Murphy’s graphic design laws

If three designs are shown to a client, your least favorite will be chosen.
If two designs are shown, a third will be requested. If provided, then one of the first two will be chosen.

Hey… I know this sound… it is the sound of webdevelopment reality. The trick though, is not to consider it a problem but as a challenge of skills. I know that it can bequite frustrating, but in the end you go home, and your customer has a site that could have been much better.

There are some true remarks here: Murphy’s graphic design laws

Listit baby

Did you say list? This will help: Listamatic: one list, many options

Incredible collection of lists, all with clear code and easy to implement. Also has links to lists. A real list of links to list resources. I like this linklist a lot 🙂

Wicked and worn

I do like the wicked and worn look. It’s a lot warmer than the slick look some sites present, but I guess that is a matter of taste.

A wicked and worn gallery @ Cameron Moll, who also has some very useful tutorials on his site that explain how to create the look.

The Hell they call Specs

I have seen the worst specs ever: A phonebook of descriptions, channels of content laid out in such detail that you would know exactly where which pixel should be. If you were able to read it of course.
I have also seen those very, very flexible specs. “Just make it send an e-card.. or something like that”.

The problem with specifications is that they can be too light or too heavy, and there is no way of knowing which is right for a project before you start. If you are really lucky, you work with thinking programmers who are able to correct mistakes, suggest improvements and fill in the gaps. They know the intention of the project and know what works and what doesn’t and most important: they aren’t afraid to speak up. Those people are rare, which is one of the reasons why a lot of websites and applications suck. In desktop software teams work for years on a piece of software, but on the web most projects are temporary and when it is done it is done. Not the best product matters but a cool look and acceptible coding in the shortest time possible.

The right specs differ from programmer to programmer, and one of the reasons for that is that we don’t all have the same imagination, (project) methodology, vocabulary, interest in users or even common knowledge.

Mark states it a bit bolder: there are two kinds of programmers… the assholes and the morons. Why specs matter. Some of the things he writes sound familiar, don’t they?

Pretty WordPress Template

The WordPress community is definately heating up, more and more templates and plugins are released, I just found very cool template that is very ‘today’s style’.

I’m just a bit afraid that in a while the WordPress community will be populated with ‘Kubricks’, but then again, I might release this retro theme 😉

Integrating parts of user experience

Peter Morville – co-author of the ‘Polar Bear book’ Information Architecture for the WWW- has broadened his vision and has also come to the conclusion that not a single part of the user experience can be seen seperate from the others, but he views it from the user point of view.

He calls it the honeycomb in which the Useful, Usable, Desirable, Findable, Accessible, Credible together lead to something Valuable.

It is this kind of meta-vision that professionals in the field of user experience need and that make our work a bit more understandable towards customers and co-workers in the business.

For me it was as revealing as was reading The Elements of User Experience. It is the Diagram that integrated the seperate pieces of our profession into one, and it is this beehive diagram that takes it all into the subjective realm of what the user experiences. Very useful and interesting!

Exaggerating is an art

How low can you go: A website devoted to banning the Comic Sans font.

“In 1995 Microsoft released the font Comic Sans originally designed for comic book style talk bubbles containing informational help text. Since that time the typeface has been used in countless contexts from restaurant signage to college exams to medical information. These widespread abuses of printed type threaten to erode the very foundations upon which centuries of typographic history are built”.

How dramatic huh? As if people don’t notice the silly type. It is like stating that that horrible powerpoint guy is killing creativity and makes painters and artists obsolete.

The intention to remove this font from the fontpool is a noble intention though.

ban comic sans :: Putting the Sans in Comic Sans