Category Archives:

Design

Posted on April 28, 2008 by Chris LoSacco

Need to cite this article?

Online science magazine ScienceDaily has a great little feature at the bottom of its articles: a simple, straightforward display of how to cite the article in APA or MLA format. Brilliant. This is one of those little things that goes a long way; I would have killed for this in college!

ScienceDaily Article

| Comments (1) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on July 6, 2007 by Chris LoSacco

Ux is Holistic

When developing software for the web, it's easy to forget that the end user--the human that's clicking around in a web browser--doesn't necessarily view her experience as a collection of disparate tasks (although she may), but rather as a singular experience focused on one goal, that gets harder and more complicated with each additional destination.

Let me provide an example. When signing up for a new payroll system, if our user is asked to enter a provider ID for her primary care dentist, but doesn't have the number on hand, she gets frustrated.

Terrible dentist code box in ADP's TotalSourceA simple solution is the one employed during the enrollment process for the ADP TotalSource system: just provide a hyperlink to the insurance company's web site, and let the user search for the ID.

Except not only has her enrollment experience just gotten significantly different (she's looking at a new web site in a new window... for the same task?) but the search for the ID is many, many clicks away--clicks where she's making decisions she's already made (like plan choice) and entering information she's already entered (like zip code).

A better user experience would be one that incorporates this additional and helpful functionality without exposing the stitches underneath. In software buzzspeak, this is called making the experience seamless.

The burden on the ADP development team here is a serious one. They have to take information they don't have control over, slice and dice it down to the sought after results, and present it in the existing interface. In most cases, the initial cost-to-benefit ratio here will always prohibit the effort, since typical management will say, it's okay, it gets the job done (or something to that effect).

A breath of fresh air, then, when the time comes to enter an ID and I have a list of available choices inline; when designers take the time to craft every point of the process; when the user experience is holistic.

This effect isn't lost on users. This is how to make people happy, encourage product loyalty and create a market for yourself.

| Comments (0) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on June 14, 2007 by Richard Ziade

10 Things We Can Learn From Apple

There's no need to restate the high reverence (or pangs of envy, depending on where your loyalty lies) of Apple. They have innovated, floundered, and in recent years, risen from the ashes to make one hell of a run in computing and electronics devices. Love them or hate them, you can't deny that they are adored by their fans. Their brand has reached that highly sought-after place in the world of marketing: they can do no wrong.

So how did they get there? Is it dumb luck? Or are they just much smarter than the rest of us? The most common reason given is Apple's rabid devotion to design. That is, without a doubt, a key component of Apple's success. But I think there's more to it than that. Here are ten reasons why I think Apple is so successful today, and what we can learn from them:

Continue reading "10 Things We Can Learn From Apple" »

| Comments (0) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on November 8, 2006 by Richard Ziade

Celebrate .Net Framework 3.0...With Flash

Oh the odd irony. We've been tracking the WPFblog here because, well, it's one of the most informative blogs on WPF, XBAP and the like. And today we noticed a great little animation celebrating the release of .Net Framework 3.0. So we click on it and to our bewilderment...it's in Flash.

Is this some sort of sign?

| Comments (0) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on October 27, 2006 by Richard Ziade

The Importance of User Experience

Yeh, we've gone on and on in the past about how important the user experience, but someone actually went ahead and drew an explanation. Experience Dynamics have put out an attractive poster that nicely ties good user experience with real value. Nicely done. You can download it off Flickr or buy a poster from their site.

| Comments (0) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on October 20, 2006 by Chris LoSacco

Why Interfaces Matter for Every Business

Perhaps an alternate title for this post could be "How Time Warner Won My Money with an Interface," or the equally appropriate "Why Cablevision Sucks." No matter what you call it, interface design played a big role in one company getting my monthly cable dollars over another. In fact, one could say that a UI played a significant role in convincing me to move to my new apartment. And anyone who has had to move recently knows that's persuasion.

Continue reading "Why Interfaces Matter for Every Business" »

| Comments (3) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on July 20, 2006 by Richard Ziade

Calling All (Really) Talented Developers!

Read it with your best British accent:
  • Are you tired of your current job where you hide in a cubicle and think about lunch at 10:30AM?
  • Are you looking for a cool, fun, dynamic environment where creativity and strong technology skills are rewarded?
  • Do you live (or are you willing to work) in the New York City area?
  • Are you into web application building / AJAX / Flash / Actionscript / PHP / Coldfusion?
  • Is this starting to sound like an infomercial? (Hence the need for the British accent)
If so, dust off that resume and send it along to Arc90. We'd love to hear from you.

| Comments (0) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on July 6, 2006 by Richard Ziade

10 Reasons We Love Flex 2

As the Adobe and Flash communities probably already know, Adobe's Flex platform was released recently. For the unfamiliar, Flex is a development environment that allows developers to build web applications replete with business rules, layout capabilities and other goodies that compile to Flash. The result can be a really compelling, rich end-user experience. We all know that AJAX gets all the buzz these days. We do plenty of AJAX work here at Arc90. But we’re also loving Flex 2. Here are 10 reasons why.

Continue reading "10 Reasons We Love Flex 2" »

| Comments (24) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on June 21, 2006 by Chris LoSacco

Designing For The Common Good

As designers that define product, we want to make everybody happy. Unfortunately, the larger your user population, and the broader your set of user profiles, the more difficult it becomes. The following experience highlights the danger of being everything to everyone in design.

Continue reading "Designing For The Common Good" »

| Comments (0) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on June 14, 2006 by Richard Ziade

Which "Design" Are We Talking About?

One of the themes we constantly hammer home to our clients is the value of design. It's a topic that cannot be summed up in a few sentences but rather requires a long and hopefully engaging dialogue about why investing in design is good for business. An initial hurdle we have to tackle before that conversation can happen is what exactly we mean by "design."

Continue reading "Which "Design" Are We Talking About?" »

| Comments (0) | Technorati Tags :

Posted on June 6, 2006 by Chris LoSacco

Good Interface Design = Money

As a total devotee of next generation design methodologies and web technologies (and other cool sounding -ologies), I'm psyched about blog.arc90.com and the opportunity to bring some of my insights to the party. You can call me Chris LoSacco. I'm an interface designer (among other things) at Arc90. Today, I want to step back and talk about why interface design is important at all.

Continue reading "Good Interface Design = Money" »

| Comments (1) | Technorati Tags :