user experience
I’ve largely been ignoring Nicholas Negroponte’s One Laptop Per Child initiative. I appreciate the nobility of the gesture, but how interesting can sub-$100 hardware running Linux really be? Well, that was before I read about the novel user interface they’re building into those small green and
usability
The standard login form is everywhere. It’s unavoidable. And it’s a giant pain in the butt. As much as we see login forms every day, you’d think we would have mastered them by now. Unfortunately, we haven’t. Here’s what I’ve observed users doing, over
programming languages
Eric Lippert is one of my favorite Microsoft bloggers. He’s one of those people who reminds you that Microsoft, despite all its problems, still employs a lot of incredibly thoughtful, near-genius programmers. Take a look at his greatest hits: * How many Microsoft employees does it take to change a
gaming
I couldn’t resist. In the innocent era of 8-bit arcades, you made characters female by adding a cute little pixelated red bow. Just like in Ms. Sawhorse Detective.
gifts
As a technology enthusiast with a bad impulse purchase habit, I’m unrepentantly difficult to buy gifts for. The way I figure it, the only reason to grow up is so you can afford to buy yourself all the crap your parents wouldn’t buy you when you were a
software development
I’m a Windows user, and I’m out to prove Wil Shipley wrong: Mac users love their machines; Windows users put up with their machines because they don’t believe there’s anything really better. I love the Mac user base because they tend to be people who are
user experience
Deep down inside every software developer, there’s a budding graphic designer waiting to get out. And if you let that happen, you’re in trouble. Or at least your users will be, anyway: Joseph Cooney calls this The Dialog: A developer needed a screen for something, one or two
technology trends
I have a great deal of respect for Apple’s iPod juggernaut. They’ve almost single-handedly legitimized the market for downloadable music. The kind you pay for. The kind that, at least in theory, supports the artists who produce the music instead of ripping them off. That said, I have
software development concepts
Simplicity isn’t easy to achieve, and John Maeda’s short book, The Laws of Simplicity, provokes a lot of thought on the topic. Programmers swim in a sea of unending complexity. We get so used to complexity as an ambient norm that we begin, consciously or unconsciously, projecting it
user experience
In my opinion, the new Office 2007 user interface is one of the most innovative things to come out of Redmond in years. It’s nothing less than the death of the main menu as a keystone GUI metaphor. This is a big deal. Historically, where Office goes, everyone else
user experience
I remember switching my homepage from AltaVista to Google back in 2000 for one simple reason: it was blazingly fast. It’s the same reason I don't use personalized Google, or Google suggest as my homepage: they’re simply too slow. Dare Obasanjo* wonders if AJAX apps are
tags: software development concepts
Leon Bambrick is full of good ideas. Like KeyTraino, for instance: When you use the toolbar, the menus or the context-menus of an application, KeyTraino shows the alternative keystroke you could’ve used. Evidently someone at SlickEdit is wearing a tinfoil hat that transmits at the same frequency as Leon’