Tag Archives: UX

Swap.com Search Fail

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Okay, I am kind of little frugal when it comes to buying books, I do look for a good deal or willing to buy it used online mostly from Amazon.com until and unless if it is not available anywhere in Used condition, then my second choice is Swap.com, a cool website where you can trade-in your unwanted CDs, DVDs, Video Games and Books with something you want. Pretty cool.

However I hate there search feature, they implemented in such a way that it won’t search the “Complete Title”. Instead the search engine at Swap.com is actually using the first three words of the book. Good stuff is it does offer the auto-complete. But sometime when you copy paste the desired book name in to the search box and try to search the desired keyword at Swap.com you will be disappointed.

Check out the following video:

I think the best way to implement the search is using the “Like” Feature and and also make sure the “:” is not hurting your Search Queries, sometime those special character become too annoying and best way to deal with them is encode them in HTML and then decode them in to the unicode for your database query related operation.

If you have more ideas about Search Logics and Algorithm please do let me know in the comments section.

Thanks

Keep the basic intact, case of iPhone App.

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When you buy an app you expect some basic feature to work fine, in case of app that related to your culture or religion you expect it adhere the basics of the captioned context.

In terms of iPray iPhone App, all is good: Prayer Timings, City Search (although it is clumsy, but it will work) and Push Notification about Prayer Time .

However the one big caveat and it is really astonishing. Let me briefly describe it, in Islam, there is a prayer call “Adhan” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adhan). Muslim are supposed to be praying 5 times a day, that is Fajar (Dawn to sunrise), Zuhar (After true noon), Asr (Afternoon), Maghrib (Right after sunset until darkness) and Isha (Dusk until Midnight). So the Adhan is called before every prayer and in Fajar Prayer Adhan, there are specific words which every Prayer Caller (Muezzin) supposed to recite and it is the way Prophet Muhammad Peace Be Upon Him prescribed. But in iPray App by Guided Ways they are “Fajar Adhan”. So why this basic Fajar Adhan is missing in this app?

In my opinion they didn’t do any kind of Usability Testing/User Acceptance Testing OR may be they missed it intentionally for the sake of Space? I highly doubt it, because if some Muslim downloading any app that helps them to do their religious duty they expect the basic without any compromise.

The best way to use this app if you already downloaded this app then to turn off any Adhan Notification for Fajar and select regular Beep Alarm for the Fajar Adhan. Also please submit your reviews to their iPhone App Page and let them know that they should not miss the basics.

My Idea Wall

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Today I start using the Posterous Blogging Service for one single purpose, to bookmark my finds in Blog Style. Although there are many public bookmarking services out there, however I need something more like Blog and able to make the “Tweet Shout” while doing it. So there you go :

http://mmudassir.posterous.com/

It will contain all articles, images and videos/audios  that I will be using for my UX, UI, Design and  Idea development.

UX Techniques & Methods: Curated here…

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After reading couple of books and articles for past 11 months, I realized what now I am looking for is the “Practical Approach” toward the UX integration in to the following:

  1. Before accepting a project or developing on my own idea I should think about the Business Strategy and how the Design Strategy can align with it.
  2. Doing “Research” plus “Design Research” once all the ducks lined up.
  3. Then curate all the detail according to the Strategy and Research result in to a meaningful content.
  4. Finally craft the best experience by implementing all the acquired knowledge from Research & Contents that you generated on step 3.

So far so good, however the following methods curated by people who are gurus in this field and agencies who care about user-centered design. I just collected them from different UX Forums for the sake of reference just in case if someone is looking for.

UXBASIS box
www.uxbasis.com

What Is User Experience Design? Overview, Tools And Resources
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/10/05/what-is-user-experience-design-overview-tools-and-resources/

Jakob Neilsen Thoughts
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/

UPA’s Usability Body of Knowledge
http://www.usabilitybok.org/methods (with awesomeness of How-to
implementation as well!)

UsabilityNet’s interactive methods table
http://www.usabilitynet.org/tools/methods.htm

Usability.gov has a great visual map of ux methods
http://www.usability.gov/methods/process.html

Web Form Design – Luke Wroblewski @ UX Book Club San Francisco

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Where: UX Book Club San Francisco

Book: Web Form Design – Luke Wroblewski

Date: November 16, 2010

Book structure

(informal table of contents)

FORM STRUCTURE

The Design of Forms – Form Design matters, The impact of Form Design, Design considerations. Form Organization What to include, Have a conversation, Organizing content, Group Distinctions Path to Completion Name that Form, Start Pages, Clear scan lines, Minimal Distractions, Progress indicators, Tabbing

FORM ELEMENTS

Labels Label alignment, Top-aligned labels, Right-aligned labels, Left-aligned labels, Labels Within inputs, Mixed alignments Input Fields Types of input Fields, Field lengths, Required Fields, Input groups, Flexible inputs Actions Primary and secondary actions, Placement, Actions in Progress, Agree and submit Help Text When to help, Automatic inline help, User-activated inline help, User-activated section help, Secure transactions Errors and Success Errors, Success, No Dead ends

FORM INTERACTION

Inline Validation Confirmation, Suggestions, Limits Unnecessary Inputs Removing questions, Smart Defaults, Personalized Defaults, Additional Inputs Inline additions, Overlays, Progressive engagement Selection-Dependent Inputs Page-level selection, Horizontal tabs, Vertical tabs, Drop-Down list, Expose below radio buttons, Expose Within radio buttons, Exposed inactive, Exposed groups Gradual Engagement Signing Up, Getting engaged What’s Next? The Disappearing Form, The changing Form, Getting it built

Useful Links:

Data Monday: Input Matters on Mobile
http://www.lukew.com/ff/entry.asp?1188

BEST PRACTICES FOR FORM DESIGN
http://www.lukew.com/resources/articles/WebForms_LukeW.pdf

Sign-up Form Must Die
http://www.lukew.com/presos/preso.asp?25

Text Input on Mobile is Hard But…
http://www.lukew.com/ff/entry.asp?1187

Input: Moving Beyond Forms
http://www.lukew.com/presos/preso.asp?22

Web Form Design in Action
http://www.lukew.com/presos/preso.asp?20

Don’t Put Hints Inside Text Boxes in Web Forms By Caroline Jarrett
http://www.uxmatters.com/mt/archives/2010/03/dont-put-hints-inside-text-boxes-in-web-forms.php

Label Alignment in Long Forms | Paper Prototyping for Engineers
http://www.uxmatters.com/mt/archives/2010/01/label-alignment-in-long-forms-paper-prototyping-for-engineers.php

Form vs. Function
http://www.digital-web.com/articles/form_vs_function/

Web Form Designs Examples:

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/04/17/web-form-design-modern-solutions-and-creative-ideas/
Blog Comments Design:

http://www.smileycat.com/design_elements/blog_comment_forms/index.php?page=1

Solving the “Repeat Email Address” Form Issue . May Be. (By Russ Unger & Jonathan Knoll)
http://www.userglue.com/blog/2009/09/09/solving-the-repeat-email-address-form-issue-maybe/

Useful links related to the development of the book:
http://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/webforms/blog/

http://www.lukew.com/ff/archive.asp?tag&forms

Interfaces and Future

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These days tap tap, flick left & right, touch and hold becomes our natural interaction on mobile devices, now here comes the Kinect, no touchy touchy all waving the gestures in the air, and making sure  device attached to it do understand and translate the gestures.

Then we just entering in to the “3D” Hologram Interface, and the first entry in this category that is portable so far I can see ishttp://gizmodo.com/5040631/3d-app-converts-iphone-into-window-to-alternative-world . So that makes me think that evolution is speeding at 100 MPH and if we keep going in this direction, the Minority Report Interface, Star Trek like Gadgets will be a toy.

Let see how things will surprise us, till then we can enjoy the happiness of “tap tap, flick left & right, touch and hold” bliss and the big treat on this Christmas with Kinect.

Kinect & Possibilities

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Kinect is here, and it is becoming Hackers’ Delight. Check out the cool hack they did on it:

http://gizmodo.com/5688319/minority-report-courtesy-of-kinect
http://gizmodo.com/5687874/microsoft-kinect-hacked-to-run-on-mac-os-x

Now what can be done is totally depend on your imagination, for instance as I was thinking about the possible use of Kinect in User Experience arena and here are my thoughts/ideas:

The 50″ Big White-board:

Hold an imaginary Marker and wave in a Writing Motion to draw your Mockups on virtual whiteboard, it can be anything. You can also use the tool “Post-It” notes and sort them out, dictate your wordings using Voice Recognition, and then start brainstorming your idea by waving gestures! Isn’t it amazing!?

Mind-Mapping

On the left side of your 50″ LCD TV you can have a Mindmap controls, and then drag them by selecting them (using the wave gesture) and then place them. However I am still not sure how we will type the content in the Mindmap Boxes? I think Voice-Recognition will be helpful here, but need to think more in detail.

Card Sorting Landscape:

You first define the Logical Grouping and then Virtual Index Cards are given to the selected person, sort it under the Logical Grouping accordingly and then submit the result, it is fun and cheerful experience.

Kinect Balsamiq

I think it will be fun project to do, when implementing the Kinect interface on Balsamiq. Would be fun to draw wireframes by “Waving”.

There are many more possibilities, what’s yours?