Posts filed under 'Design'
Serendipity User Survey
We have reached the first milestone of the Season of Usability project I’m participating in: the Serendipity user survey is now online. If you’re a Serendipity user, please participate! It’ll no doubt help us improve your blogging experience.
Season of Usability 2006/2007
I’ve had no formal training in interaction design, information architecture or usability (not many card-carrying IxDs do anyway, let alone grasshoppers like us). I’m very lucky to gain a certain amount of practical insight through the work we do at Vesess, but that hardly makes up for the lack of theoretical knowledge. That’s one of the reasons why I’m really excited about being selected for the Season of Usability 2006/2007.
Forms markup and CSS - Revisited
Earlier this year I posted an article on a CSS-based form template, originally done for the Sahana interface. It was modified based on the feedback I received from the readers who stumbled upon the article, and the final version made it to the Sahana system.
I have come to realize certain shortcomings of that template, hence this modified version.
Thank you Google
Google SoC has come to an end. This is not my official thank you note - that’ll come in a later, longer post. This is a pointer to the Thank you Google image created by Manu Cornet.
I was overjoyed to see the blue-green padma of this site, used as my avatar, all over the place - apparently it was a good source for creating the blue letters.
Pushing your limits
A few of my best friends are in Japan, doing their higher studies. One of them has come back on vacation, and while talking to him I was amazed to hear about the insane hours he’s working there. Apparently he gets two hours of sleep before heading off to work on the night shift at a restaurant, and then comes back to have one more hour of sleep before going to uni the next day. I never thought the human body could endure such torment, seeing how I get dizzy after a couple of days of sleep deprivation. I mean, it’s not like my friend is using polyphasic sleep, but here he was, fit as a fiddle, and yet sleeping only three hours a day.
Enjoying Safari
One of the many great things about Google Summer of Code is that we get a complimentary Safari account from O’Reilly. It’s a “Basic Small” account for 2 months, with 10 slots, meaning we could keep about 10 books in our personal bookshelf to be read online at a given time. I logged in today, and got lost among the 3000+ titles. It’s no easy job selecting the best from the high quality tech books O’Reilly is known for. This is a brief look at the five I’ve selected so far.
Accessforall.lk - the irony
Access for All is a commendable campaign that asks for the inclusion of disabled people when rebuilding the nation
. Having seen otherwise healthy people like my mother often having difficulties when managing stairs, I can readily understand the dire need for better informed design decisions in public infrastructure, transport and even places of employment and services. However, what seems to be sadly overlooked by this campaign is the right of access to information for all people, including the differently-abled.
Fossed
The last few weeks have been incredible, for the FOSS community at large, and personally to me as well. First, there was the FOSS-Ed for Hackers conference, where I had a wonderful time (and where Anuradha W presented me with a hard-bound copy of Free Software, Free Society, thanks mate!). And then, a couple of days ago I got confirmation from Google that I was accepted for the Summer of Code 2006. Awesomeness.
A Free Designer
Came across this interview of Issara Willenskomer in the RedHat magazine. He discusses the overly protective way designers tend to keep their design tricks secret, and why that’s totally bullshit.
CSS Reboot Guest Reviewer
Kev has called in Mr. Johnny Nice-Painter for a guest review on CSS Reboot, and he has been extremely nice to Nidahas.
Johnny seems to be especially puzzled by the invasion of black backgrounds, and Rebooter Premium.
In other news, I’m enjoying the attention of some really talented designers, who have done a stellar job with their own sites for the reboot.
Update: Kineda Magazine loves us too, and so does the man behind the whole thing.
