For a few years now, a mild debate has simmered over "delightful" interaction design. For some, features that instill delight, as long as they don’t interfere with the fundamental capabilities of the system, sit with pleasure atop Maslow’s hierarchy of needs as redrawn for interactive systems.
Others don’t really care about such features, or place "delight" alongside "frictionless" and... Read More
They’re probably the most familiar interfaces on the planet: the numeric keypads on our mobile phones and calculators. Yet very few notice that the keypads’ design has remained unchanged for nearly half a century in the face of evolving global design norms and conventions.
Even fewer users notice another startling design feature: the phone’s keypad is the inverted version of the... Read More
Kids spend a lot of time online, and their cognitive and physical limitations present many challenges to them when they do so. Pair that with poorly designed content and dark patterns, and you have a bad mix. As designers on the web, we have a responsibility to create things that empower kids and make them smarter, not the opposite.
This article will give you some insights about what kids... Read More
If you’re a UX designer, you’ve probably designed a lot of forms and web (or app) pages in which the user needs to choose between options. And as a designer, you’re likely familiar with best practices for designing forms. Certainly, much has been written and discussed about this topic. So, you probably know all about how best to label and position form fields and so on for optimal usability.
... Read More
Testing responsive websites is a laborious task. Until now, implementing a stable and maintainable automated solution for cross-browser and cross-device testing of a responsive layout has been nearly impossible. But what if we had an opportunity to write visual tests for responsive websites? What if we could describe the look and feel of an application and put this directly into our tests?
... Read More
In chess, the psychological dimension that springs from a dialogue between two brains, two ideas, two strategic conceptions that depend on the personality of each chess player has long been somewhat of a romantic mystery. How do Grandmasters think? What strategies do they use?
More often than not, the most successful strategies are rooted in our very own nature. And common to most... Read More
Most designers spend too much time with their designs to be objective about them. The best thing any designer can do is to collect feedback from real users. Testing uncovers pain points and flaws in a design that are not otherwise obvious.
Recently, I had an opportunity to experience this firsthand when iterating on HelloSign, the iOS app that enables users to scan, sign and send... Read More
Mobile user experience design is maturing. One way to gauge this is to look at the tools at our disposal. Prototyping tools such as Balsamiq, Axure and Fireworks enable us to build wireframes and click-dummies, helping us to explain the targeted user experience.
Cross-browser frameworks such as PhoneGap, Zurb Foundation and jQuery Mobile help us to create prototypes using the native... Read More
As a mobile UI or UX designer, you probably remember the launch of Apple’s first iPhone as if it was yesterday. Among other things, it introduced a completely touchscreen-centered interaction to a individual’s most private and personal device. It was a game-changer.
Today, kids grow up with touchscreen experiences like it’s the most natural thing. Parents are amazed by how fast their... Read More
