January was the last Calgary UX Book Club meeting as autonomous entity (we have since been merged into the Calgary UX Group) and we ended on a high note by chatting with author and IA guru Russ Unger. We had heard that Mr. Unger was a lively speaker and he did not disappoint! We talked [...]
Book Review: “A Project Guide to UX Design” by Russ Unger and Carolyn Chandler
By Ross, March 7th, 2011 in Book ReviewsInnovation
By Ross, March 7th, 2011 in UX MusingsInnovation is a great word. It’s filled with such hope and is ambiguous enough to let great ideas and thoughts shine through. Innovation is a critical concept when working through brainstorming and idea generation sessions but I have come to dislike the word innovation. These days, the word innovation makes me shudder and cringe but [...]
Noise, noise, noise
By Ed, March 7th, 2011 in UX MusingsSometimes I feel like the Grinch, becoming increasingly annoyed at the cacophony coming from Whoville: “One thing I can’t stand is the noise, noise, noise.” My aggravation: another mobile device stencil. And the Whoville culprit? For me it’s the Nokia S60 smartphone stencil (conveniently supplied by the manufacturer). Oh sure, I realize I’m skipping stones [...]
Your user champion is outside the door
By robb, March 7th, 2011 in UX TechniquesSo you’ve recognized the need to engage a user experience architect on a major project. As an enterprise level organization, you may even have the luxury of deciding between bringing in a contractor or creating a full-time internal position. With a green light from HR and the gang in Finance, which one do you choose? [...]
Prototyping
By Scott, March 7th, 2011 in UX Techniques, UX ToolsIn an ideal world, we could build and test complete, functional, high-fidelity prototypes for every project, then iterate and test again. But even in the real world, with time and budget constraints, we can use prototyping to answer user-research questions, solve interface problems, prove concepts, test usability, and reduce risks before committing to development. Prototyping [...]
Working Abroad
By Scott, March 7th, 2011 in Work CultureThis past summer I had the opportunity to spend six months in Berlin, Germany, on “working sabbatical” with UX Guys. The reasons for going were complex – my wife’s academic research, our possibly optimistic desire to render the daughter bilingual, and my own infatuation with the place. One of my personal goals for the trip [...]
The Emotional Power of Wireframes: Part 1 (Practitioner)
By Ross, March 7th, 2011 in UX TechniquesWe all know that wireframes are great for communicating design concepts and rationale before a pixel is ever pushed in Photoshop or a bezier curve is laid out in Illustrator, but I was wondering if anyone has ever considered how wireframes make people feel? This curiosity extends to both the people building the diagrams and [...]
Practical Search Engine Optimization
By Mark, March 7th, 2011 in UX TechniquesSEO. It’s a little three-letter acronym that has represented dreams of corporate success and online riches and padded the wallets of digital snake-oil salesmen and spammers ever since Google became a verb. It certainly earns its both bad and good reputations in the worlds of digital strategy and consulting. First, the bad: practitioners remain out [...]
Working Virtually – or is that Virtually Working?
By Erica, March 7th, 2011 in Work CultureAs a team of web professionals who generally work in a virtual environment (in other words, we work from our home offices the majority of the time), the UX Guys are often asked – how do you make it work? The short answer is that most of the challenges of working remotely are fairly self-evident, [...]
Book Review: “Wired to Care” by Dev Patnaik with Peter Mortensen
By Ross, February 18th, 2010 in Book ReviewsIn November of last year, the Calgary UX Book Club read “Wired to Care” and were fortunate enough to have a video conference during our monthly meeting with co-author, Peter Mortensen. The video conference was fantastic and gave Mr. Mortensen a chance to share his insights and anecdotes around the process of writing the book and “Wired to Care” has been lingering in my subconscious ever since…