanced user interfaces using HTML mockups, wireframes, page flows, interaction diagrams, etc.
Participate in the software development team as the UI developer and also as user advocate on the teams
Maintains set of user interface standards for in-house applications by documenting and following common web page design patterns and CSS styles
Demonstrates and applies subject matter knowledge of design principles to create effective, efficient, and engaging products.
Develops effective information and navigation architecture to promote user's ability to navigate and find needed functionality. Ensure room for growth as applications expand.
Develops interfaces that meet Section 508 standards and accessibility objectives.
Interface with the SRA-wide User Experience group to connect with their expertise.

Requirements

6-9 years of experience

Bachelor degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or related field with studies in human-computer interaction or user experience design

Must provide portfolio of sites or applications developed.

Required Skills

Experience in the following technologies: XHTML, Cascading Style sheets (CSS), Java Server Pages (JSP) and JavaScript.

Experienced with Dreamweaver, Visio, Eclipse IDE, and Photoshop or other graphics program

Understand, apply, and promote research- and application- based usability standards and best practices.

Demonstrate and apply knowledge and understanding of Section 508 standards and accessibility objectives.

About SRA
SRA is a leading provider of information technology services and
solutions - including strategic consulting; systems design,development and integration; and outsourcing and managed services – to clients in national security, civil government, and health care and public health. SRA International, Inc. has been recognized by FORTUNE magazine as one of the "100 Best Companies to Work For" for the seventh consecutive year.

Please send resumes and any questions to Kate Walser kate_walser@ sra.com).

NYC-UPA Oct 16 Event: Eye-Tracking for Usability

2007-09-29T00:38:00.000-04:00

NYC Usability Professionals Association presents: (Event Details)

Eye-Tracking for Usability Testing:
Seeing what people do and hearing what they say is the heart of usability
research. But what's the brain doing? Nielsen Norman Group used eye-tracking
technology to watch hundreds of people's eyes as they used the Web, doing a
plethora of different tasks and using different websites. Seeing exactly
what the user is looking at – and not looking at – is like getting to sneak
into his brain for a little while. Kara Pernice Coyne will discuss how she
conducted this research and present some of the findings from it. She is the
co-author with Jacob Nielsen of the upcoming book, Eyetracking Web
Usability. Event Details

Speaker:Kara Pernice Coyne, Director of Research, Nielsen Norman
Group

Job: Senior Interaction Designer/SF Bay - Intuit

2007-09-29T00:24:00.000-04:00

We are looking for a Senior Interaction Designer for Home and My
Business. The products include Quicken (desktop and online), Simple
start, QuickBooks Online edition, JumpUp. It's a web-based, v1 product
for consumers. We need someone with web skills who is very creative
(good at conceptualizing, visioning, etc.). The team tends to move very
quickly, so they also need someone who can keep up (fast on their feet,
articulate, etc.).

My contact information is nancy_falkenburg@intuit.com

COMPANY NAME: Intuit
JOB LOCATION: Mountain View, California
JOB TITLE: Senior Interaction Designer (63892)
JOB DURATION: Full Time

Intuit is looking for a strong interaction designer to help build and
enhance solutions for next generation business tools on the web.

Your responsibilities include:
* Design and focus on end to end experiences, influencing teams, and
making trade offs
* Apply strategic thinking and business goals to design work
* Work across multiple teams and segments to build design architecture
* Develop vision concepts
* Drive research and user testing
* Understanding and application of aesthetic values
* Identify and take advantage of new web technologies
* Be responsible for delivering all aspects of design from concept to
implementation details
Qualifications:
You will:
Produce great design work that shines with simplicity despite complexity
of the systems. Drive and define the architecture and design language
working with multiple teams for consistency across products. Define
implementation criteria, guidelines, and specs. Work with other
designers, researchers, management, and marketing to produce jaw
dropping work. Turn ideas into dynamic design. Have a love for solving
problems and delivering great work to every customer.

* Five-years plus of product/interaction design experience
* Degree in Design, Design related field, or equivalent experience.
* Experience in shipping high-volume, high-profile, or award-winning
software products
* Strong portfolio available for viewing
* Expertise in Adobe and/or other design software
* Proficient in web prototyping skills to convey ideas and concepts.
* Understanding of DHTML, scripting, and web technologies
* Experience in Flash, Flex, WPF, or dynamic front end software tools
always a plus

CONTACT INFORMATION: nancy_falkenburg@intuit.com

JOB: User Experience Designer - 185582, Redmond, WA - Microsoft Corporation - Full Time

2007-09-29T00:23:00.000-04:00

Company: Microsoft Corporation
URL: http://www.microsoft.com
Location: Redmond, WA
Position: User Experience Designer - 185582
Duration: Full Time

The Microsoft Windows User Experience team is seeking exceptional interaction designers to make the personal computer more powerful, engaging, and rewarding to use. This is an opportunity to reinvent how people interact with computers, to turn new technology into positive user experiences, and to deliver a product that reaches millions of customers. If you are inspired by these plans, then this is the team for you.

As an Interaction focused User Experience Designer, you will work alongside some of the world's most talented product designers, usability specialists, and software developers to build the next generation of the Windows operating system. You will help set the vision for the future Windows user experience, serving as a user advocate to ensure the highest level of usability, desirability and customer satisfaction. You will research, design, and prototype product experiences that meet demanding quality standards, and you will drive your work through the software development process. You will collaborate with teams across the company to ensure we maintain industry leadership, delivering innovative, exciting and emotionally engaging products.

Candidates should have outstanding skills in designing interaction and visuals for software or the web. We require a proven ability to articulate ideas through high fidelity prototypes. You should be an excellent communicator and presenter, and show experience applying user research throughout the design process. Qualifications include a 4-year degree in industrial design, interaction design, or related field. Industry experience in developing software products for large markets is preferred. Expert knowledge of major multimedia, design, and operating system software (Photoshop, Flash or Director, Windows, Office) is expected.

Please submit resumes (link to portfolio or work samples attached is required) to a-dantur@microsoft.com. Due to the high volume of resumes received only qualified candidates will be contacted.

For additional information about design at Microsoft please visit http://www.microsoft.com/design.

JOB: User Researcher - 173850, Redmond, WA - Microsoft Corporation - Full Time

2007-09-29T00:20:00.000-04:00

Company: Microsoft Corporation
URL: http://www.microsoft.com
Location: Redmond, WA
Position: User Researcher - 173850
Duration: Full Time

The Windows and Windows Live XDR UX Research group needs a lead to drive making Windows client and services world class user experiences. The mission for Windows & Windows Live XDR is to think end to end about the experience and both broad and deep. Giving users a Windows experience without problems isn't good enough; we want the experience to be an immersive pleasurable experience that is appropriate for each and every customer. To drive this requires us to take a holistic approach to the end to end experience - we need to know our users inside out, and understand their perceptions, desires, needs, frustrations, environments, and problems related to the PC experience and beyond.

To drive this work we partner with product teams, OEMs, IHVs, ISVs, and sales/marketing; essentially anyone who makes decisions about the user experience is our potential partner. We are looking for someone to join the team who has passion around making UX decision makers accountable to users. The candidate will excel at understanding the Windows business strategy and incorporating into the XDR strategy. The ideal candidate will be excited at the prospect of finding creative ways to evangelize the rich research data we have to both internal and external audiences and drive the results of those communications into the final PC experience.

The candidate must have exceptional communication skills both oral, and written. In addition the candidate should have at least 3 years experience managing people, comprehensive project management skills, and a strong appreciation for user research.

Please submit resumes (link to portfolio or work samples attached is required) to a-dantur@microsoft.com. Due to the high volume of resumes received only qualified candidates will be contacted.

For additional information about design at Microsoft please visit http://www.microsoft.com/design.

Job: UI prototyper/designer

2007-09-29T00:00:00.000-04:00

When you think about the Internet, do you see endless possibility?
Are you anxious to apply what you know about Web 2.0 user
experience? Then consider joining the User Experience team at
Plateau, a growing software company. We are looking for a team member
who has both development and design skills to be our UI
prototyper/designer .

Job Duties Include:
§ Develop high-fidelity functional prototypes supported by flat
files or other local databases that can be used for demonstrating
interaction behavior and proof-of-concept, and which can also be used
for limited-focus usability testing

§ Rapidly prototype design concepts using HTML, CSS,
JavaScript, etc.

§ Collaborate with interaction designers, business analysts and
product managers to ensure a high quality user experience

§ Collaborate with visual designers to communicate visionary
concepts and refine the user experience

§ Work closely with developers to ensure that interactive
techniques are understood and provide oversight during implementation.

Job Requirements/ Education:

§ 5+ years of professional Web development/ design experience

§ Experience designing for and implementing Web 2.0 user
experience

§ Minimum of 2 years experience coding HTML, JavaScript, CSS,
XML for Web applications, preferably Enterprise level applications or
services.

§ Strong interest in emerging tools and technologies in the
industry

§ Strong communication, analytical, and interpersonal skills

§ Solid skills using prototyping and design tools such as
Photoshop, Omnigraffle, Visio, and Dreamweaver

§ Working knowledge of usability principles and user-centered
design techniques

§ BS/MS in Computer Science, Human Factors, or related field.

§ Online portfolio

This is not a software development position. All prototypes will be
used for design elaboration or usability testing purposes. This
position is located in Arlington, VA.

Please send your resume to Lillian Christman (lchristman@plateau. com)

JOB: Associate Creative Director - frog design inc, - Stuttgart, Germany

2007-09-27T00:46:00.000-04:00

Associate Creative Director - Stuttgart, Germany. About frog design

http://www.frogdesign.com/jobs/view-job.html?jobid=5568
If you're smart-working, hard-playing and dedicated, we'll free you to do the best work of your career.

Associate Creative Directors oversee the daily activities of a team of designers assigned to multiple projects and cultivate an environment of sustained creativity and professional growth. Associate Creative Directors will assist the Creative Directors on design direction, team effectiveness, and client relationships. They are also expected to play an active, hands-on role in key projects.

Creative

Provide daily management of the quality and tenor of the office and the digital team?s creative work.
Assist the CDs in the definition and guide the team in the direction, style, and methodology.
Collect feedback and best-case examples from the team and collaborate with the CDs to drive the potential creative futures of both your team and the broader frog design consultancy.
Make yourself a ?timely expert? towards the creative needs of our key clients in order to provide necessary creative insights and project oversight.

Client

Work with project leaders to ensure they are reading, interpreting, and reacting appropriately to the strategic, logistic, and creative needs of the client.
Participate in the creative role of new business pitches, proposal development, and project initiation.
Take a creative leadership role in at least one top-tier client.

Team

Oversee the creative output of your team.
Monitor and drive an ideal balance in the available skills and personality of the team towards the needs of our customers.
Monitor and drive the team to utilize the best and latest methods and tools to be competitive.
Help develop the culture and mindset of the team to ensure they are healthy, happy, inventive, curious, and open.
Mentor the careers of your direct reports.

Responsibilities:

Manage day-to-day operations of the digital design team, including setting priorities, assigning resources, and ensuring project goals are achieved
Oversee simultaneous projects from inception to completion, reviewing project plans, designs, and deliverables
Identify and implement process improvements to meet project and team needs
Mentor digital designers and help them set and achieve satisfying career goals
Establish performance objectives, write performance reviews, and make compensation recommendations
Participate in recruiting and hiring digital designers
Promote a culture of innovation and teamwork
Establish and nurture good client working relationshipsParticipate in new business development activities

Requirements:

At least two years experience managing a digital design team
At least seven years professional digital design experience
Strong leadership and people management skills
Proven ability to mentor and develop skills in junior digital designers
Strong knowledge of design process and project management
Excellent interpersonal and presentation skills, including the ability to communicate effectively in small and large groups at all levels of a client organization.
Ability to negotiate and coordinate with multiple groups and disciplines
Bachelors degree in a design-related discipline
Language skills in German and English a must

Please submit your resume to us at www.frogdesign.com /jobs/ including your earliest possible date of entry, your circa salary requirements and attach your detailed CV, letters of recommendation and photo.

"Frog Design is an Equal Opportunity Employer"

JOB: Senior Design Analyst - frog design inc. - Stuttgart Germany

2007-09-27T00:43:00.000-04:00

Senior Design Analyst - Stuttgart
http://www.frogdesign.com/jobs/view-job.html?jobid=5678
If you're smart-working, hard-playing and dedicated, we'll free you to do the best work of your career.

About frog design:
frog design is one of the world's leading strategic-creative consulting firms. By identifying emerging market opportunities and transforming ideas into compelling product and service experiences, frog helps Fortune 500 clients to evolve, expand, and envision their businesses. Founded in Germany in 1969, the company is headquartered in Palo Alto, California, with studios in Stuttgart, Milan, Austin, New York, San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle and Shanghai. With a cross-disciplinary team of more than 350 employees, frog offers a broad range of industry expertise, in fields such as consumer electronics, software, entertainment, finance, medical, retail, and fashion. Clients include Alltel, Disney, GE, HP, Intentia/Lawson, Logitech, Microsoft, MTV, SAP, Seagate, Sky, Yahoo! and others.
Senior Design Analysts lead product research, strategy, information architecture development, and interaction design to create products that bring a smile to the lips and a flutter to the heart; regardless of whether it?s a corporate Website, software application, or consumer electronics device. Senior Design Analysts are able to discover, understand, and communicate the business requirements of our clients, the emotional desires of their customers, and the context in which these two come together.

Responsibilities:

Plan, prioritize, coordinate, and conduct user requirements analysis, task analysis, conceptual modeling, and usability testing.
Design and specify user interface and product creation materials using participatory and iterative design techniques, including observational studies, customer interviews, usability testing, and other forms of requirements discovery.
Produce user requirements specifications, personas, storyboards, scenarios, flowcharts, design prototypes, and design specifications.
Effectively communicate research findings, conceptual ideas, detailed design, and design rationale both verbally and visually.
Manage the design process, drive decisions, track issues, and assist in estimating resource needs and schedules.
Work closely with development teams to ensure that design specifications are implemented.
Participate as a contributor to an interdisciplinary team that includes other designers, project management, business and brand strategists, and hardware and software developers.

Job Requirements:

At least five years of design experience, preferably in the product design discipline.
Strong knowledge of design processes and methodology, particularly as applied to convergent digital/physical areas and consumer electronics.
Strong project and people management skills. Must be able to function as a project leader as well as an individual contributor.
Knowledge of design and prototyping tools such as PhotoShop, Illustrator, and Dreamweaver.
Knowledge of capabilities and limitations of industrial production processes as well as technologies such as HTML, JavaScript and Flash.
Excellent communication and organization skills.
A passion for creating products that resonate emotionally with people.Ideally Masters level design related education

Tolerable Waiting Time

2007-09-13T01:42:00.000-04:00

A study on tolerable waiting time: how long are Web users willing to wait?

Usability in Multilingual contents & labels

2007-09-11T16:24:00.001-04:00

For any application - multilingual content & labels should be screened thoroughly. This make the internationalisation part a successful.

General check in handling content is QA check in spelling, grammatical error, breaking longer sentence to shorter.

Once translator gets a request to translate, most of the time translators do subjective translation than word by word. Subjective translation is an appropriate way of translating the content or label than word to word translation.

Real challenge starts while translating the engineering or medical terminologies i.e. scientific terminologies. For example to translate words like "Tighten ARM knob/Toeout on Turns and Lockangle" Translator needs better understanding of the system.

translator or copyrighter action points:

1. Understanding the system
2. Understanding the end users.
3. Content should be subjective
4. Simple, easy to read & remember.
5. All navigation items - labels should be short.
6. Should be ready with different label (with same meaning) to implement it as per the users preference after the usability testing.

Evaluating labels & content:
Copywriter & translators feel that they are always 100% perfect with their labels. But the end users are the best one to judge the accuracy of labeling and content. Best way to evaluate menu labels is by usability testing.

Usability testing on multilingual sites:
Usability engineer will test the application with the users to check how comfortable users are with the labels used.
1. Choosing users.
2. Conducting test.
3. Analysing the result

Analysis result:
At this stage users understanding on labels and contents can be measured quantitative and qualitative. Statistical data & feedback from users will help content writers and translators to understand the end user expectation.

Usability Magazine

2007-09-11T16:23:00.001-04:00

A new UX web magazine 'UX Matters' has launched on World Usability
day, with a welcome editorial and five in-depth articles on usability,
IA and design.

http://dev.uxmatters.com/index.php

Testing with Screen Readers: A Hypothetical Conversation

2007-09-11T16:22:00.001-04:00

Paul Bohman has framed a FAQ on Screen Reader Accessibility Testing. Paul Bohman speaks on following question in webaim. Please go through this interesting webaim-article.

What are the benefits of testing web content with screen readers?
Should I always test my web content for accessibility using a screen reader?
So if I don't know how to use a screen reader, I shouldn't even try?
What are the main differences between the way sighted users and screen reader users access web content?
Then how do screen reader users experience web pages?
So how do I know which of all these methods screen reader users are going to use on my web content?
What kinds of things would make it hard?
How can I learn all the screen reader keyboard shortcuts?
Wait a minute! How many screen reader programs do I need to learn?
How big are these "slight differences," and do designers have to take these differences into account when they design content?
Do you really expect developers to keep track of all of the differences like that?
So should I test my content with all the screen readers?

And More ...

Typoglycemia

2007-09-11T16:17:00.000-04:00

I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid Aoccdrnig to rscheearch taem at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Such a cdonition is arppoiately cllaed Typoglycemia :)-

Amzanig huh? Yaeh and yuo awlyas thought slpeling was ipmorantt.

This is for the readers. Content Publishers are not suppose to do Typos in web content.

Research on Left Navigation

2007-09-11T16:12:00.000-04:00

Kingsbury and Andre (2004) conducted a study to determine which Web-based three-level navigational selection pattern elicited the best human performance and highest user preference. They surveyed 69 Web sites and found that most of them favored a three-level navigational selection structure that was either:

* The initial selection was made from the top followed by a selection from the left navigation panel and subsequent selections from the left navigation panel (TLL).
* Left selection followed by subsequent left navigation selections (LLL).

more info is available in following link:
http://www.usability.gov/pubs/040106news.html

Freelance Visual Designers/ Icon Designers needed

2007-09-04T13:36:00.000-04:00

Hi,

I'm in need of a visual designer and an icon designer for a couple of projects. Here is a brief summary of the requirement.

Visual Designer: Exceptional visual designer who is comfortable with design essentials and can provide XHTML/CSS designs that are both aesthetically stunning and XHTML/Standards compliant. We would like somebody who has displayed a flair for coming up with phenomenal designs and hence a portfolio of past work is essential. The current project could take about a
month and compensation would be the best in the industry. If you feel you have an interest in this project, please get back to me with a brief background about you and a link to an online portfolio.

Icon Designer: Outstanding Illustrator/Icon designer who has the ability to illustrate icons in various sizes for a windows based application. The designer should be able to carry out the illustrations and provide icons that have a consistent style and are intuitive to understand. We will provide you with the background and the iconography, and you would need to come up with at least 500 icons that meet our quality criteria. If you feel you are interested in the project please get back to me with an brief background and a link to an online portfolio.

Both these projects would pay well however quality and timely delivery is essential. The company is based out of Bangalore, but you could be based out of anywhere for this project, however designers from Bangalore may be given a preference, given the logistics involved.

Until I update the full email ID - please email your profile to editor[at]suggestusability.com

----------------------------------------------------
Navneet Nair
Interaction Architect
----------------------------------------------------
Website: http://www.onclipevent.com
Blog: http://enterframe.blogspot.com/

Four openings in UCD team at VERITAS

2007-09-04T13:31:00.000-04:00

We are looking for good people to work on the UCD aspects of our products (good being the operative term). So if you think that you are a good designer, and looking to crack some tough information design problems, perhaps you should give a try.

VERITAS Software India is in Pune. Our UCD team is one of the first in India, now we are 25 people. Chances are you know some of them. So if you are interested, just go ahead and ask them about the group and company. Or reply to this mail. Googling will get you most of the
details about the company, as well as Pune.

There are four openings, two of which are for consultants (all based in Pune). The openings are for UI designers (2+ years), but anyone with a good aptitude can apply. BTW, good work portfolio will be valued more than degrees, certifications and jargons. The opportunity is good, as we work on all aspects of UCD process -- User Research, Task Analysis, Conceptual Design, Interaction Design, Visual Design and Testing.

Thanks to Anirudha Joshi, trigger savvy folks can click on the reply button without any fear. The whole world will not know about your job application or salary expectations :-)

Cheers./Sinoj
sinoj_mullangath [at] symantec [dot] com

Senior User Experience Designer

2007-09-04T13:18:00.000-04:00

RSA, the Security Division of EMC, helps organizations protect private information and manage the identities of the people and applications accessing and exchanging that information. RSA Security's portfolio of solutions—including identity & access
management, secure mobile & remote access, secure enterprise access and secure transactions—are all designed to provide the most seamless e-security experience in the market.

We currently have an excellent career opportunity available for a Senior User Experience Designer to join our User Experience team located in our India office.

Primary responsibilities:
Lead the user interface design effort for one or more RSA products. Work closely with Engineering, Product Management, Marketing and other groups within RSA to optimize the user experience for our customers and to make ease of use a product differentiator. Create paper and online prototypes to gather early feedback. Must be
familiar with the iterative design process and be able to develop web pages for integration into the product.

Communicate designs by creating storyboards, prototypes, user interface design specifications and crafting process flow diagrams. Work closely with Usability Engineers to validate designs using a variety of methods, including usability testing, focus groups, surveys, etc. Work with the User Experience Design team to optimize the design process and apply design standards to ensure a common look-and-feel across all RSA products. Mentor and train other members of the User Experience Design team as necessary.

Qualifications required:
Minimum of 5 years experience leading user interface design efforts in a software company development environment, with some of that experience designing web interfaces. Visual design skills along with interaction design skills are highly desirable. Must understand all phases of the software development process
including planning and scheduling tasks. Experience designing complex web-based applications is a plus. Experience developing personas, scenarios, wireframes, usability requirements, and leading brainstorming sessions. Experience validating designs using focus groups, surveys, usability testing, and other creative methods. Experience measuring usability and tracking results is a plus. Ability to work well with Engineering, Product Management and Marketing to validate product requirements and to convert requirements into usable product designs. Demonstrated expertise with products such as: Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash, Dreamweaver, Director, and other professional design tools is a requirement. Must have excellent communication skills.
Must be passionate about improving software usability and optimizing the customer experience. Must be a self-starter who thrives on working in a fast-paced
environment. Portfolio of work required.

Education:
Bachelor's Degree in a related field is required.

Please send in your resume (with Portfolio of work) to afernandes[at]rsa.com

Job opportunities at Onward Research (Bangalore)

2007-09-04T13:04:00.000-04:00

Hi all,
We're currently hiring Researchers at Onward Research. Details below...

About Onward Research:
Onward Research + Consulting is a user research consulting organisation based in Bangalore, India. Our vision is to empower and enable organisations in developing highly usable, effective and innovative products/services for their end-users.

We use ethnographic research techniques to identify unmet and unarticulated needs of users, leading to deep insights for our customer’s business. In the few months since we started up, we have been working on exciting projects for technology, mobile, retail and healthcare organisations that deliver products/services in India.

We are now looking for highly talented, skilled and passionate individuals who would drive the growth of this team. More than the qualifications, we’re looking for the passion and excitement to grow a startup company, that is breaking new ground in user research in India.

Job Description:
* Researchers will design, plan and conduct ethnographic research; and would especially drive the fieldwork including observations and contextual interviews.
* Defining and refining research intentions, correlating them with the client’s business needs.
* Analysing and interpreting research data, and eventually reporting & recommending key insights about the end-users, the client’s business and products.
* Supporting business development activities including creating proposals for new projects.

Required skills:
* Proven experience in ethnographic research, qualitative research, user research or design research projects.
* Those with Bachelor’s/Master’s/Ph.D in Human factors, Anthropology, Sociology, Psychology, Design or similar would be ideal.
* Strong analytical skills. Effective verbal and written communication skills.
* Experience in technology, mobile or retail projects would be preferrable.
* Strong interest, passion & willingness towards growing a startup.

Send your profile at: jobs@onwardresearch.com

Regards,
Parameswaran Venkataraman
Founder-CEO,
Onward Research + Consulting,
Bangalore, India.

Need a Freelancer - RIA, Flex

2007-09-04T11:57:00.000-04:00

Hi All,

I Require a freelancer who has the following skill sets

a) Some level of LAMP based knowledge - technical architecture, designing a
system etc.
b) Someone w/ Rich Internet Application experience ( Flex, OpenLaszlo etc.)

The project is for a US based organization, Other details on request.

Contact: Puneet_Thariani

Until I post the the complete email ID, you can mail it to editor[at]suggestusability.com

Thanks,
PUNEET

Yahoo Mail Vs. Google Mail - Which is best? Answer is here...

2007-08-31T18:40:00.000-04:00

Two month before, we did a comparative study on Yahoo Chat & Google Chat integration with their email services. Below table has the differentiation between Google & Yahoo's chat integration with email. Gmail was good in this front.

Also see:Chat integration in E-Mail: Google Vs. Yahoo

In HCIIDC Interaction designers group, lots of discussion were happening under the topic "The better email - Yahoo mail or Gmail? Anirudha Joshi posted a nice explanation Yahoo Mail or Gmail in HCI IDC forum.

Digital Inspiration has posted video on Walt Mossberg of WSJ posted Vlog on same topic. Walt Mossberg is saying that Yahoo Mail Beta is better than Gmail & Live Mail.

These discussions will help us in lots of design ideas & insights.

Usage of Alt Text in blog & websites.

2007-08-30T17:47:00.000-04:00

Alt is the Attribute of image <img> tag. Alt is the short form for "Alternate". Provide alt text has become mandatory.

Few advantages of providing alt-text:

Alt text helps search engine to bring up the pages
Helps Screen reader softwares to understand the page, which helps visually challenged people to understand the content of the page.
Improves overall usability
Helps users using text based browsers.

There are 4 types of images used in a blog or website.

Decorator Image - Decorator images are generally used to bring up the aesthetics of the website. For example a spacer.gif or a Curve image or a hidden transparent gif. For those types of images we should provide a blank alt. Like alt="" . Its very important to make sure that, there should not be any space between double quotes.
Showcase Image - These are types of images which will be used in ecommerces websites to show products.
Link Image - Which has some action to it. For example a submit button. Its very important to provide what action its going to perform.
Repeated Image - Mostly decorative are repetitive in website. Some time buttons. Its very important to provide the same alt text to follow consistency.

Few Exceptions:

Dont' provide the alt text if label is placed next to a icon.
For bulleted list, don't use bullet images directly rather provide it in stylesheets.

As per the WCAG - Web content accessibility guidelines, Alt text is the basic fixing to get priority 1 compliances.

Yahoo Mail Vs. Google Mail

2007-08-30T07:10:00.000-04:00

HCI IDC is one of and only Interaction Designers group of India. HCI IDC group is popular among Indian IT companies and User experience professionals. It is so popular that total Number of members count in HCIIDC will say total number of interaction designers in India. This group is moderated by Anirudha Joshi - Indian HCI Guru.

There were some hot discussions going on about the best email services i.e. Yahoo Mail vs Gmail.

I request every one to join the HCI IDC group. For those who are not member of HCIIDC, I have copy pasted Anirudha's reply on that topic. Its nice & here you go -

Here is Anirudha Joshi - Indian HCI Guru reply on that topic
Back in 1999 in the hey-days of the dotcom, at a seminar in IDC, there
was some corridor talk about how Yahoo! had emerged as a leading
search engine, and everyone (including myself, I confess) thought that
Yahoo! has a fantastic momentum and no one can touch it now. We were
all wrong - and Google proved it.

Personally, gmail is my favorite webmail service (and I have been
through Yahoo, Hotmail and our own Squirrle Mail in IITB, though not
recently) but I must admit that gmail took some getting used to.

The concept of labels was different in itself. But gmail disturbed one
other of my important email habits - before gmail, I used to 'leave
behind' actionable mails in my inbox till I was done with them. So a
blank in-box meant that I have been a good boy. A swollen one meant
that I have things to do. Even if you label a mail, it still stays
behind in the in-box, so in gmail this didn't work. But I got over
this one by changing my habit - I created a label called to-do and
started labeling only those emails that I had something actionable
from my side. Voila, I discovered that I have fewer to-do mails than
not-to-do mails. That actually reduced my labeling / filing effort
(though my mind went through the usual resistance curve before I hit
upon this solution). Now my swollen inbox merely means that I have not
downloaded a backup to my hard disk in a while.

So gmail forced me to change my habits, which might sound contrary to
user-centred design, but it isn't. Allow me to explain. Email is a
frequent, long-term use application to most people and in frequent-use
apps, it may be OK to compromise learnability with speed of use of
frequent tasks. (If you don't use email frequently, perhaps gmail
isn't going to come in the way - only frequent users file if at all).

And I have some data. In my teaching, when I talk about designing
'known products' I give the example of gmail. At this time, I usually
ask if there was anyone in the class who did not have a gmail account.
Ever since I started asking this question, I have not yet found a
single person who doesn't. (The same does not apply to almost any
other email product, though I must confess that data is not rigorous
there).

So why does everyone (in my class) have a gmail account? When gmail
was launched, it was certainly not the first webmail app. There were
dozens of free webmail apps around for over a decade and anyone who
had an email account already had one. So here is an attempted answer:

OK, gmail had a few of technology firsts - one GB email was a big draw
(many people first associated the name gmail to that) and so was AJAX
- it saved a lot of round-trip times (e.g. expanding the reply box
in-line, attaching a file in-line etc.). And of course there was the
automatic contact building that was Google page-ranked (not
alphabetically sorted). Then there was integrated chat that was added
a few months into the product. But all these technology features were
fairly quickly copied by other, established providers. What's more,
gmail still does not support IMAP (and I used IMAP for a while, just
before I switched to gmail). So technology and features is not the
answer.

Gmail also had an interesting marketing first (at least for webmail
products) and this one was completely counterintuitive - you COULDN'T
just sign up, you had to be invited and had to have another email
account. I remember this made a big buzz for a few months after the
launch, and I think the curiosity ensured that many who had an email
account managed to get themselves an invite and gave it a try. The
fact that Google was already an established brand of young, cool
technology helped.

But all this has now become passe, but gmail continues. Why? One
answer could be thread view, and this is true at least in part -
though there are many email products that support thread view, none
are in the sense of gmail. Thread view in gmail actually saves me time
(for example, this thread was lying in my in-box for the past 10 days
with dozen+ replies, but I could read it all in one go, in context,
and then reply - other thread views that I have used in the past
required me to still open each mail separately).

In the end, I think everyone in my class still has a gmail account now
due to its (as has been pointed out) better information visualization
and less visual clutter (though I find the colours and rounded corners
a bit dated).

So, in summary, you don't have to be the first to make a 'dent in the
universe' (it helps, but you don't have to be). You don't even have to
be 100% compatible with what exists - 80% will do just fine. Thinking
out of the box, breaking the rules, brand and clever marketing plans,
including viral effects, help to get you a foot in the door. What
sustains in the long run is good, simple design that works and solves
real problems.

So, do you think you can beat gmail?

Anirudha

Adobe Dreamweaver cs3 review - 2

2007-08-28T17:40:00.001-04:00

Dreamweaver cs3 not only attracts developers, but also designers. Adobe has integrated lots of nice feature in Dreamweaver which a designer can enjoy, its an intelligent integration with Flash, Flex, Photoshop, fireworks and contribute.

CSS: Dreamweaver cs3 is tuned to create CSS layouts. cs3 has also has the advantages of viewing, editing, moving styles within or between files. There is also a facility to do a browser compatibility check for CSS layout.

Coding: Coding in Dreamweaver CS3 is very very easy than any editor available now. Apart from the color coding, line numbering can also be colored. Commenting is very simple.

Editing code: If there is a 100 line of javascript, that function of code can be collapsed for easy editing. XML can be integrated into any code by Drag & Drop.

Support with Technologies: HTML, XHTML, CSS, XML, JavaScript, Ajax, PHP, Adobe ColdFusion®, ASP, ASP.NET, and JSP.

Style Rendering toolbar: This is another cool feature Dreamweaver CS3. Page can be viewed as just as how end user will see it. HTML can be simulate to see PC screen, handheld device, or printout.

Latest Dreamweaver cs3 has nearly 1000 downloadable extensions. And this is one of the best version of CS3.

If you are using Dreamweaver 8, Its recommended to upgrade to CS3. Request you company / department for the upgrade of dreamweaver CS3.

Online free photoshop - Mini version

2007-08-28T15:44:00.000-04:00

Photoshop is one of the expensive tool for a designer to buy. But for ameteur who does smaller task on picture editing tool need not to buy photoshop here on. Flotoflexer is an online photo editing tool smaller tasks can be achieved. This software can be really a useful tool for bloggers. This tool has five main menu - Basic Tools, Color Effects, Distort, Beautify, Text Tools, Advanced. Under each there is a tool by which image can be edited. We tried with image resize, image cropping, rotate, flip, draw, erase, fill & Color Grab, it works nice.
Fotoflexer has various features -

Color effects - Bronze, Sepia, Grey, Invert, Rotate, Painting, Stamp, Cartoon, pop art,
Distort - Twirl, Bulge, punch, stretch, squish
Beautify - Autofix, smooth, sharpen, fix red eye, fix blemishes, smooth wrinkles
Text Tools - Add text, Speech Bubbles, thought bubbles
Advanced - Web cam, smart cutout, smart recolor, opacity, adjust, contrast
Best part is you can take snapshop from webcam, As this option is not available with the windows pc. There is also a facilty to upload photos from Fotoflexer to flickr, myspace, picasa and facebook.
You don't need to sign-in to use all these features, to save file its asks for login details. And signing in is also as easy.
Thanks to Techcrunch to let us know about Fotoflexer.

Interesting Sign up Forms

2007-08-23T15:29:00.001-04:00

Some time we find very bad signup forms (eg:2) in the web. Its very important that signup form are easy to complete. Have a look at the signup form of http://www.seniorpeoplemeet.com/sign_up/. Its very intuitive and interesting. I like the way signup form is designed in this website. This form is desinged keeping senior people in mind, but this interaction can be useful easy any one.