architecting for collaboration

Build your community out of the box with Drupal modules. Here is an interesting video from today’s Tech Crunch. Here is a project that will be built with the opensource Drupal framework. More on Pirillo’s vision for a socially relevant network well beyond the blog and what this software can do for your own site.

The power of open to build community sites versus social networks. Which open do you hunger for and where would you shine? Which open direction would attract more outside users? Read more…

green is my colour

Still deep under the Toronto ice, but there is green here. Snow is slowly melting and St. Patrick’s Day marks the end of winter (I am hoping!). Where is green important outside of this festive day?

Green is important in how we think and act environmentally. It is a precious resource. Green photos on Flickr help remind me of this.

Green symbolizes health in design. Green plants improve the air in our homes and our office. Green is a vibrant fresh colour, much missed but just around the corner as we move into spring.

Here is a video I think sums things up very well on the green agenda and how it reached a great awareness at the very same time as green design in 2006. Video on ted.com: Talks Norman Foster: Building on the green agenda

Green is also eco-towns which promote zero-carbon housing developments.

living with new directions

Pouring over my notes from the recent conference, these are some of my thought clouds:

Remember half accessibility is worse that no accessibility

Good semantic markup

Standards compliant

Be the client

Make your product remarkable

Make everything that you do purposeful

Achieve visual organization which works wonderfully

Allow the user many ways to access and display information

Know what we need to accomplish before we even solve the problem

Intuitive design happens when the gap is minimized

Increase the user’s current knowledge

Visuals should match or mimic the behavior

Design should communicate what to do next

Intuitive Design is when current + target knowledge are at the same point and the user already knows what to do

The act of coming up with ideas and crafting the details is where innovation occurs

Gets everyone from team members to busy executives on the same page with respect to design + strategy

Think about your business model

Remember that the English web is a small space, serving other languages within your own country

Give people the ultimate freedom that they desire with your information

So where now?

Customization and more interlocking panels, grid based layouts and flexible layouts

Ajax, Javascript, Adobe Air, Widgets

Web ecosystem - where data is changing all the time

Invite people to learn and experience results in the form of visual language

Don’t get people to think. We want to think about other things

Mobile perceptions are the most exciting of all!

Fitts law, change your life (decrease distance to travel or increase target size)

Assumed events (WIMP) windows, icons, mouse and pull-down menu’s

Start focused

Echo the design language and allow proper time for the testing cycle

Iterate and respond to the many types of feedback from people

Does this design deliver satisfaction?

How does this design work online and off line?

Where do we halt people and when is halting necessary?

Find the ignition stages of the web this year

Products are social, we recommend them or not

Attention is a scarce resource; we have to fight for attention, for capacity

tag cloud from web directions north ‘08

This tag cloud sums up the recent conference and much learning. It also creates a map of 2007 and new directions to grow in. Mobile design is definitely on the horizon.

Accessibility, Ajax, Akismet, anti-spam, ap, API, BabelZilla, behavior, Better Gmail, blogging, business model,
Calendaring, Canvas, Chumby, CMS, commenting, communicate, collapsed threads, columns, conversation, creativity,
CSS, CSS3, customization, D.N.A., dentrassi, design, desktop, device, developer driven, device enabled web, Digg,
digging, Django, DOM, dynamic interfaces, ECML, feed, feedback, feedreader, Fitts law, flexible layouts, flickr,
gap, Gmail, Google, Greasemonkey, grid structures, iGoogle, information architecture, infostetics, innovation,
interaction patterns, interactive applications, intuit, intuitive, iterate, Javascript, JS, jQuery,
knowledge gap, live data sets, markup, mental models, metadata, mobile, mobile TV, nested comments, Netfront,
niche, open source, OpenID, OpenID libraries, Opera, Opera-mini, patterns, PHP, PodPress, Pownce, proof-of-concept,
Python, radio, Rails 2.0, redesign, Rememberthemilk, RSSI, Ruby, script compiler, SMS, Snap feedreader, strategy,
Stylish, Symfony, tagging, tasks, Textile, threading, training, trends, typography, user driven,
user interactions, Userscripts, Userstyles, visual fields, visual medium, web ecology, web standards, Webkit,
widgets, Word Press, YUI

new steps into 2008

A snowy new year’s day and time has stood still, with almost everything these last few lazy holiday hours. The stillness is a picture worth framing. I peer out at the snow with acceptance that no one wants to venture outside. Snow on snow… more snow, and one thought in my winter mindscape of 2007.

I wonder if changing my mind about just one thing last year, may have greatly affected where I am now. The design world is always in a constant state of change. So much that we thrive on endless possibilities day to day. Knowing that one wise change or one more variation can produce the right emotion carries me to completion in all my projects.

Perhaps for me the change that could have made the greatest difference in 2007, was the conscious decision to embrace more web 2.0 concepts because social change carries community benefit. With that the realization that people are innovation, not technology, created a much more satisfying shift.