UX/UI Links, January 2018
On January 13th, an official of the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency sent an erroneous missile alert to all the Hawaiian population â including tourist â spreading a wave of panic that lasted 38 minutes.
We can assess the causes and consequences of such mistake by sifting through all the outraged headlines condemning the human error. But even though now we know that it wasn't accidental, we can still look at the facts differently from the usability perspective. In fact, here are 34 articles trying to explain why bad design can be blamed for this false alert. Do you consider this is the case? Tell us in the comments!
Read on for 5 more click-worthy links shared across the web in January.
Discovery on a Budget
Research is not a phase you can afford skipping in the process of creating or refining a product or service. Answering âdo I have a problem worth solving?â is essential to every business success story, and Discovery on a Budget is a practical starting point to help you with the task.
Meg Dickey-Kurdziolek, a freelance UX Researcher, delineates "strategies for conducting discovery research with no budget, existing user data, or resources to speak of" so you can revise and enhance this crucial step of the process.
Understanding the Value of Workarounds
Understood as "an unintended solution to a problem," a workaround is also an opportunity for improvement. But "how can we identify workarounds and assess their value in order to come up with an even better solution?"
In Understanding the Value of Workarounds, Michael Morgan, UX Researcher for ADP's Innovation Lab, shares some pointers towards the answer.
Why You Shouldnât Skip Your Wireframing
We build wireframes to communicate our ideas and get everyone on board before committing to code or elaborated visual designs. We build them to reduce time and effort. We make them "not just to have a skeleton for the UI design, but to be able to quickly iterate, modify and get feedback."
In Why You Shouldnât Skip Your Wireframing, Nazlı Kaya, freelance UX Designer, explores the usefulness and relevance of wireframes as a communication tool, and how we can take advantage of them throughout the design process.
Designing Friction For A Better User Experience
The standard practice is to reduce friction to the minimum in the experiences we design, but there are "a few use cases" where friction can be just the right feature to add.
Zoltan Kollin, Head of UX at IBM Cloud Video, expands on these few use cases in Designing Friction For A Better User Experience. In the article, he analyzes a set of scenarios and examples showing how "the right amount of friction at the right time" is what makes designs efficient.
5 UX Books Thatâll Change How You Think about Design
Every field has a definitive reading list that practitioners trust for learning and refreshing. But there are also some hidden gems that fall out of the cracks of these lists until some generous colleague brings them to our attention.
Here are 5 UX Books Thatâll Change How You Think about Design according to Petr Augustin, Lead UX Designer at Kentico Cloud. Enjoy! (And let us know what you think.)
...That's it for this month!
Hopefully, you've learned something new and useful from this list.
If you have any suggestions, please leave a comment. I'd love to know how to make this list better for you.
For more curated links check our previous posts or follow us on Twitter and Facebook.
- Jess from the Balsamiq Team
Jessica for the Balsamiq Team
