Archive for the ‘Musings’ Category
How to learn to become a User Experience Designer?
Leave a CommentOr, maybe how to learn just one factor of being a UX designer — interface designer, interaction designer, or content designer? Here in Philippines, schools or classes for designing for web or mobile or any software application for that matter is very unheard of (well for me). So it will be mostly self-learning:
- You can start with usability books by Steve Krug – but the thing with Krug’s books is that they are mostly about websites (note that websites are different from web apps). If you are into creating software applications, I guess it’s best you start with Alan Cooper’s book.
- If you think books are too expensive, and you do not have much patience of reading them. Try following designers’ blogs or even just their tweets. Creating Passionate Users blog by Kathy Sierra is a nice fun read — it’s such a waste that she stopped blogging. If you’re into eye-candy designs, you can check Smashing Magazine – from there you will find a good list of different designers who you can follow.
- Use as many software applications you can — from desktop to web to mobile and all sorts of applications. Then, observe how these applications are put up. You would notice that one application may be good at their interface design, another may be good at their workflow design, another maybe good at their content design. Just now, I notice that one thing that makes 37signals (note: I’m not a big fan of 37signals) is their content design. Their copywrite , their short instruction, their eeny weeny warning texts are simply delightful. So be mindful and observant in using applications – from their landing page, to sign up, to their settings page.
Welcome Back Myself
Exactly 1 year and 1 day from my last post, I’m back. I’d been meaning to just shut this blog down, and just transfer all the posts here to my personal-musings blog but I just did not have time to do it. One reason why I like to remove this blog because I came to accept that I’m just not fit for user experience (UX) designing. Add to that I’m from a place, Cebu, Philippines, where UX is %^$#%^#$%^$#% to everyone.
So what happen to me in a year:
* 2 web application products that were shelved off. I never see it as failure but as a very good learning experience. I guess I learned a lot of great deal about user experience design and such. In a way, I could say I have now more mature view about UX.
* 2 tech blogs focusing on Philippine scene which I’ll also be resurrecting soon from being shelved off. I really really love those 2 blogs. So help me, God.
My plan for this blog is, as usual, I’ll talk about my own view of user experience. I’ll try to write stuff that will make more sense for a 3rd-world country setting. Then, I’ll be posting here user interfaces and designs I find delightful. I guess I will be doing most of the latter since that’s easier to do.
The Right Way to Wireframe – Axure Edition
This really looks good. But the thing is this is not usually how others work, not in our case do. With everybody in the team all developers, mostly they just code away then rewrite. Though, I believe this is a better way to do it. But I guess there are 1001 ways to kill an application. =)
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About Face 3
This book has been sitting on my desk for a month already but I keep delaying reading it. Instead I hop from one usability book to design related book to find answers to my question — How to design a workflow of a complex software application which is google to be used by a certain group of people but can also be applicable to a broader group of people?
I kind of ran out of books, plus all the previous books I read always makes reference to About Face of Alan Cooper so finally I decided tocut the chase, and pore myself into this ‘textbook.’ And, boy do I want to bang my head! Not because the book is bad. But because it is too beautiful, I want tosold myself for nt directly picking it up. I kind of ‘wasted’ time on other books (but not really. Books are always a treasure.)
It is something I want to finish fast so I could learn fast. But at the same time, it is something I want to take it slow — to relish the moments, to read and re-read it until I miss nothing.
I just read Chapter 1 but I learned basic important matter of software designing and that is Goal-oriented Design. Aesthetics and task-centered are all cotton-candy techy terms. It does not relate to best products. It’s the Goal-Oriented Design.
I promise to post a summary of important thoughts for every chapter so expect it from my future posts here.
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