27 May 2010
I woke up this morning with a kink in my neck. The kind of kink that can't be cured. No amount of massaging, twisting, or rolling will get it back in line. And so my head is tilting slightly to the left today. I figure if I rest my chin on my hand, I'll just look like I'm in deep thought, like I'm...
27 May 2010
I love my Subaru. I've driven it with no issues for about seven years. (BRB - going to knock on wood.) Despite my love, there are two design flaws that have driven me nuts throughout the duration of those seven years. (Disclaimer: I drive a 2004 Subaru. These features may have been updated on newer...
13 May 2010
When reviewing a designer's mock-up of a web site design, my job as an interface engineer is to look for areas of the design which will be challenging or impossible to implement. Such areas aren't always obvious. In theory, a mock-up and the final site should look identical, but in reality a mock-...
10 May 2010
Joshua Porter's Designing for the Social Web
I attended the Information Architecture Summit in Phoenix, Arizona, back in April 2010. The IA Summit is the premier gathering place for information architects and other UX professionals. This was the 11th IA Summit, and it included Dan Roam...
30 Apr 2010
Nicely-cropped images help any web site look more credible and finished. Unfortunately, not everyone has access to fancy, schmancy photo-editing software like Adobe Photoshop. But don't despair. Beautifully-cropped photos can be yours with a few simple steps.
Software
I recommend using Picnik.com...
28 Apr 2010
One of the building blocks of visual design is contrast. Contrast occurs when two elements are different. Therefore, when you want two elements to be different from each other, you should ensure that those differences are obvious. Robin Williams eloquently reminds us that
"Contrast is created...
17 Apr 2010
This weekend I started playing around with two advanced CSS properties I had never used before -- @font-face and text-shadow. The property @font-face allows the embedding of non-standard fonts, resulting in text that is rendered normally in the browser in the font of your choice (achieving the...
26 Mar 2010
There wasn't even room on the floor during Margot Bloomstein's content strategy panel during the first day of the South by Southwest Interactive Festival. I managed to squeeze into a space upfront along the wall, pulled up some carpet, and took furious notes. I'm glad I made the extra effort; this...
18 Mar 2010
Those of us familiar with front-end user interface development such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, understand the pains and complexities of Cross-Browser Compatibility. For most others, the main thing that matters is how a web site or application displays and functions in their browser(s) of choice...
7 Mar 2010
As humans, we are visual creatures. We understand information best when presented visually (versus verbally). Below we discuss and share examples of how trends have shifted over time in the quest to communicate data effectively.
First there was Edward Tufte who revolutionized how information (...
