I have the fondest memories of field day in elementary school. All the classrooms would have their own shirts with their teacher’s name and a mascot. I’ve been a Haines Hound, Vickers Viking and Strickland Spartan. We competed against other homerooms in the same grade levels and won ribbons at the end of the day. I still have my good sportsmanship ribbon from first grade. Probably the only time I ever deserved it

Imagine my surprise when I went to field day at our main elementary school when my daughter was in first grade (she’s in ninth now). The whole school wears one t-shirt (there may be color variations) and there are no ribbons or anything. Just a fun day with lots of group activities ending with a teacher’s tug-of-war. I think it’s a wonderful way to emphasize good sportsmanship and having fun while exercising.

• Tips for Usability Professionals in a Down Economy (applies in an up one, too).
• Social PR Survey II: Continued disconnect between clients, agencies
• Ten Twitter Mythconceptions
• 31 Ways to Get Inspired
• Industry-specific Twitter Guides by Profession
• Styling your Lists: 20+ Brilliant How tos and Best Practices
• The Ultimate Collection of The Best Light Swirl Photoshop Brushes

• 11 Geeky Mouse Pads: I have the color code, but don’t use it as a mousepad (not enough traction).
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• *PEW PEW*, NOM NOM: An AT-AT Cake
• If Microsoft ruled the world

I survived my first Writing Blog March Madness match up. However, it was no easy win so advancing rounds will be nail-biters. As if the first one wasn’t.

Community: The weakest spot in this blog is the lack of community. John’s right about that and it has puzzled me. For a while, I tried posing open-ended questions to invite comments. That didn’t work. I stopped because the blog entries looked pitiful having a question with no comments.

Gaming: I was relieved that John realized the gaming section was separated out. I worried he’d think I had something irrelevant mashed in with writing and business. I broke out gaming as much as I could from a technical standpoint (if you go through posts by clicking “next” and “previous,” you’ll see the games entries.). I was going to set up a different site for gaming, but as Mark of TheDiamondGames pointed out … meryl.net is established. Why start from scratch (in terms of SEO and ranks)? I thought he had a good point and took the route that I did.

Design: When I worked with Blue Flavor on this site’s design, we tried to make the site feel professional yet personal. With this design, I could stand to look at my own site… for the first time ever.

Usability & Navigation: The reason I provide a summary is based on my experience. I became frustrated with scrolling through some bloggers’ long entries and thought scanning ‘n clicking would be better than scrolling. But I could be wrong. What say you? I’m willing to change this and consider any other annoyances.

Purpose: I’ve always admitted that my blog has never been niche-based. It’s evolved over the years. I don’t think I can do better here unless I pick a niche.

Personality: I don’t want this blog to be about me, me, me. In promoting the business side of things, I try to show what’s in it for the prospect. In writing blog entries, I try to provide information you can use and not make it about my opinions. Personality matters as it gives the blog life, so I try to do that without crossing the line or getting too personal. Some things shouldn’t be out there for the world to see.

Content: Whew. John captured it, “She has a nice habit of giving tips and then illuminating them with examples from her own experience.” I’ve learned well from others’ examples plus examples help show instead of tell.

What can I do better so you leave this blog glad that you spent a little time reading it? How about enticing you to leave comments. What compels you to leave comments on a blog? That’s the missing link here.

The biggest reason I’m afraid to give presentations is fear of not being able to interact with the audience. My lipreading skills are imperfect and I don’t want to frustrate the audience by repeatedly asking, “What?” when they ask questions. A blog doesn’t have that problem and I respond to almost all comments — some are in private. But the interaction isn’t happening.

You’d think after eight years of blogging that I’d know the answer?

I admire John for taking the time for doing in-depth reviews of 32 blogs and including mine. Thank you, John.

Lest you think this is a brownnosing post — it will most likely not even be covered in the next round as I should have at least five posts by then. I want to understand how to improve on the weak areas. Who better to ask than you?

I go to various gas stations to fill up a thirsy car. The one in my neighborhood takes longer to use because of its strange set up. Most gas stations have the screen and buttons next to each other.

Not this one. The buttons appear near the nozzle and the credit card slot. The screen sits in the middle like most gas station screens. It’s tough to notice the buttons because the panel is slightly covered (indented area) like porches with a roof cover.

To make it more difficult to use, four arrow buttons appear on both sides of the screen. You use these mainly for yes/no questions. But you enter your zip code, other information, and press “Enter” on the other panel.

It feels like a “left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing” situation. I’m sure the designer moved the buttons and credit card slot to its location as protection from weather. But really. The screen and panel should be together, which is what most gas stations do.

Moral: Ensure your content and interactive parts — especially a shopping cart — of your site work together and intuitively. Quick and cheap (free really) way to do this is to have friends and family test the site.

Every new release of an application adds more features, but not always for the better. Get ten tips for getting feature frenzy under control. In writing an article about social network sites, I looked at over two dozen sites like MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, Sermo, TravBuddy, MyCreativeCommunity. Wikipedia provides a list of many social networking sites.

I noticed most specialty social network sites do one thing well — they provided the appropriate features that fit their site’s purpose and target market. They didn’t try to capture the features everyone else has.

The following is a shorthand version of Frank Spiller’s excellent post:

1. Get task-focused.

2. Map business requirements to user tasks.

3. Talk about user tasks not features.

4. Design for probability not possibility.

5. Validate features with user tasks.

6. Map features to tasks.

7. Create a feature-task matrix.

8. Think scenarios first, use cases next.

9. Use tasks to test features, and features to test tasks.

10. Use diary studies to evaluate feature adoption over time.

Remember that users won’t necessary use every feature in an application. It costs to add a feature — so make sure it’s worth the cost.

Someone interested in breaking into information design contacted me to ask about the field, whether a degree or certificate would help, and the tools and skills used. It’s a very broad question as information design covers everything including print. But I answered the question from the online perspective and thought others may benefit from this information.

This field include information design, user experience, web design, publication design, graphic design, information architecture, etc. Looking at the Web sites and locating a nearby chapter in the following organizations makes a good starting point:

• STC (Society for Technical Communication) — www.stc.org
• UPA (The Usability Professionals’ Association) — www.upassoc.org
• SIGCHI — www.sigchi.org
• ASIS&T (American Society for Information Science and Technology) — www.asis.org/SIG/ia.html
• IA Institute (The Information Architecture Institute) — iainstitute.org

STC, for example, has different SIGs (special interest groups) that could also provide valuable information. But of course, you want to narrow down your interests before joining SIGs or else too much information will come your way.

The following sites provide conference proceedings:

• www.upassoc.org/conference/2007overview.html
• stc-on.org/id/
• www.stcsig.org/usability/
• www.asis.org/SIG/ia.html
• www.sxsw.com/interactive

What would you recommend to someone interested in the field? What do people need to break in the field? How valuable (or not) is a degree or certification? What area should the degree or certificate be in?

Thanks to Elisa Miller for her input into the response.

I’ve gotten so much mail from EFTPS (Electronic Federal Tax Payment System — it must be an unwritten rule that everything government-named must be abbreviated — I worked in the federal government once upon a time), the IRS‘ (Internal Revenue Service) online payment service. Part of it is my fault and part of it is a usability problem.

Just now, I was trying to confirm the URL of the Web site and had the letters next to the keyboard. Either my vision has drastically changed in the few weeks since my last vision check up or the IRS has forgotten to add that bit of info to its letters.

The thick envelope also came with brochures and I’m guess Web address is there, but I already had copies and threw them away. Shouldn’t it be on the letterhead somewhere? The phone number shows up plenty.

When I first signed up for EFTPS, I used a different bank account than the one I need to use now. Following instructions on the Web site, I attempted to change the bank account number. The action prompted the system to send me a packet of information. I checked the site again later to see if it took the new bank account (as it said it would), no change.
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When we design Web sites, we often overlook the simplest things because we’re too wrapped up in the design. After working on Web sites for a while, some of us have slowly moved away from what we know is usable to adding or removing elements that may enhance the ‘look’ — and also break a site’s usability.

Steer back on track with the new edition of Krug’s highly referenced book. Novice, intermediate, expert. No matter where you are on the scale, the book provides value to everyone — even managers, testers and project managers. Management likes to get their hands a little dirty when it comes to Web design projects and sharing this book may make the team’s life easier.

Anyone involved with Web design or usability will recognize most, if not all, of the concepts covered in the book. What makes Don’t Make Me Think usable is that it’s a great checklist to ensure you’ve covered all the basics.

Krug provides many before and after examples to show how a few changes can enhance a Web site’s usability. The illustrations reinforce the concepts covered as well as how visitors use and read a Web site.

As for the differences between the first and second editions, the second addition has three new chapters while usability testing shrinks from two chapters to one and with good reason.

The testing chapter breaks down the testing process into digestible steps; complete with a script between the tester (user) and the person watching the tester. Too often, we’ve seen testing get mangled or ignored. With this chapter, teams might find themselves empowered and eager to do testing.

The chapter on “Usability as common courtesy” explores how a site can make or break the “reservoir of goodwill” as Krug puts it. We arrive at a Web site with some goodwill and depending on how well the site meets or misses our needs; the goodwill level goes up or down. It may only take one mistake to propel visitors to flee.

Another new and short chapter is “Accessibility, Cascading Style Sheets and you.” Krug captures what developers and designers hear when it comes to accessibility and addresses what they fear. He lists five things designers and developers can do make a site accessible without a lot of effort.

Finally, the book closes with “Help! My boss wants me to…” Krug has received plenty emails and questions on the topic to identify two questions that repeatedly come up. He provides email examples for free re-use, so no one has to explain it to the boss.

It only takes about two hours or a plane trip to read. The writing is conversational, clear and packs a punch with a dash of humor thrown in. Reading the book is not much different than reading fiction because it flows well and the information sinks in without much effort.

Title: Don’t Make Me Think : A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability (2nd Edition)
Author: Steve Krug
Publisher: New Riders
ISBN: 0321344758
Date: February 2005
Format: Paperback
Pages: 224
Cover Price: USD: $35.00 Amazon: $23.10

The Accessibility Channel is keeping busy for the first World Usability Day. The channel says, “it’s going to be a 24-hour, round-the-world webcast featuring dozens of accessibility experts, policy developers, and advocates for universal design.

“You will be able to see and hear these presenters on any Windows PC with a broadband connection, and communicate with them by text in a chat window. All presentations and the text dialog will be archived and put on a blog for continuing discussion.”

Wow. Text dialog. That’s not something I see often. Of course, it would be hypocritical if it covered accessibility and didn’t ensure everyone can access the information.

We have a day or holiday for everything now including usability. November 3 is World Usability Day, which is about to start as it’s Thursday in New Zealand. Its purpose is to promote the importance of making things easy to use. If my toaster oven breaks today and I buy another one, I won’t likely have too much trouble figuring it out without instructions. PalmOS devices have a low learning curve, at least, compared to Windows Mobile devices. I can’t say the same for a digital camera or a remote control as I’ve gone through many of them and each had a learning curve.

It’s appropriate that I happen to be reading Don’t Make Me Think! right now (well, not this very second as my fingers are typing, but you know what I mean). The book itself is an example of usability. It’s short — takes about two hours to read — and gets to the heart of the problems and how to fix them. I have a couple of other books on usability and I have yet to crack them.

In Why easy to use is not enough, the author writes, “How many old people have injured themselves trying to open child-proof safety containers with scissors? Can anyone get the wrapping off a CD?” I have industrial strength scissors and even using them, I cut myself trying to open items in hard plastic.

If I dread my children’s birthday parties, it’s not because of the work involved in getting the party together — but the work I have to do in opening all the toys that come with a minimum of 39 twisties and then hard plastic holders that have to be carefully cut to avoid cutting the object. People are complaining loud and clear about lost parts, so this is how the manufacturers took care of the problem… ensured it was impossible to remove parts from the box.

Instead of worrying about people returning items, Web teams have to worry about people not coming back. Sometimes we overlook the obvious or think it’s too obvious that we don’t bother doing something that would actually make the site more usable. Assumptions are dangerous when it comes to usability. Want a usable site? Then test it with real users — family and friends, if you have to.

I was reviewing feedback left for a Marketplace seller. Here are a couple of snippets:

“Great book for new moms to be!

“Excellent book!”

“Great book…”

“Great quality…”

“Great product…”

This person is a book seller. He doesn’t publish books or sell e-books. So if a person buys a book from him and the book stinks, does that mean the seller is bad, too? If you’re thinking the person could be describing the book’s condition, there are better ways to say that like these:

“As described…”

“Great condition…”

“The order arrived in a timely manner, however the book had water damage…it was listed as almost new.”

“Item arrived well packed and in great condition.”

I always forget where to find the feedback page and the product ordered page complete with its condition. You can’t find these in the same place.

The Recent Transactions page (you get there from Your Account > Amazon.com Payments: View All Your Recent Purchases > Sign in > Search transactions or click “Recent Transactions.”

The Transaction ID/Order ID page has the buyer’s shipping address, items ordered and price, payment date, and transaction activity.

The Listing ID shows the item information, seller, seller’s ratings, condition seller listed, and seller’s comments.

Leave feedback is not reachable at any of these pages. It took me five minutes to find it again. I had to click on “Where’s My Stuff” from the Your Account page.

Why can’t all of this be in one convenient place? Perhaps, Amazon’s huge and complex backend may limit its ability. When I got stuck in the Marketplace account pages, I had to email the company because the Help didn’t help.

If I want to see my friends’ wish lists or check to see if I reviewed something, I click on “Your Wish List” > “Your Amazon Home.” It sounds like “Your Amazon Home” should be in the global navigation and this could take you to your accounts and everything else. Yeah, you can get to the account pages and “Where’s My Stuff” if you scroll to the very bottom of Your Amazon Home. It would be nice to get to this page in one click instead of two.

Wow. I’m ranked in the 1200s as a reviewer. You don’t get any awards for hitting top 1000 or top 500 reviewers, but the info appears by your name. Just have to get a few hundred more votes and I’m in. I haven’t been top anything for years.