Everything I really need to know about UX…
... I learned in Sunday School. Designing a website or mobile app is largely an act of faith. We don’t really know how users will receive our work, and even…
Why new features usually flop
Launching a successful feature demands the same skills as launching a successful product. The difference is that you also have to navigate around all of your legacy decisions, and appease…
UI walkthroughs
Clear, Rise and Solar are three examples of a trend of “gesture driven” apps with a flat UI. These are novelty apps for people lusting for the very latest in…
Fun in interaction design
People use the tools we design – sometimes every day. Our job as designers is not only to get their goals and tasks completed as easily as possible, but to…
Showing your users that you care
Voice and tone. Tone and voice. Though the words “voice” and “tone” are often used interchangeably, they’re not synonyms. Our voice makes us unique, and our tone makes us sound…
Designing the Whole
When you first launch a product, pretty much every feature you add is (or at least should be) key to achieving your larger vision. You add new modules, pages, sections,…
Applying Lean UX
We recently wrapped up a project for a startup in the digital photography space, and aside from being great design partners, one of the fun things about them was their…
UX in a minimum viable product
I gave a talk at Refresh Chicago last week, and afterwards a fellow came up to me with a question. He does UI on a team of mostly engineers, and…
Understanding typographic hierarchy
One of the most important techniques for effectively communicating (or “honoring”) content is the use of typographic hierarchy. Typographic hierarchy is a system for organizing type that establishes an order…
The 26 UX Axioms
1. It's all about people, it's not about the object UX design starts and ends with people. It's not everything, but designing for people should be your focus. We need…