The first company I worked as an interaction designer, Remend has officially closed it doors. Here are some lessons learned for dot-coms building a product: A dollar spent in architecture is 10 dollars saved in maintenance. Never hard code anything if you can help it. The lesson is that things change. Details change. You have…
Marketo.com (The comapny I work for as UX Architect) is launching their flagship product and public site this week. Uses a bunch of jQuery, Tabs Plugin, Validation Plugin and Scrolling Promo Effect. Design was by (upon request). HTML Production was done by NetKitchen and myself. Overall, I think it’s a solid looking site. One thing I…
Exciting news: The book publisher has green lit my book. I am starting to write it now. It is about jQuery and how it empowers designers. I will give a better summary after I work on it for a little while. I get an advance and everything. The book will be made of physical paper…
David Foltz over at Turbotax pointed me at this video. I think it’s brilliant. Apparently they are having a content for the best Turbotax rap. Now that is some inspired marketing. They should put this on TV. Their regular commercials are boring and stale. The work I did with Turbotax last year has been tested this season. Although…
Some of the UX Designs I made for TurboTax are going live. I HAD temporary links. Some people at Intuit who shall remain nameless have objected to showing them. So I am going to make local copies and host them myself. The test is also delayed, so I will wait a little bit to put them up.…
What is e.g.?An abbreviation for "exempli gratia,"Latin for "for example." What is n.b.?abbreviation for nota bene: used to mark something as particularly important. What is i.e.?abbreviation for "id est," Latin for "that is"; also means, "in other words." it is followed by an explanation, specific list or a paraphrase.
I had gotten so used to being reactive at Intuit. The phone would ring, the email would arrive, the meetings would be scheduled. I only had time to "work" in between these hectic moments. So much so, that I had to avoid some meetings (Like the dreaded PELT) to actually get some work done. Now,…
Yesterday, I went to get some bread. I said, "A two and a half pound sourdough, sliced please." Matthew was in my arms and pointed out his index finger high in the air and yelled, "SCUSE ME ONE MINUTE! SCUSE ME ON MINUTE!"The lady smiled at him and said, "Yes? Matt perked up and said,…
I made a deal with one of the most talented designers I know. He asked that his name be changed, to protect the innocent. We shall call him Kedalsen Sirhc. (aka CBOT) The Deal: Whoever makes 20 million first has to give the other 1 million dollars. Can’t use the money on hookers in Vegas. I am…
In my previous ‘2 weeks’ post, I neglected to mention Eric Yeh and Steve Lam. I probably forgot them because I am still emotionally scarred from them making fun of my clothes, hair and gut. However, I just want to let them know, I liked working with them better than I liked working with Vasu. …
I gave notice to Intuit yesterday. It is a sad moment for me. There are some people there that I will miss terribly. There have been a few people throughout my career that I have just loved working with.Ben Nadel, Tom Quaile, Sean Zimmerman, Florence Tang, Bill Mirbach, Chris Nesladek. These are people I consider…
Quicken just launched their new site. I had nothing to do with it. Sapient did pretty much all the work. As an optimist, I wanted them to succeed, but looking at the site, I have trouble getting over some significant issues. Task completion was definetely not a major part of the thought process. The amount…
Some of my work launched today on Intuit.com. All of the account management features have had an overhaul. Some improvements: New design makes a frame around account management to clearly identify it Dynamic error messaging/field validation. Better Credit Card Info Management. Order Status/History page redesign. Email template enhancements. Better workflow. Bigger buttons! We eliminated a…
Having a bad week. My HTML/CSS is looking ragged. My head is distracted. Lots of negative interactions. It has been hard to keep my head up. The beard has grown back, which is a good thing, I think. (Tangent – Remember in The Tick, when the mustache attached itself to the Tick and spoke in…