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7 UX Deliverables: What will I be making as a UX designer?

Posted on November 9, 2018 by admin

What does a UX designer actually produce? Here, we will explore the concept of UX Deliverables, a term that describes the outputs of a UX design process during its various stages. The deliverables produced by UX designers vary according to their role in the design team and also depending on the methods and tools used by each role. We will provide an overview here of some of the most common types of deliverables.

A UX design process typically follows something similar to a design thinking approach, which consists of five basic phases:

  • Empathize with the users (learning about the audience)
  • Define the problem (identifying the users’ needs)
  • Ideate (generating ideas for design)
  • Prototype (turning ideas into concrete examples)
  • Test (evaluating the design)

The first two phases (empathizing and defining the problem) are often grouped into the term “User Research” – i.e., understanding both the nature of the users and how this affects their needs. A number of tools and methods can be used in each phase. Each tool or method might produce a different type of output (UX deliverable), but here we will focus on some of the most commonly used types to give you an overview of what you might be expected to produce in a UX design career.

User Research Deliverables

Personas

A persona is a fictional character which the designers build as a sort of user stereotype. It represents the typical users, their goals, motivations, frustrations and skills. Other information such as demographics and education backgrounds complete the persona. Depending on the scope of the projects, designers will generate a number of different personas to capture as wide a part of the audience as possible. Generating personas helps designers empathize with the users and demonstrate a thorough understanding of who they are and what they want to achieve.

Storyboards

A storyboard is an idea borrowed from the movie industry. It essentially consists of a comic strip, outlining the user’s actions and circumstances under which these are performed. The power of this idea is that it doesn’t only demonstrate what the user does, but it also reveals the environment, which might be affecting how or why the user does something.

Customer Journey Map

A customer journey map (also known as an experience map) is a diagram that represents the steps (i.e., the process) taken by a user to meet a specific goal. By laying the process out along a timeline, the designers can understand the changes in context as well as the motivations, problems and needs along the way. By identifying the major stumbling blocks for users, the designers can better relate to their problems and begin to see where a product or service might fit along the way to help the user.

Ideation Deliverables

Brainstorming

Brainstorming is a process whereby a team of designers generate ideas about how to address the issues and opportunities identified in the user research phase. The concept here hinges on the generation of as many ideas as possible (even if they are completely wild) so that the designers can later sift through these and reduce them to the ideas that seem most promising. A central point is that the team members are free to explore all angles and realms; indeed, the best solutions can sometimes sprout from the craziest-sounding notions.

User Flow

A user flow diagram is a simple chart outlining the steps that a user has to take with your product or service in order to meet a goal. In contrast to the customer journey map, the user flow diagram considers only what happens with your product (that is to say, ignoring all external factors). These diagrams can help designers quickly evaluate the efficiency of the process needed to achieve a user goal and can help pinpoint the “how” (i.e., execution) of the great ideas identified through brainstorming.

Prototyping Deliverables

Sitemaps

Sitemaps show the hierarchy and navigation structure of a website. Such maps are also often produced for mobile apps, as well. They serve to show how the content will be organized into “screens” or sections, and how the user may transition from one section of your service to another.

Low-fidelity prototypes

Once you have your sitemaps ready, you can begin to sketch how the content will be laid out on each screen. A low-fidelity prototype omits any visual design details and serves as a rough guide to allow designers to get a feel of how and where they should place content. Low-fidelity prototypes can start as hand-drawn sketches (which are great, because they are fast and cheap to produce, so you can easily throw them away if you change your mind) and later refined as computer-drawn wireframes, which are more faithful to the presentation of information on a real screen, but still lacking visual design details.

High-fidelity prototypes

These prototypes are a step up from low-fidelity prototypes. Often they are called pixel-perfect prototypes because they try to show all the visual and typographic design details of a product, as it would be shown on a real screen. They take into consideration physical screen dimensions and are produced in a size that corresponds to the physical device’s size. Although these require a lot more time to produce compared with low-fidelity prototypes, they are often the type of illustration that you would want to show to a customer or stakeholder.

Interactive prototypes

The low- and high-fidelity prototypes discussed above are little more than a collection of static images. To better evaluate your designs, you might turn these prototypes into an interactive demonstration, aimed at showcasing how the interaction might work with these. Commercial prototyping software allows you to define clickable areas, transitions and events, in order to produce an interactive prototype that captures the user flow process and demonstrates interactivity, without having to write a single line of code. In some cases, you can use a much simpler tool, such as PowerPoint or Keynote. Even better, you can use these interactive prototypes in early user tests, before any code has even been written. This way, you can make sure that your design is likely to work well, before committing to the expensive and laborious process of developing code.

 

Evaluation Deliverables

Usability report

Once you have a design that is implemented (even if only as an interactive prototype), you can begin to run some evaluations of this design with real users. Evaluation can take many shapes and forms. You can have some users try out your design and then interview them, or work with them in a focus group: This is an example of qualitative evaluation. You could bring users into a lab and ask them to accomplish specific tasks with your prototype, while you measure things such as the number of errors, number of clicks, or time taken to complete the task. In the lab, you can use special equipment, such as eye-tracking cameras, to see where your users’ attention is spent while navigating a particular design. You could also ask them to perform the same task using prototypes that offer alternative design implementations, so you can compare them and see which design is better (known as A/B testing).

There are many ways to evaluate a design. No matter what you end up doing for evaluation, you will have to summarize your findings into a usability report. A complete usability report typically contains the following sections:

  • Background summary: what you tested, where and when, the tools and equipment that you used and who was involved in the research
  • Methodology: how you went about the evaluation, what tasks you asked the users to perform, what data was collected, what scenarios were used, who the participants were and their demographics
  • Test results: an analysis of all the data collected, including illustrations such as bar charts and textual descriptions of the findings, and user comments that might be particularly illustrative or enlightening. Depending on whom you are communicating the report to, this section may contain some more technical details, such as the type of statistical analyses used.
  • Findings and Recommendations: what do you recommend, based on the data that you collected and your findings? Write down what worked well, what didn’t and why. State what should be done next to improve the design or move forward with the process.

Remember that a usability report might be directed towards a number of other roles in your project. Managers will probably just need an executive summary and a statement of how the findings impact the overall project timeline. Other designers will be more interested in how you carried out your evaluation and would like all the details. Developers are probably only interested in your findings and recommendations. Ensure that your report is structured and worded appropriately for its audience.

Analytics report

When a designed product has been released and has been running for a while, your company might make some usage analytics data available to you. Looking into this data may offer great insights into how to improve usability, particularly if this data contains users’ transitions and behaviors in your product.

For example, you might find that many users in an e-commerce website are not registering to complete a purchase. Does it mean that the registration process is not easy enough? Does it mean that they don’t see there is such an option? An analytics report contains the insights from this data and highlights areas where the design might be improved. While it is tempting to just put in the nice visuals and charts produced automatically by products such as Google Analytics, the UX designer’s job is not just to lay down the facts but also to interpret them. So, your report must contain the data, but also plausible explanations and recommendations on what to do. It’s also a useful record so that you can see the impact that design changes might have had on your website, after you have identified issues and attempted to address them.

The Take Away

In a 2015 article for the Norman Nielsen group, UX specialist Page Laubheimer analyzed the type of UX deliverable that UX designers most frequently reported as being asked to create as part of their role. Wireframes and prototypes were reported to be most commonly produced, followed by flowcharts, site maps, and usability/analytics reports.

These are what we consider to be “classic” UX deliverables, but one important point to keep in mind is that while these deliverables are produced and shared with others, many other types of deliverables will be produced but never shared (hence ranking lower in this study). In order to produce a wireframe, should a designer not have a complete understanding of the users and their needs? Often, management, clients and other team members are interested only in the type of deliverable that helps them advance their tasks, as well. Given this, the types of the deliverables you produce might need to be “tuned” to whom you are going to share them with, too.

In your role as a UX designer, you will invariably have to produce deliverables for each stage of the design thinking process. Whether you keep these to yourself or share them with others, you need to practice your skills in as wide an array of tools and methodologies as possible, and become familiar with all the types of UX deliverables out there.

Source: www.interaction-design.org

Author: Andreas Komninos

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15 Guiding Principles for UX Researchers

Posted on November 8, 2018 by admin

We’ve found that a lot of first time UX researchers have similar questions and concerns when they start working in UX design. So, we thought we’d round up and tackle some of the most common questions to form a set of useful principles for UX researchers. Of course, this isn’t a complete guide to UX research(there are some fairly weighty tomes out there which do that) but it’s a good starting place to answer some of those nagging UX questions.

Mix It Up

The best researchers don’t use a single tool to do their research. They take a host of different methods, tools, etc. and then mix them together. This gives you a much greater chance of finding the actual issues and then being able to fix them.

It’s Easier To Find “You Got it Wrong”

Research can quickly help us work out when we’ve got something wrong. If you add a new feature and your first five research participants hate it – there’s probably a problem. However, a hundred people can use something without comment and it may still not work.

You Can’t Standardize Sample Sizes For All Your Research

Sorry, but sample sizes need to be calculated based on the risks you’re willing to assume in any given piece of research and based on the type of research you’re carrying out. Don’t try and use a single size for all of your research – it’s a flawed approach.

Testing With Just One User is Not Pointless

Imagine you’re creating a new word-processing package and you sit down with your first user and they try to save a document and you see that the process is broken. How many more users do you need to test that with? None, right? Some problems are universal and it only takes one user to point them out.

Increase Sample Sizes for Better Accuracy

The bigger your sample size, the more likely your data is to be accurate. There’s a general rule of thumb that says to double the accuracy you have to increase the sample size by a factor of four!

Randomizing Can Overcome Research Design Flaws

If you can change the order of questions, responses, process flow, etc. then do it. The more random the path you take – the more likely it is that you’re going to get consistency and minimize experimental design flaws.

Research Results Belong to No-One

All that data you’re collecting? It’s not yours. It’s not your team’s. It’s the company’s. The more you get your user experience research out into the company as a whole – the more likely it is that your company will start focusing on user needs as a priority. Don’t create a UX silo in your business; let the data flow and reap the rewards.

Scale Ratings In Questions Aren’t That Important

Sure, there are plenty of arguments about whether an x-point scale is more accurate than a y-point scale and whether you should have a neutral rating or not. None of them are important enough to spend more than 5 minutes worrying over – pick a scale and do the research already.

Participants Need to Reflect Personas

Not everyone is a user or even likely user of your product. Not every user fits your target market. Get your user personas out and recruit to the persona – that way you have the most chance of getting results that actually work for your target users. You can’t please all the people all of the time and UX professionals shouldn’t even try to.

What They Say vs. What They Do

It’s often said that what people do is what matters and not what they say. We don’t agree. You need to measure both what people say and what they do. Then you can explore the reasons for the disconnection between the two positions. Sometimes people really do want what they say they want and sometimes they don’t. Knowing when those things are true matters to the user experience.

Keep Growing Your Toolkit

There are going to be new ideas and methods floating out there for a long time to come. Don’t dismiss them without trying them. Even if they suck, you’ll have learned that they suck rather than assuming it. In many cases even the worst tools can offer reasonable insights if they’re adapted properly.

Usability – A Polite Fiction?

It is impossible to measure usability. What we can measure is when something is not usable. Those measures are fluid – they change from product to product, user to user and UX researcher to UX researcher. That’s OK, finding problems is part of what research is about. We already know it’s much harder to show there is no problem than to find a problem.

Keep Reports Short

Sure, the method was amazing and innovative and the results were incredible but… you don’t need to write a book to get that across. If you want your research to have wide value in the organization keep your reports to a minimum. However, don’t let that stop you from creating more detailed work as a learning tool within your own environment or from writing that book if you intend to publish it commercially.

Be Aware that Observers Observe Differently

There’s a reason police treat eyewitness testimony with a certain healthy scepticism. People see what they’re going to see and rarely will witnesses see the same things. That’s not a major problem; in fact, it means that adding observers may increase the overall success of research – if you all identify different problems, that’s better for the users (as long as you intend to fix all those problems, of course).

And don’t forget that the act of observation may also change the results that you get.

Cults of Personality Suck

There are a ton of UX gurus out there. Some will be highly trendy today and treated with contempt tomorrow or vice-versa. There’s no one “right” way to be a UX researcher; ignore the name attached to UX ideas and focus on the underlying idea instead and treat everything with a healthy dose of scepticism and interest.

Source: www.interaction-design.org

 

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Paging, Scrolling, and Infinite Scroll

Posted on November 7, 2018 by admin

As I’ve noted many times before, people do notnecessarily read left to right—and certainly, not in anything that is reliably like an F-pattern. However, once people find your content, they do reliably read it from top to bottom.

Wrapping text to the next line, continuing line after line, and presenting lists of discrete items of information are the two safe, reliable ways of designing digital content, especially for small mobile devices.

But what about when your content goes on and on? While there’s great concern about the right way of displaying arbitrary amounts of information, people make a lot of design decisions on the basis of hearsay, opinion, fear, or inertia. Plus, they assess existing design patterns based on incomplete data or bad implementations.

People Scroll

The first corollary of people reading from top to bottom is that people scroll. Designers don’t need to worry about scroll-bar visibility or providing little animations that tell users to scroll. People already know they need to scroll, and they generally scroll to explore the content on any page you offer to them.

Of course, it is possible to inadvertently create a false bottom for a page, where the user interface makes it look like the page ends, discouraging the user from trying to scroll any further. But it’s not hard to avoid this problem, so it’s not something we typically encounter anymore.

More common is the opposite situation, where people wonder whether they have reached the end of a page. So always provide plenty of extra space beneath the end of the content to make this clear—and to encourage people to scroll the content to the middle of the screen where they can read it more easily.

When a Page Doesn’t Work

The earliest useful microcomputers mapped the display of content to the dimensions of the screen. The page size was the same as the size of the monitor’s viewport. If you needed to display more information than would fit on the screen, the user would have to issue a command to view the next page of content.

However, since at least the mid ’80s, computers have had windowing systems. So, by the time the Web came about, computers could already load arbitrary amounts of data into a page that is larger than the viewport, allowing users to just scroll, and this was the obvious way to build almost every digital system.

Designers could create a page that was full of all sorts of information and just assume that everyone would scroll down to see more. This has worked great. Today, most news articles and other content comprises just one page.

You can use clever design and code to sidestep issues with loading performance. For example, Amazon product-detail pages are very long, but users think they load quickly because what is visible at the top of the page loads immediately while the rest of the content on the page loads as it can—that is, employs a lazy loading design pattern.

Nevertheless, it is sometimes impractical to load all search results or other long lists of data on just one page. What should you do then? There are three design options in this case:

  1. Paging
  2. Automatic infinite scroll
  3. Manual infinite scroll

Paging

Paging simply means displaying and enabling users to navigate a series of pages that contain contiguous chunks of content. A specific number of items in a list, rows of a table, or lines of another type of content load on each page. A set of pagination controls appears on the page, usually right after the content itself, indicating the current page and enabling users to access other pages.

Pagination controls can vary almost infinitely. You can list the other pages, provide Previous and Next buttons, allow jumping to specific pages, and combine these elements in various ways. You can also duplicate these controls at the top of each content area to help orient the user, but this can sometimes be counterproductive. However, paging is all too often the default design choice—maybe because a lot of development practices are stuck in the past. However, just because this is the traditional design option that doesn’t make it safe, and in many cases, its problems outweigh its benefits.

Benefits of Paging

  • Paging may be the default approach. Paging is built into a lot of frameworks, so developers assume this behavior is optimal. Unless you want to argue with them, you’ll get lots of paging.
  • Paging limits user choice. This can be a good thing. Google, for one, uses paging to make people focus on the top few search results because they know almost all good results are there. You can reduce the paradox of choice simply by restricting easy access to options.
  • Marketing can easily measure clicks. Measuring scrolls is harder—though not impossible. Marketing is happy counting clicks. This is why some news sources make you click to read more. They can measure each click, thinking they’ll have a better engagement number to tell their bosses and investors.

Problems with Paging

  • Users still have to scroll. Unlike early computers, page boundaries never line up with the viewport, so the user has to scroll by some amount to read the content, then press a button to see more, and so on.
  • Pagination controls vary widely in their form and function.Therefore, every user must learn their position and modes of interaction for every new site and app.
  • Having too many controls can be confusing. They don’t give users more actual choices, but add complexity, so discourage users from interacting at all.
  • Users perceive page loading as slow and burdensome. This can discourage interaction with pagination controls. Having to click something further limits users’ desire to view anything beyond the first page of content.
  • Users may not notice the pagination controls. They might assume that the content that is currently visible is all that is available.
  • Page loading tends to be slow. This is especially true when loading entire pages from scratch rather than refreshing only the content area. If users typically display multiple pages, it is much less efficient to load entire pages.
  • Multiple selection, or batch selection, has insurmountable issues.Users cannot tell whether selection applies per page or for the whole list of results. I have worked on solving this problem for 20 years and nothing has helped much.

Automatic Infinite Scroll

Before bound books with pages existed, there were scrolls. The natural way to get more content is just to read more content. Remember, people scroll.

Infinite scroll pretends to display all the content in a single list on a single page, but it’s faking this. It actually breaks the content into little chunks. Really, automatic infinite scroll is just paging with the automatic display of the next page of content, whose content it adds to the current page.

To avoid users’ perceiving any delay, any infinite-scroll system should prefetch the next most likely content users would see when scrolling. The amount of content it loads and prefetches must be calculated based on both the type of content and the expected—or observed—user behavior. Optimized prefetching can actually involve less data transfer than a paging system.

There has been a lot of badmouthing of infinite scroll, but these negative perceptions are all based on bad implementations. Losing the position of an item the user tapped or clicked when the user returns to an infinite scroll list is a result of bad design and coding choices, not an issue that is intrinsic to this pattern.

Benefits of Automatic Infinite Scroll

  • It provides entirely natural browsing of content. The user need only scroll.
  • Batch selection is clear to users. All selections are from a single list.
  • It provides the best possible performance. This is especially important for displaying large amounts of information
  • Mobile apps can support alternative scrolling functions. These include indexed fast user scrolling.

Problems with Automatic Infinite Scroll

  • It can result in unnatural, frustrating behaviors. These occur if automatic infinite scroll is not implemented correctly.
  • Its proper function adds implementation complexity. Automatic infinite scroll requires significant coordination between the presentation-layer code, APIs or Web services, and data storage.
  • You must design entire page templates to support infinite scroll.Otherwise, an implementation can prevent users from accessing the bottom of a page, slow access to the top of the page, and cause users to become disoriented.
  • Scroll-bar size and position reflect only what content has loaded.Since the scroll-bar size and position don’t reflect the length of the entire list, users may become confused about where they are in a list.

Manual Infinite Scroll

One simple change to infinite scroll can make a lot of things easier and alleviate a lot of the concerns product teams and developers have about it: making it manual. Manual infinite scroll simply removes the automatic function, making the user click or tap a button or link to load the next chunk of data.

Although automatic infinite scroll usually works fine, it does take some effort to implement it correctly. Therefore, it has a bad reputation that is unfounded. Acknowledging this can help you persuade everyone on your project to get 90% of the way to a good design solution.

Because a button or link to load more content is so important to this function, you must design it well. The best solution on a mobile device seems to be for it to take up an entire row below the content or at the end of a list, clearly affording a tappable target.

For example, in a list view or table, this affordance might say something such as “Show next 20.” I prefer show instead of load or anything else because it’s a user-facing control. The system loads content so it can showthat content to the user. These subtle wording distinctions help more than you might think.

This function should communicate exactly how many more items or rows will load, but make sure this is not hard coded to ensure it always provides an accurate value, not just the typical page size.

Benefits of Manual Infinite Scroll

  • Scrolling through content provides quite a natural browsing experience. The user can scroll through all available content on the page.
  • Batch selection is clear to users. All selections are from a single list.
  • It is conceptually similar to paging. Therefore, manual infinite scroll is an easy sale to database and software-development engineers.

Problems with Manual Infinite Scroll

  • The user must press a button to load content. Thus, manual infinite scroll is more labor intensive than automatic infinite scroll.
  • It can result in unnatural, frustrating behaviors. These occur if manual infinite scroll is not implemented correctly.
  • Its proper function adds implementation complexity. Manual infinite scroll requires significant coordination between the presentation-layer code, APIs or Web services, and data storage.
  • You must design entire page templates to support infinite scroll.Otherwise, an implementation can prevent users from accessing the bottom of a page, slow access to the top of the page, and cause users to become disoriented.
  • It does not work well with indexed scrolling functions. Such alternative scrolling functions are not supported adequately.

Floating Controls

A valid concern for many long pages, especially those with infinite scroll, is the disappearance of key content or functionality. What if scrolling makes the use lose context because the header is outside the viewport? What if a user doesn’t notice a button way down at the bottom of the page so doesn’t submit a form?

The answer isn’t shorter pages, but a floating masthead and chyron. These floating elements have a fixed position in the viewport, and the page content visible in the middle of the screen moves beneath them.

The masthead is at the top of the screen. It need not be just the branding and app name, but can extend to include page titles, tabs, and other information that is important to maintain context.

The chyron is a footer for an app or site. However, it should never include the normal elements of a traditional Web-site footer. A chyron should remain at the bottom of the viewport only if it provides status, buttons, or control functions.

Design Rather Than Just Choose Your Solution

So which solution is best? I really can’t tell you. Your app or Web site is not like any other. For example, Google has its own unique requirements, and studies of user behaviors on sales sites are not especially relevant to the design of other types of sites.

Always design a solution. Don’t just choose a solution from the two options the framework provides. While this article details the three key scrolling options, there are variations and other ways of designing them. Occasionally, variants such as side-to-side scrolling are appropriate. Plus, there may be entirely different solutions.

Don’t judge a solution just because you love or hate it personally. Look deeper and discover the best solution for a particular app or site. Work with your whole team to define requirements and understand constraints.

Do not assume that anything about technology constraints is true. Look harder. I recently worked on a control panel with a 1-bit, or black-and-white, screen. Everyone assumed it would have to be characters only and not scrollable, but as cheap as the screen was, it had a modern technology core and could both display graphics and scroll windows. So, even for that screen, we could make the design follow modern principles.

Source: www.uxmatters.com

Author – Steven Hoober

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Facebook timeline Redesign — Case study

Posted on November 2, 2018 by admin

Facebook featured the timeline during 2011, which is a fair option of looking back through one’s historic info. However, most people refrain from using it, for being practically too complicated. Some people would certainly like an option of methodically searching through their past information on Facebook, such as: events, photos or statuses etc…

Current concept behind Facebook’s time line

Facebook started to address user profiles chronologically, which is no doubt ingenuous. The upper left menu’s searching options are satisfactory, only apart the absence of options to search and sort data by “month”.

My predicament started when I tried to track down a 3 years old status I posted. In my opinion, Facebook does not refer to the timeline as data retrievable, but as a plain, straightforward, extended bulletin with very little options of extracting data.

To my personal view — timeline search options should be extended:

1. Facebook has existed for 12 years now. It is hard to tell now what will be Facebook’s objectives product wise, or will they include options of data retrieval.

2. It is imperative that both users and platform owner will avail user information accumulated through the years. For instance, a 17 years old blogger racking 3 posts every day (in as much a humble estimation), will muster 21 posts every week, and more than 84 statuses every month.

3. Such a blogger who might be willing to promote predated payable posts or statuses will currently only have a thumbnail or the feed presentation to look into and if she or he want to find a specific post it is inconvenient for them.

4. A presentation of listed information will be more conducive in that case.

Current navigation and design of the timeline

Time line hasn’t been reviewed or revised since its announcement on 2011. Current data presentation is insufficient: the only two options allow thumbnail view and feed view while both lack a “list” search view.

Thumbnail view might suit those whose posts are “photo associated “- where the text is hidden and it unravels only when users scroll above it. However Such a time consuming endeavour is impractical.

and the browse by feed view option is tiresome because one needs to scroll endlessly till they get to the desired info.

Source – uxplanet.org

Author – Nitai Lev Oren

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Minimalist Graphic Design: 10 Examples & Tips

Posted on October 31, 2018 by admin

Minimalist design is simple. But it is not boring. Just because a minimal style design often lacks some of the embellishments or color palettes or crazy typefaces in other projects, doesn’t mean it isn’t great to look at. In fact, designs featuring minimalism can be some of the most beautiful and usable websites around.

And even though minimalism is a design style of itself, what types of elements show up in these projects and how they are used tend to change over time. You might call them minimalism trends. Here’s a look at 10 tips for creating a modern minimalist graphic design with examples.

1. Keep It Simple

The key to a minimalist graphic design is simplicity.

But that doesn’t always mean it is easy to design. Sometimes the simplest visual and functional designs are actually quite complicated to develop. (It can take a lot of work to look so easy.)

To help streamline elements and keep the design simple, start with a font and color palette that’s rather limited. Consider a key element that will serve as the visual in the minimalist graphic design and focus on how to get users to look at that.

Create messaging that matches the visual theme, and you’ve got a solid start to create a simple design.

2. Be Selective with Typography

Fonts will make or break a minimal design. Since there’s not a lot of other visual material competing for attention, a minimal style needs to feature clean and readable typography to be most effective.

Develop a font palette with one or two type families and create a hierarchy for how to use type elements. Stick to this hierarchy like you would a grid. It should be the foundation of the type design for a minimal project.

Add a few subtle elements to highlight keywords, phrases or messaging, such as color.

If you question the type, rethink it. Typography is a key element in a minimalist graphic design and should be treated with utmost care.

3. Streamline the Color Palette

The color palette should be as simple as the typography palette. Aside from black and white (or your base neutral), pick one color to drive the design.

This color can be bright or light and can serve as anything from a background texture to accent. To maximize the impact of color in a minimal graphic design, use your preferred hue consistently. But don’t be afraid to use it.

The example above shows a minimal design with a bold color option for the background. It’s the only color but sets a mood to the project and helps drive its visibility.

4. Design a Consistent UX

Not only should the visual design be rather simple and intuitive in a minimal graphic design, but for websites the interface should be just as easy to understand.

From user interface elements and buttons to scroll actions and engagements, create a consistent user experience that isn’t complicated and that doesn’t require an instructional manual to use. Each visitor should understand, without even thinking about it, the interface and how to interact with it.

Keep the engagements simple and direct so that the feel is consistent with the visual design. If the overall aesthetic is minimal and every hover action explodes animated confetti, there will be a disconnect and it will impact usability.

5. Use Color

While you probably want a more streamlined palette for a minimal graphic design, you don’t have to have colorless design. There’s a misconception that minimal means black and white. That’s just not true.

A minimal design can be black and white, but it can also feature a full color palette. The trick here is to create a simple palette in terms of number of colors and usage.

The Curious Agency, above, does a great job with a bright background that’s bursting with color in an otherwise minimal design scheme.

6. Strip Out All the Extras

Getting rid of clutter in a minimal graphic design is important. (It is the essence of minimal.)

Once you get the design in pretty good shape, think about each element individually: Does it serve a purpose that will create a better journey for the user? Does it help meet a good? Or is it pure decoration?

If the answer is the latter, you might want to rethink whether that element should be part of the design or not.

7. Be Bold with White Space

White space is one of the elements that most minimal graphic designs have in common. You won’t have any mushed, smushed or crowded elements here.

Every piece of a minimal graphic design should have meaning. And it should have plenty of space around it so that that concept is clearly discernable.

Studio Firlefanzski, above, does this with plenty of space around the edges of the canvas, but where the design really excels is in the spacing between lines on the main block of text. This extra space makes every line stand out so that you read each word, fully taking in the meaning.

8. Create Open Spaces

This might seem like incorporating white space, part 2 … it is that important.

Create open spaces to draw the eye and balance heavier parts of the design. The key difference here is not to get stuck in a symmetrical flow or pattern of linespacing and padding.

Make space part of the design.

Verho, above, does this in so many different ways:

  • There’s interesting space for the vertical navigation.
  • Image elements line up a little off-center to create spaces that move the eye from element to element.
  • Text elements are light and just a little more tracked out than average.
  • Elements are also placed “off-center” vertically, changing the way space feels from scroll to scroll.

9. Seek Balance and Harmony

For every heavy element in the design, look for a way to balance it with space or lighter elements to establish harmony in the overall design.

Many minimal graphic design projects can be text-heavy, leading to some really dominating elements and spaces. Establishing a counter balance to that weight is important to keep the design from feeling lopsided or overwhelming.

Lissi, above, does this with plenty of white space and alternating regular and bold typefaces to create more balance.

10. Incorporate Imagery

One of the things that many designers forget about or ditch when working with a minimal project is images. It’s ok to incorporate images into a minimal design project. (In many cases you probably should use images.)

When picking out photos, look for photos that also feel simple and easy-going. Avoid cluttered scenes or crops that feel exceptionally tight.

Caleb Johnson Studio, above, uses a handful of serene photos in the hero slider with bright, light colors and simple visual ideas. The photos match the overall tone and feel of other design elements for a colorful, visually impressive minimal design.

Conclusion

Although you can strip away elements as you create a minimalism graphic design, remember there is more to it. Some of the trends we are seeing in minimalism, have a minimal feel with some maximal elements, such as photography or color.

Mix and match styles to get a simple graphic design that you love and meets the goals of your project.

Source – designshack.net

Author – Carrie Cousins

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Create Some Space – for Ideation Sessions and Design Thinking

Posted on October 30, 2018 by admin

The spaces we occupy deeply influence our experiences, our feelings, and our behaviours. Our state of health, psychology, productivity, mood, and creativity spaces influence us on many levels and also influence our interactions with each other. The spaces in which we journey through Design Thinking and Ideation sessions must be set up in such a way that they facilitate the purpose behind each phase or step appropriately. This involves creating an environment in which the team is free to embrace the mindsets required at each point in their process without the intervention of others who may not understand what they are doing and why.

Freedom to Think and Express

With all their thoughts out in the open, Design Thinking teams may feel slightly vulnerable to outside eyes, but with a protected free space they will feel more at home throwing forward everything they have to offer.

The right kind of environment helps to create a creative work culture and influences the way people see and do things, as well as how they interact with each other. Instead of boardrooms with the CEO at the head of the table, Design Thinking and ideation sessions requires a space that levels the playing field and puts everyone on an equal footing.

Fluid Spaces

The Design Thinking team may require the configuration of the space to change throughout the process. With their vision clearly pinned to the walls, Design Thinking teams and ideation participants are more easily able to keep their eye on the purpose of the challenge at hand, while allowing the influences of their exploration to tug constantly at their understanding.

Creating such a space means having room to move, wall space to stick up charts and ideas, white boards or paper charts for gathering data into meaningful collections and to make visual connections using drawn lines and other visual methods. Later on in a Design Thinking process, the room should provide enough space for building prototypes and testing models.

Tips and resources for creating an innovation space

Scott Doorley and Scott Witthoft, directors of Environments Collaborative, co-authored a book with support from the design school known as Make Space. The book outlines tools, templates, building methods, and situational plans for creating collaborative spaces that foster a culture of innovation. The following checklist provides an idea of elements that may assist in creating the ideal Design Thinking space.

Checklist for the Ideal Ideation and Design Thinking Room and Requisites

The following checklist provides an idea of elements that will assist you in creating the ideal ideation session and design thinking space:

  • Space: Make sure you have enough space for all participants. Ideally, the Design Thinking and Ideation space should be located away from work environments, which stifle creativity or remind participants of stressful activities and time pressures.
  • Whiteboards and Flipcharts: These are generally portable and lightweight as they are the centre of attention at many design thinking sessions. You’ll see that they’ll soon be covered with sticky notes featuring handwritten ideas.
  • Room: A light and natural environment to encourage creativity.
  • Illumination: Make sure to choose a room with plenty of daylight. If possible, you should choose a room with large windows to post sticky notes on—or even draw or write directly on them if you have the right kind of markers, of course! Warm natural colours and materials are more supportive than sterile cold surfaces.
  • Air: Good ventilation and fresh air if the weather allows for it.
  • Temperature can support creativity. Research has identified that the correct temperature for sitting and working at a desk is between 22°C – 25°C. However ideation sessions and design thinking sessions will include a lot of standing and moving around so you should probably consider setting the thermostat a little lower.
  • Acoustics: It often gets quite loud when people explain their ideas to each other. Make sure that the acoustics are great and that there’s no echo.
  • Elevated tables and chairs: will encourage participation in the ideation processes. Elevated furniture allows people to come as close together as possible. The upright position keeps participants engaged. If possible, find a room where there’s a couch to use during the breaks or to sit back and relax in while the other teams present their findings and results.

Ideation Material

  • Paper
  • Sticky notes (as large as possible, a range of colours, five different types)
  • Markers (whiteboard markers, permanent markers, many different colours and not too thick)

Prototyping Materials

  • Magazines (for collages)
  • Cardboard
  • Tape (duct tape)
  • Glue
  • LEGO or Duplo
  • Blue tack

Source – www.interaction-design.org

Author – Rikke Dam and Teo Siang

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UX Highlights of Figma

Posted on October 27, 2018 by admin

Figma, the new age interface design platform, appears to be at the epicentre of collaborative design culture. The way its enhancing productivity and efficiency of designers is impeccable and I am realizing its potential over the past one year since I came onboard. While a lot of credit for a seamless performance is bestowed upon its various features, a lot of due credit must also go to the overall User Experience Design (UX) of the product as well. A few months back when I started using Sketch and Figma in parallel, I had shared a story – The Future of UX: Design & Collaborate with Figma, on the various features of Figma which promised to be disruptive in the world of Sketch’s dominance, ranging from Collaboration, Shortcuts, Components, etc.

While most of the product UX is laudable, here I am addressing a few UX elements that I have had an experience with, things that appreciably work well and on the hind sight, things that doesn’t work well in Figma.

• First up, things that work well!

Its feels nice to realize the attention Figma has given to the smallest and simplest of tasks, enhancing performance for intricate steps, concentrating on improving the experience of some of our daily activities and making it a better product, bit by bit. Here’s a list of some Pros of Figma I felt good about:

1. Entering a Hex Code

Fill and Stroke

Entering a hex code for colour has never been as easy as it is in Figma, especially the neutral ones like White, Black, shades of Grey. In Adobe CC products like Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects, for entering the HEX Code #FFFFFF (say), we have to type the full code. However, it uses some intelligence by adding zeros if one doesn’t want to type the entire code. For e.g., if the HEX Code is #0000FF, one can simply type FF in the code field and press Tab/Enter button on the keyboard to fill it with 0s, where 0s precede those characters. So, if the user is aware of the hex code which has preceding 0s, say #0000AA, #000333 #00AFAF, etc., the user only needs to type the non zero characters of the hex code. On the other hand Sketch provides no such intelligence as we always must enter the full hex code to get the colour.

But is this intelligence of much help? Personally, I didn’t really feel this functionality of great value yet, because its not intuitive enough as it demands complex calculations like separating only the preceding 0s from a hex code, and hence I often tend to type the entire code, or copy paste the code.

However, Figma proves much smarter and its intelligence for neutral colours is way more handy and intuitive. For e.g.,

For colour #FFFFFF, user only needs to type F and press Tab/Enter button to fill the desirable hex code.

For colour #1A1A1A, user only needs to type 1A and press Tab/Enter button to fill the desirable hex code.

For colour #AAEEFF, user only needs to type AEF and press Tab/Enter button to fill the desirable hex code.

Basically, Figma’s intelligence reads patterns in hex codes and populates it automatically thus saving the effort of typing in full hex codes.

This intelligence of Figma has proved much more valuable to me as entering colours like, #FFFFFF, #000000, #1A1A1A, #363636, #AAEEFF, #11BB44 etc. is very easy now and since this intelligence is specific to hex codes with patterns, its intuitive enough and easier to remember when to apply. Working with hex codes is really faster now. ✌️

2. Corner Radius Controls

Corner Radius (Figma)

Independent Corners (Figma)

The independent corner radius control in Figma for rectangles is indeed well thought through, designed and implemented. I had used corner radius in Sketch and was very annoyed with the functionality. One has to activate corner controls to access the radius of that corner and then type in the radius field for changing other corner radii. However, in Figma, it has an Independent Corner control which allows the user to enter radius for each corner of a rectangle which actually is pretty fruitful while working.

Consider the below rectangle with Top Left corner radius as 10px. The image below shows how the controls appear in Sketch and Figma. In Sketch, entering 10px as the radius itself is cumbersome when one needs to double click on the rectangle to first control the corners, then click on the top left corner, enter the radius and then it appears as below for changing other corners. In Figma, simple click on the Independent Corners option and manually control all corner radii. Brilliant!

3. Object/Content Controls

A simple press of Enter button on your keyboard activates the vector controls of any shape or the content of a textbox. While, Figma concentrated on making things easier to control, it has also maintained familiarity principle in basic functions like double click on the object to control content, as usual.

This practice of maintaining familiarity can be also seen with the Eye-dropper tool which works with shortcut “I”, like most design tools, but also works with the Sketch shortcut “Control+C”, which is actually a poor UX, but addresses ease of use for users shifting from Sketch to Figma. Similarly, an ESC button to exit a text edit state works same as a Cmd/Ctrl+Enter option to exit edit state.

Working with vectors is extremely easy in Figma and apparently is the closest to Illustrator functionalities, considering its not a complete vector software. The overall platform is pretty efficient for keyboard shortcut users.

4. Deleting Vector Curves

While vector controls in Figma is the closest any software has gone to Adobe Illustrator, in some aspects I felt it has outscored Illustrator as well. Let’s take the below example of a circle A where the aim is to delete the first quadrant curve to get a shape like image C.

In Adobe Illustrator, its a pretty tedious task whereby the user needs to use the Add Anchor Point Tool (Shortcut +) to add a point on the curve, select it with Direct Selection Tool (Shortcut A), and delete (Del) it obtain image C.

In Adobe Illustrator

In Sketch, the approach is similar but the objective image C is not achievable.

In Sketch 

In Figma, deleting the first quadrant curve to get the desired shape (image C) is very convenient. Press Enter and simply click on the curve and delete (Del), that’s it. If you want to delete the fill or the stroke or any particular section of a shape, even that is possible by simply clicking on that area and press delete. It’s as simple as it could get.

In Figma 

5. Deleting Layer from Child Components

Component in Figma is a pretty powerful tool. One can simply make a component with multiple layers which acts as a parent, and you can simply change the text or colour or fill or stroke or opacity or visibility of these layers in the child components without impacting the parent instance. You can read more about Components in my previous story The Future of UX: Design & Collaborate with Figma.

Parent & Child Component

At anytime users, quite naturally, tends to press Delete (Del) button to remove any unnecessary layer from the child instance. However, on pressing Delete (Del) button, that layer in the child instance automatically hides itself rather than completely deleting it. It felt like an example of great UX whereby the user’s need to delete any layer from the component is met by turning visibility off, but also keeping the instance layers intact for adding in future scenarios while keeping the parent unaffected. Pressing the Delete (Del) button visually removes the layer from the component by simply turning off its visibility. Excellent!

Child Layers

6. Boolean Groups

One amazing functionality of boolean groups is its ability to flatten (Cmd/Ctrl+E) multiple shapes into one vector and control it as a whole but still being able to control each shape separately. Simply selecting all the shapes and performing Flatten (Cmd+E) allows this functionality.

Another amazing functionality lies with the boolean controls Union, Subtract, Intersect, Exclude, which are quite common functionalities, but its integration with Flatten option works wonders. In Figma, once a boolean grouped layer (Union/Subtract/Intersect/Exclude) is flattened, the vector shape gets its own vector controls and not for each aggregating shape, like in Sketch.

And finally the most amazing feature of boolean groups is the radius control in an unflattened boolean group. Controlling radius on the boolean group as a whole gives the shapes an organic and fluidic feel. It is a beautiful feature to have when it comes to designing vector icons.

A boolean combination of Subtract and Union of shapes (Unflattened)

Shifting the triangle within the boolean group with a radius.

Organic Booleans in Figma 

Must admit, this is a masterpiece of design and engineering, producing an easy, seamless, delightful function. This is simply one of my favourite feature and moment of Delight through Design . Kudos Figma team!

• On the contrary, things that doesn’t work well!

Every great product has always had incremental growth and similarly with Figma, there are always things which can improve, things that must improve, things which somewhat neutralizes the wonders. Listing out a few Cons I have faced with the tool:

1. Assigning an Instance

While components open the door to a lot of great features, exploring components become an extremely hideous task in Figma. Like we all know, UI Design is an iterative method and designers naturally tend to create a lot of versions and similarly in one of my project draft I ended up creating a huge number of iterative components.

Consider the Header Bar in the image above, for which I had to assign a different component instance, titled v6-Header-Bar. Now I use the drop-down LOV in the right panel of Instance to explore the list of components as below.

The components are arranged in alphabetic order and hence I go from More (Block 1) to More (Block 2) to More (Block 3) and so on to reach components starting with V (v6-Header-Bar). But, after 7 blocks of More, I have reached components starting with L and all corresponding components have amazingly gone outside my screen to the left as seen below.

What do I do now? 

Surely there must be a better way of doing this activity. For e.g., a quick elastic search approach in the instance title box can automatically filter out unwanted component names from the drop-down.

Another work around of handling an extensive number of components can be to have separate pages for every iterations like in Sketch where new component versions can go into new pages. However, Pages have since been introduced by Figma but that’s obviously not the purpose behind introduction of Pages. Meanwhile assigning a new instance to an existing instance from an exhaustive list is still cumbersome.

2. Rotation

Rotation has always been one annoying functionality on most vector tools. Though hovering on the corners allow the user to rotate the object easily in Figma (like in Sketch and most Adobe CC products), but defining a point of rotation is still mysterious in Figma. Personally I have often felt the need to rotate a shape around a certain vertex but never really succeeded in identifying a way to fix a point of rotation and evidently it always rotates around its center. Sketch provides a really nice Rotate tool for controlling the anchor point but I remember going through the pain of identifying the method for defining a point of rotation in Adobe Illustrator which is really not that easy and intuitive. I hope Figma eventually makes it easier.

3. Real & Dummy Data

Working with any real data is a major setback in Figma which brings me to the concept of Sketch’s third party plugins. Since the entire concept of plugins doesn’t exist in Figma, there’s often the need to fill in mockups with dummy data rather than lorem ipsum. Amidst all the pros of third party plugins, something like content generator is a huge necessity with Figma.

4. Mirroring

Figma provides a Mirror app which unlike Sketch is OS independent but lacks a certain great feature of Sketch Mirror. For using Figma Mirror, it is a necessity to stay connected to the internet, and select each frame you want to view in the mobile. However, with Sketch Mirror, it provides me a way to cache the art-boards and access the prototype, though only in an iOS device, but the prototype is available. Figma Mirror, as of date doesn’t support prototyping.

5. File Exports

Exporting files in multiple file types though hasn’t been a major necessity yet, but Figma provides very limited export file types like:

PNG, JPG, and SVG,

whereas, someone using Sketch can extract files in:

PNG, JPG, SVG, TIFF, WebP, PDF, and EPS as well,

which at times can prove fruitful. Moreover, I cannot open any Figma file in Sketch but the reverse is possible which further restricts me.

Exporting any file to external platforms like Zeplin also hasn’t been as smooth as expected. Files being on cloud apparently slows down the syncing process but often exporting to Zeplin times out, fails with some parse errors and feels very buggy. I have been trying very random work-arounds like detaching all components in the frame to be synced or deleting hidden layers from the frame and trying to upload and strangely, at times, I have succeeded and failed.

Source : uxplanet.org

Author : Arijit

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7 Tips for Using Background Textures in Web Design

Posted on April 10, 2018 by admin

This is not your typical roundup of textures to use for website backgrounds. If you are looking for a specific texture, we have those here. But what if you want to create your own? Or find a way to customize a texture to fit your project? That’s what we’ll focus on today.

While there are many ways to use textures in web design, you’ll get a lot more mileage out of those backgrounds if you take a modern approach, and follow a few simple rules. Here are seven tips to help you use background textures in web design well (and in-line with 2018 design patterns and trends).

1. Go Simple and Understated

background textures

A great background texture might not even get noticed by many users. It should be a nearly invisible element that contributes to overall readability and usability while providing depth or visual interest.

Simple and understated background textures are the perfect way to do this. For an event late last year, Github’s Universe Conference used a design that included a simple black background with white dots. The night-sky effect really does fall into the background so that the fun gradient logotype and event information are easy to find.

Simple background textures tend to have small or tight repeating patterns and can be almost any color. The idea is that these background textures aren’t a focal point; they serve to help bring attention to the rest of the design.

2. Go Big and Bold

website textures

Maybe subtle isn’t your thing. If that’s the case, opt for a big and bold background texture or pattern.

These larger-than-life styles work for designs where the foreground is more text- or user interface element-heavy, and there aren’t other competing images to deal with. Using this type of background texture can get tricky, from creating a tiling pattern that invisible to the user to keeping the background from inadvertently becoming the main focal point of the entire design.

To ensure that your oversized background texture is working, keep an eye on analytics and user habits once to make the change. A sharp decrease in traffic or conversions is a sign that you visuals and users might not be connecting.

3. Incorporate a Trend

background textures

A background texture with a trend can make your design feel super-modern and fresh.

With geometric shapes as all the rage right now, it’s no wonder that Apacio’s website is appealing. With a mix of bright colored geometry on a dark background, the pattern creates a nice texture and depth that helps the user focus on the large text and call to action because these elements contrast with the background. The text – simple sans serif lettering – seems to lift right off the green shapes.

The layering of textures contributes to this overall effect as well. Note that color separates two layers of backgrounds with darker elements “behind” brighter elements.

4. Use an Image

website textures

A background texture doesn’t have to be a repeating pattern that you pull from a download site. Some of the best background textures are images that relate to the brand or main messaging to add another level of visual interest and engagement.

The trick is to fade the image into the background effectively. (And that doesn’t necessarily mean to use a fade technique.) Fading the image means that it drops out of the main image area and into the distance.

In the example above, Oxeva does this in two ways: It darkens the photo so that only outlines are visible of the cityscape, and it uses a bold color treatment in the foreground to draw the eye naturally. The photo also has somewhat of a blur to it, so that the image is discernable, but not with a level of detail that makes fine points of the photo important.

5. Use Color Variations

background textures

Mix and match tints and tones from the same color palette to create a bold texture from lettering or shapes. Color variations, even those in the same family, can create depth and visual interest.

Types of Type uses a fun combination of colors with giant letters to create the background texture. Even without techniques such as gradients or shadows, the lines from letterforms establish depth and balance while helping to draw the eye to where the colors in the background meet and the main headline is located.

6. Grab a Gradient

website textures

Gradients are trendy and visually engaging. When it comes to using a gradient as a background texture, you can use it alone or layer it with a photo.

Almost any color combination goes, so using a gradient to create texture and depth isn’t difficult. You can find a gradient combination you love from WebGradients if you don’t already have swatches in mind to work with. https://webgradients.com/

Mobipad uses multiple, subtle gradients to create depth and texture in the background. Illustrated animations in the foreground almost pop off the gradients, and the dark-colored call to action is easy to see. Lighter and darker spaces in the gradient texture help move the user move through the design at a glance.

7. Animate It

background textures

While many of the tips have focused on static background elements, there’s no rule that says a background can’t be dynamic.

To make the most of this type of background texture, the movement should be subtle so that it doesn’t detract from the main image or messaging. Including a muted or subtle color palette, such as Latvian Alphabet, above, is a great option as well.

This animation can include elements that move or twist or turn or video. Motion is a good way to grab the attention of users. Make the most of an animated background texture by ensuring that this motion doesn’t overwhelm the foreground of the design.

Conclusion

A great background texture can add depth and visual interest to your overall website design. While many designers are still using more flat backgrounds – such as single color – adding a hint of texture can make your project stand out.

The trick to using textures is that they have to be subtle and actually fall into the background so that foreground elements are easy to read and understand. That can be a pretty delicate balance. Remember to establish plenty of contrast between background textures and foreground images, user interface elements and text to maximize the impact of the overall design.

Source : DesignShack

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Make the Web Your Playground with Wix

Posted on February 17, 2018 by admin

For web designers, it’s important to take advantage of tools that empower you to do your thing without getting in your way. You need flexibility and efficiency without sacrificing quality. The amazing thing is that you no longer need to hop around from tool to tool to get the best of everything.

With Wix, you have it all in one place. Wix provides web professionals with a platform that enables total creative freedom. You can build the exact website you want with no comprises. In other words, Wix helps you to make the web your playground.

Professional Quality Websites Built Your Way

Whatever your project requirements, budget or timeframe, Wix gives you plenty of options to make the most out of your site. You can start your build from scratch or take advantage of the hundreds of top-notch templates available to get you up and running in no time. Either way, you’ll have everything you need to design a fully-professional website that looks great on any device:

An Incredibly Simple UI

With the Wix Editor, the process of adding and positioning any of the hundreds of available design elements is a matter of dragging and dropping them within your template. There are no hoops to jump through. By making things simple, Wix helps you get projects done more quickly.

Code Friendly

Developers will love the power of using Wix Code. You’ll have full control of your site’s functionality using both JavaScript and Wix APIs. Create databases, dynamic content, custom forms and more. Even better is that everything works within the same, highly-visual, Wix UI.

Harness the Power of ADI

Want to take advantage of the future of design? Then you’ll want to check out Wix ADI (Artificial Design Intelligence). Just answer a few questions and the system will design a beautiful, unique site – just for you.

The Right Features for Any Type of Website

Whether you’re building a website for yourself or a client, you’ll find the features and functionality you need to do the job right. Among the features that can be easily added to your website:

Wix Stores

Sell physical or virtual goods online with ease. Inside, you’ll find the features you expect in an ecommerce suite, such as the ability to add unlimited products, manage shipping and pickup options, promotional tools like integrated email marketing, coupons and sale pricing. Plus, securely take payments via PayPal, credit card or even offline. A SSL certificate is included to ensure the utmost security.

Wix Bookings, Wix Hotels Booking System and Wix Restaurants

If your business needs the ability to take online bookings, Wix has you covered. Customers can book appointments, rooms or a table for two in a jiffy. You’ll love that all bookings come with no commission sales.

Wix Music

Musicians and bands can stream and sell their music directly from their own website. Listeners can share and download songs. Plus, it’s easy to bring in audio from outside sources such as Spotify and SoundCloud.

Wix Art Store

Artists now have a way to sell both digital and physical work with Wix Art Store. See your work appear on products such as bags, mugs, canvasses and more. And, you won’t have to worry about packing, shipping or payment processing – it’s all included.

Wix Blog

A full-featured blog is crucial to keeping in touch with your customers and the community at-large. With Wix Blogs, you can build a beautiful blog in just minutes. It comes complete with built-in social features and support for multiple authors.

Apps for Every Need

Need something else? You’re sure to find what you’re looking for in the Wix App Market. Explore the wide variety of available features you can add to your site with just a few clicks.

The Extras That Make a Difference

Wix not only offers you the world’s most technologically advanced platform for building websites, they also provide access to features and design assets that you won’t find anywhere else. At least, not under one roof! For example, the Wix Image Library contains thousands of images you can use for free (through Wix and Shutterstock) on your site. And you can display images, autoplay videos and text via over 30 high-quality media galleries.

Wix also understands the importance of building a site that is truly your own. So they have made the ability to customize every aspect of your site a priority. For instance, choose from hundreds of fonts or upload your own. Or add some modern touches with animation and parallax scrolling effects. When it comes to formatting, you can create grids and layouts that match your needs perfectly. And, while it’s important to have a site that’s both beautiful and functional, it’s just as vital to ensure that potential customers can find you.

That’s why Wix has integrated SEO tools to help you get listed in search engines. Plus, you’ll gain valuable insights through the new FAQ widget. It provides you with instant answers to the most common SEO-related questions.

Start Building with Wix for Free

If you haven’t tried Wix before, now is the time to take it for a test drive. Experience this all-in-one platform’s power and user-friendly UI. Discover the possibilities for building an amazing, mobile-friendly website in the most efficient way possible. Want to learn more about how web professionals are using Wix? Check out their Playground and start building your own online masterpiece for free.

SOURCE : https://speckyboy.com/

AUTHOR : Eric Karkovack

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Serial Position Effect: How to Create Better User Interfaces

Posted on February 15, 2018 by admin

Learn about the limits of your user’s short-term memory by understanding how the serial position effectworks and how you can manipulate it in the context of user experience design. Many of the most successful designs out there, produced by highly successful companies like Apple, Electronic Arts, and Nike, reflect an understanding of the serial position effect and how it influences their designs. This article will teach you the theories that support the serial position effect, and ways you can manipulate it in your design work so you can further improve user experience.

The Serial Position Effect

The serial position effect, a term coined by Hermann Ebbinghaus, a German psychologist and pioneer of memory research, describes how the position of an item in a sequence affects recall accuracy. There are two main concepts involved in the serial position effect:

  1. The Primacy Effect: Items that are presented at the beginning of a list are recalled with greater accuracy than items in the middle of a list.
  2. The Recency Effect: Items that appear at the end of a list are also more likely to elicit better recall than items presented in the middle of a list.

Author/Copyright holder: WikiPremed. Copyright terms and licence: CC BY-SA 3.0

This graph illustrates the tendency of a user to better recall items from the beginning as well as the end of a list or sequence. The middle items are the most difficult to remember.

The Primacy Effect

The theory for the primacy effect is that the greater accuracy of recall is due to the relatively small amount of processing effort expended in rehearsing the item by itself. This is in contrast to proceeding items (in the middle of a sequence) which must be rehearsed with all the other preceding information (in the beginning of a sequence); causing significant cognitive burden and affecting recall.

This theory is supported by experimental findings from ‘A two-process account of long-term serial position effects’ by Glenberg et al. (1980), where the primacy effect no longer appears when participants get a rapid presentation of list items; whilst presenting items slowly improves recall. As expected, they found that the more time between being exposed to each item, the greater chance there is for the participant to rehearse previous items in order to store them into their memory.

The Recency Effect

The theory for the recency effect is that recall is better for items appearing towards the end of a sequence due to their preservation in our working memory, the part of our short-term memory that processes conscious and immediate perceptual information. Our working memory holds transitory information and acts as a buffer for new information while it assimilates into other memory systems.

Cognitive scientists Murray Glanzer and Anita Cunitz (1966) conducted an item recall test to assess whether recency and primacy are enduring effects if there exists a distracter task between the information study phase and test phase.

Results showed the primacy effect was present even after the 30-second interference task, but the recency effect was no longer present. Therefore, when distracter tasks are employed during recall tests, the recency effect disappears, supporting the theory that improved recall is due to recent items being sustained in a temporary memory system, such as working memory. Glanzer and Cunitz concluded that the capacity of human short term memory is likely to be three to four chunks of information at one time.

Consequences of the Serial Position Effect in User Interface Design

The effect of recency and primacy have implications for the design of user interfaces. Presenting long lists of information places significant strain on limited attentional resources and restricted memory systems, especially short-term memory, where only three or four items or chunks of information can be maintained at one time. Our ability to recall previously presented items is also severely impacted by events between initial processing and later recall.

Four Ways to Effectively Manage the Serial Position Effect in Your Designs

Knowing that the positioning of an item can affect user experience by causing information in the middle of a sequence to be harder to recall, it can be helpful to minimize the effect it has on your users. By understanding how to manipulate the order of information and minimize the serial position effect, you can reduce strain on your user’s memory load and limit the distraction that exists between presentation and recall of information.

Here are 4 ways you can design better user experiences by understanding how the serial position effect affects your users:

1. Maintain Task-relevant Information within the User Interface

Maintain task-relevant information within the user interface to minimize the tax on your user’s cognitive resources. Provide tools to guide your user toward their goals, helping them be more efficient and more accurate in their tasks.

Creative tools like Keynote by Apple Inc., Photoshop by Adobe, and Microsoft Word by Microsoft provide users with page number information, rulers, and grids to help the user create better work and be faster at it.

Keynote, a presentation software application developed by the multi-national technology company, Apple Inc., maintains task-relevant information for users so that they can more easily create presentation slides by providing things like page number and status, grid lines, and rulers.

2. Include Cues in the User Interface

Include cues in the user interface whenever possible as they can initiate recognition, the identification of something previously encountered, and recall, the action of remembering something previously learned or experienced. Provide various perceptual cues like sounds created by cause-and-effect (e.g., a “bling” sound goes off when a video game character collects gold coins), or provide a map or speedometer on the interface of a racing game.

Author/Copyright holder: Need for Speed Most Wanted 2005. Copyright terms and licence: Fair Use.

Need for Speed, a racing video game developed by American gaming company, Electronic Arts, Inc., includes cues in the user interface to let the user know where they’re at at all times by providing a map on the bottom left and a speedometer on the bottom right.

3. Limit the Amount of Recall Required

Limit the amount of recall required across parts of the dialogue by retaining relevant information at all points of a task, when necessary, or offer simple means of retrieving this information. Human attention is limited and we are only capable of maintaining up to around five items in our short-term memory. Due to the limitations of short-term memory, designers should ensure users are only faced with less than five items at any one time within the dialogue. Many online retailers know that it’s important to keep the user informed as they move through the user flow of product purchasing.

Author/Copyright holder: Nike, Inc. Copyright terms and licence: Fair Use.

The website by Nike Inc., the multinational corporation providing apparel and equipment, shows what filters the user has chosen at every step in their shopping experience, as well as what the products are sorted by.

<img “=”” src=”https://public-media.interaction-design.org/images/uploads/db170ae6784582af56e2e43fe9a0996e.jpg” class=”layzr-loaded lightense-target”>Author/Copyright holder: Amazon.com Copyright terms and licence: Fair Use.

The website by Amazon Inc., the American e-commerce and cloud computing company, shows the user how many items are in the cart at every step in their shopping experience, where to go for help-related information, as well as relevant offers prior to purchase.

4. Emphasize Key Information in the Beginning and End

Emphasize key information in the beginning and the end, while placing the least important items in the middle of your sequence. The primacy and recency effect explains that people remember information more accurately when it is consumed early on and at the end of a sequence.

Many landing pages are designed to support this concept. In the example below, we will examine the serial position effect by dividing Apple iPad Air 2’s landing page into three sections based on its apparent content: Beginning, middle, and end. You can also see this reflected in speech writing and textbook writing as well, where the important information is emphasized in the beginning and re-iterated at the end.

Author/Copyright holder: Apple Inc. Copyright terms and licence: Fair Use.

The first section of the landing page that sells the iPad Air 2, a product by Apple Inc., communicates the key reason why you should buy their product at the beginning of the page sequence.

Author/Copyright holder: Apple Inc. Copyright terms and licence: Fair Use.

In the middle of the landing page sequence of the iPad Air 2, there are chunks of relatively less important information compared to the beginning and the end of the page. This reflects the designer’s understanding of the serial position effect on their users.

Author/Copyright holder: Apple Inc. Copyright terms and licence: Fair Use.

The final section of iPad Air 2’s landing page, provides the call-to-action activities a user would expect to find at the end of any sales pitch. Need special financing? Need fast delivery? Get help buying and click to learn more.

The Take Away

Design should reduce the strain on users by understanding the limits of their short term memory, such as the limitations highlighted in the serial position effect. Knowing the serial position effect, we should aim to empower the user by maintaining task-relevant information on the screen when necessary, including cues in the user interface, limiting the amount of recall required across parts of the dialogue, and emphasize key information in the beginning and end of a sequence whenever possible. By understanding your user’s cognitive processes and incorporating this knowledge into your designs, you will be better equipped to create more powerful and intuitive user experiences.

References & Where To Learn More

To view more information on the primacy effect, please see:

http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/xlm/6/4/355/

To view more information on the recency effect, please see:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S…

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