Jing

Week 8 Reading Summary:

2006-02-19T00:52:00.000-08:00

Web Redesign, Chapter 6, Phase 4 : Production and QA

This article is very useful for our class project, I think. It provides a detailed checklist for us, especially project managers.

This phase is to creat, implement, and integrate--where the actual building happens. The goal: no duplication of efforts; Code each HTML page only once; No misinterpretation of user capabilities or project goals; No backtracking.

The author divides this phase into three sections-- prepping, building, and testing. This is a production workflow aimed at
keeping the project's HTML construction on track.

[Prepping] Assessing Project Status
Reassess HTML production team’s capabilities now that you know the true extent of the design and technical requirements. Depending on your team’s level of expertise, you will need to determine the true level of complexity that the site production can handle. And before any coding truly begins, a final justbefore-production-starts review of audience needs (browsers, screen size, connection speed), technology (plug-ins, scripting, backend needs), and redesign goals (download size, user experience goals) can only help.

You will have to address complex questions about servers, directory structure, and the HTML production specifics that may have been left until this phase.

[Prepping] Establishing clear guidelines
The Client Spec Sheet sets parameters for audience
capabilities and technical standards for the site. It is a worksheet, long and detailed and technical. Parameters: target operating systems, browsers, monitors, and connection speeds.

Before beginning the production process, it is important to
identify a composite of the target audience and understanding the client’s expectations and preferences concerning the site production details.

*check whether scope expectations meet scope reality
*check time. You should have been tracking your hours on a weekly
basis, so this should be a relatively easy assessment.
*check content status, design status;
*confirm the backend integration plan (if the site is dynamic).

[Prepping] Setting File Structure
It is not site architecture, but housekeeping (be scalable and stay organized).

[Building] Slicing and Optimization
Prior to production, during the design phase, before any visual design directions are finalized and approved, they must get checked by the production team to ensure that the files are, in fact, sliceable and optimizable under target-audience download requirements. Visual designers need to work closely with the HTML production team to determine the best way to slice the graphic templates so that the HTML tables — the rudimentary basis for HTML layout — can be constructed.

[Building] Creating HTML Templates and Pages

[Building] Implementing Light Scripting
* Rollovers, forms, pull-down menus, pop-up windows, image swaps, frames… all are the result of light scripting.

* The separation of style from content--separate our design from our data.

[Building] Populating Pages
Make sure the content goes into the correct places. Make certain nothing gets missed or placed in the wrong spot.

[Building] Populating your pages
It involves all content, including the frequently forgotten, production-specific “invisible content”— ALT, META, and TITLE tags.

[Building] Integrating Bachend Development
Communication between the backend development team and the front-end design and production teams has always been important, but at this point in the web development process, it becomes absolutely crucial.

[Testing]
> Understanding Quality Assurance Testing
> Creating a QA Plan
> Prioritizing and Fixing Bugs
> Conducting a Final Check
*Design check
*HTML check
*Functionality/engineering check (if applicable)
*Content check
*Client approval.

Week 7: Readings

2006-02-12T02:07:00.000-08:00

In my opinion, the articles of this week are the extension of
what we read before-- the Gestalt theory, the uniform design and
the user-centered theory.

Aesthetic Experience and the Importance of Visual Composition in
Information Design
by Tim Greenzweig

"No matter how the information or information structures are
organized in a composition, the main objective in designing the
information is to provide the user with an easily accessible,
clearly structured, and aesthetically pleasing presentation."

I agree with the author: the idea of "look and feel" is
essentially an issue of how to "decorate" the information.
Although web design is a kind of technical-based work, it is more
like a work of art. Yes, web design should be like music,
painting or poem. I remember when I was a child, my brother-in-
law, who is a PhD of Maths, told me maths is so dulcet that it is
like music. I think web design and art are connected. We can give
life to our works. Art composition is the Soul; technology is the
skelecton; content is the flesh.

This article looks at the ways in which visual composition
contributes to a user's aesthetic experience and why such an
experience is important when designing infromation structures.

The author thinks what seems to be lacking in information design
is a concern for the visual composition of information (in a
given space) as an integral component of the overall information
structure. He recommends some tools of framework for developing a
visual composition: Grid systems; ABA form and varitations; the
rule of thirds; juxtaposition and combination.

Another important point--to negotiate a relationship between type
and image within a composition, is very interesting. "Roland
Barthes, in his book Image Music Text, states the following:
Formerly, the image illustrated the text (made it clearer);
today, the text loads the image, burdening it with a culture, a
moral, an imagination."

Web 2.0: Mistaking the Forest for the Trees?
By Dave Rogers

"users are not designers, but users are the ones using the tools
that we produce". This sentence affords for thought. Yes, Web 2.0
calls us to reach deeper into the minds and hearts of our users.

"It demands greater attention to end-users than ever before. Just
as its technological hurdles challenge developers, Web 2.0
requires more of user advocates".

What on earth is the exact definition of "Web 2.0"? The author
introduces Mr. O'Reilly's "compact" version: "Web 2.0 is the
network as platform, spanning all connected devices; Web 2.0
applications are those that make the most of the intrinsic
advantages of that platform: delivering software as a
continually-updated service that gets better the more people use
it, consuming and remixing data from multiple sources, including
individual users, while providing their own data and services in
a form that allows remixing by others, creating network effects
through an 'architecture of participation,' and going beyond the
page metaphor of Web 1.0 to deliver rich user experiences."

Week 6: About the Book Review

2006-02-05T23:53:00.000-08:00

Title: Managing Projects Large and Small
The Fundamental Skills for Delivering on Budget and on Time

Harvard Business School Press; Boston, Massachusetts

The Author: Richard Luecke
He is the writer of this and several other books in the Harvard Business Esentials series. He has authored or developed more than 30 books and dozens of articles on a wide of business subjects.

The Subject Adviser: Robert D. Austin
He is a member of the technology and Operations Management faculty at the Harvard Business School. His research focuses on management of nonrepetitive, knowledge-intensive activities and on information technology management.

Why I choose this book?
I looked for a needle in a bottle of hay. After a long searching, I focussed on 6 books about "project management", which is an interesting and useful topic for me. I am going to read all these six books, because they are all very good.

As for the book review, I hesitated over the choice between two books: one is "Managing Projects Large and Small", and the other is "Complex IT Project Management: 16 Steps to Success". Finally I decided to review the former first, because it is the most essential among the six books. This book includes almost all fundamentals about project management. I think that only after reading this book, I will be able to understand the others better. It is not only like a textbook or introduction--concise, accurate and vivid, but also like a manual of PM.

The other book--"Complex IT Project Management: 16 Steps to Success" is also very good. I plan to write a review on it next week, on my blog. :)

Week 5 Readings: Making the design clear and striking

2006-01-29T22:58:00.000-08:00

Hierarchy And Contrast: The Basis of Good Design
by Margo Halverson

How to communicate our message boldly and effectively? Halverson makes us understand some useful design basics, so that we can transform our presentation from dull to dynamic. If I read this article last quarter, my powerpoint presentation should have been better!

The concept of hierarchy is very crucial. It means the process of ranking elements in order of importance. We can achieve this aim through the use of contrast. It means making bold design moves that show differences between elements. It enlivens the slide, adds visual interest and makes clear where the viewer’s eye should go first.

We can realize contrast by many methods – element grouping and spacing, type size, style and color, and so on. However, overmuch may create “noise”. Simply make the theme striking and make the elements harmonious. That’s enough.

Here are some points extracted from this article:

1. The key to clear hierarchy – Rank and simplify.
2. White space is your friend.
3. Group related elements and isolate them for emphasis.
4. First move of contrast – Size. Use no more than three type sizes per presentation.
5. Use the text style to produce some effect.
6. Color creates lively contrast.
7. Exaggerate one item, not everything! The trick is to keep it in check and be selective.
8. You must strive for consistency in order to maintain clarity, and you do this through repetition.

Blueprints for the Web: Organization for the Masses

Christina Wodtke shows us how to assure a usable web site organization by doing a simple card sort, a useful exercise to organize your contents into categories for easy browsing. She also reveals how to invite potential users of the web site to participate in the design, thus assuring the web site creator of a usable organization system.

I totally agree with the author: “If you want people to be able to find what they are looking for on your web site, you must organize the contents based on how people think about those contents. The site must reflect the reality of its visitors, or it will confuse them.”

The article gives us some good tips to learn how people think about our content: observing others, studying the enemy, and visiting our search logs. They are so clever ways!

As for “Do a card sort” – it means putting like objects together.

By “User testing”, we'll learn that people who use recipes differently also organize them differently, as do people of different generations and cultures. So, to determine who will be using our organization scheme first and do a card sort only with those folks are important. Then we need to resolve the results: look for the dominant organization scheme, adjust it for consistency, set aside the odd categories that don’t match.

Finally look over everything. “A taxonomy is simply a hierarchal organization scheme, and on the web it's very useful for browsing. Getting it right the first time means profitability. Running card sorts with your users can help you meet that goal.”

Week 4: Gestalt Principles and HCI Design Principles

2006-01-22T23:17:00.000-08:00

from Don Norman

How do the HCI design principles relate to Gestalt theory? I think they both start from the logic/psychological perception of users. When we design digital messages, we should ask ourselves “what will it be in users’ mind?” instead of “what will it be in fact?” As Norman said, “The real question is about the perceived affordance: Does the user perceive that clicking on that location is a meaningful, useful action to perform?”

In the final analysis, it is still the issue about "user-centered design."

Some important notes from the readings:

Gestalt Principles:
Figure and Ground
The terms figure and ground explain how we use elements of the scene which are similar in appearance and shape and group them together as a whole. Similar elements (figure) are contrasted with dissimilar elements (ground) to give the impression of a whole.

Similarity
The principle of similarity states that things which share visual characteristics such as shape, size, color, texture, value or orientation will be seen as belonging together.

Proximity / contiguity
The principle of proximity or contiguity states that things which are closer together will be seen as belonging together.

Continuity
The principle of continuity predicts the preference for continuous figures. We perceive the figure as two crossed lines instead of 4 lines meeting at the center.

Closure
The principle of closure applies when we tend to see complete figures even when part of the information is missing.

Area
The principle of area states that the smaller of two overlapping figures is perceived as figure while the larger is regarded as ground. We can reverse this perception by using shading to get our message across.

Symmetry
The principle of symmetry describes the instance where the whole of a figure is perceived rather than the individual parts which make up the figure.

How new users understand what to do: Four principles for screen interfaces:
1. Follow conventional usage, both in the choice of images and the allowable interactions.
2. Use words to describe the desired action (e.g., "click here" or use labels in front of perceived objects).
3. Use metaphor.
4. Follow a coherent conceptual model so that once part of the interface is learned, the same principles apply to other parts.

Human-Computer Interface Design seeks to discover the most efficient way to design understandable electronic messages.
You Should Use the Eight Golden Rules of Interface Design:

1.Strive for consistency
*consistent sequences of actions should be required in similar situations
*identical terminology should be used in prompts, menus, and help screens
*consistent color, layout, capitalization, fonts, and so on should be employed throughout.

2.Enable frequent users to use shortcuts
*to increase the pace of interaction use abbreviations, special keys, hidden commands, and macros

3.Offer informative feedback
*for every user action, the system should respond in some way (in web design, this can be accomplished by DHTML - for example, a button will make a clicking sound or change color when clicked to show the user something has happened)

4.Design dialogs to yield closure
*Sequences of actions should be organized into groups with a beginning, middle, and end. The informative feedback at the completion of a group of actions shows the user their activity has completed successfully

5.Offer error prevention and simple error handling
*design the form so that users cannot make a serious error; for example, prefer menu selection to form fill-in and do not allow alphabetic characters in numeric entry fields
*if users make an error, instructions should be written to detect the error and offer simple, constructive, and specific instructions for recovery
*segment long forms and send sections separately so that the user is not penalized by having to fill the form in again - but make sure you inform the user that multiple sections are coming up

6.Permit easy reversal of actions

7.Support internal locus of control
*Experienced users want to be in charge. Surprising system actions, tedious sequences of data entries, inability or difficulty in obtaining necessary information, and inability to produce the action desired all build anxiety and dissatisfaction

8.Reduce short-term memory load
*A famous study suggests that humans can store only 7 (plus or minus 2) pieces of information in their short term memory. You can reduce short term memory load by designing screens where options are clearly visible, or using pull-down menus and icons

Week 3: About "Internet Standards"

2006-01-16T03:10:00.000-08:00

From reading the article “Internet Standards, Protocols, and languages”, I understand it is really a daunting task to develop a uniform international standard! Standardization and interoperability might continue to be unsolved issues in a short term. Interrelationships of the organizations and entities are too complex. However, I believe people will find out a good solution finally at the strong desire.

Question 1: How do standards impact our ability as communicators to reach our target audiences? I think standard is like a converter. In other words, it provides the platform.

Firstly, it is a necessary condition for Internet data sharing between message senders and receivers. Standards make our contents gain ground. “Protocols are agreed-upon methods of communicating and transmitting data between telecommunications devices.” “A computer language is an agreed-upon method of communicating, but the focus is on communicating with the computer and its operating system.” So, standards, protocols and languages have very close relationship.

Secondly, it makes global communication available. As the author said: “Regardless of whether the topic is standards, protocols, or languages, the common thread in international unification of methods is interoperability and platform-neutral specifications. Technology providers, businesses, consumers, and government agencies all recognize the need for compatibility.”

The “seven layers” of the OSIM are also suitable to describe this question:

• Application layer. This layer is a “service” used to communicate with the actual application in use. It performs such tasks as converting messages into the necessary format for use by the application.
• Presentation layer. This layer negotiates the syntax (format) of the data
transferred.
• Session layer. This layer is responsible for establishing and maintaining
communications channels. It negotiates packet recovery and provides
synchronization checkpoints for data packets transmitted.
• Transport layer. This layer provides data reliability and integrity checks of the data received by the ultimate end node. It also performs error detection and control functions.
• Network layer. This layer performs data routing and delivery across multiple (intermediate) nodes.
• Data link layer. The layer performs the transmission of data and error control from one node to another node (a single communications link).
• Physical layer. This layer performs the physical transfer of bits to the
transmission medium; it is the data communications interface with the
hardware.

Question 2: When (why) might we chose to deliver information that does not conform with standards?

Here I think the other article--"Information Interaction Design" could answer this question. As Shedroff said, “Data is useful only to producers or anyone playing a role in production. Data is not meant for ‘consumers’ and too often we deluge our audience with data instead of information, leaving them to sort it out and make sense of it. Many providers even boast of the large amount of meaningless, contextless data they throw at their customers.”

“Successful communications do not present data. If, for example, presenters haven't bothered to provide context and build meaning, audiences have little patience for doing it themselves. As designers, we constantly must ask ourselves what service we provide.”

So, we might deliver information that does not conform with standards, when the standards obstruct our audiences from understanding or enjoying the content we send.

Week 2 Readings

2006-01-08T23:11:00.000-08:00

Week 6: Communities in Cyberspace

2005-11-06T23:01:00.000-08:00

I have experienced some of the types of community onine: email
(use everyday), discussion list (use sometimes), BBS (use
everyday), blogs(use every week)... However, I have never touched
MUD. After reading this article, I think I will have so many interesting areas to explore in the cyberspace.

For me, online commnunities are part of my life. But they are
obviously differed from off-line communities. I agree with the points Kollock and Smith mentioned: 1)Identify problems 2)Social control 3)Age, gender, and race become unimportant in online interaction. 4)It has no connection to the other facet of a person's life. 5)It seems to be an ideal of community.

In the online community, people are not face to face. They don't need to be accountable for their actions. Individuals will be judged by the merit of their ideas, for example, between honesty and deception.

People's physical appearance is not manifest online, too. That is often very important, such as in online dating, etc. Online community often give people imagination and surprise!

About the ID, the article summarizes two sources of ID information: account name and history of previous posts on the Internet. Every ID online has its own reputation, writing style, signiture, with its owner's address of company and position. Although some one did not give true information sometimes, it is often easy to find out owner of this ID, by checking other information and previous posts. So, there is another characteristic of online community: terribly not private sometimes.

Week 5: It is too early to say:

2005-10-31T00:06:00.000-08:00

The World Is Flat

When I read the story that Chinese students exchanged their experiences of answering visa official’s questions through online chat rooms, even giving them “nick names”, I felt that Friedman describes it so vividly! As he mentions Dalian, a modern city in China, I think Friedman exactly knows about China a lot. However, except for these details, I cannot agree with him totally at some main points.

Friedman assumes the world is flat, because “the playing field is being leveled”. He said countries like India and China are now able to compete for global knowledge work as never before. But I think he is over-worried. Although I hope it is true, it is too early to say that the world is flat. Outsourcing is in a mushrooming, and it looks like a menace for some people. But in fact it is not so severe as it looks, just like two sides of a coin. Even with the outsourcing some service jobs shift from the U.S. to China or India, China or India’s rapidly growing economy is creating a massive demand for many more American goods and services. As Friedman said himself, what goes around, comes around.

About the US economy and position in the world, I agree that the US is always on the edge of the next creative wave. Therefore, it still has absolute advantage among the world. It attracts kinds of excellent youth from all over the earth, pushing it run so fast. Others could chase it, but could never catch it or surpass, at least in a short term. The fore and the latter are both running so fast, who can tell the outcome? Some of my Indian and Chinese friends once told me their feelings of working for American big systematized companies: they are always making a sleeve of one elegant suit, but not the whole suit.

Anyway, the budding trend that the world is flat is true, and is a piece of good news not only for me but also for all people, because globalization pushes our world step ahead. I hope it comes into true soon.

Ecologizing Mobile Media

Howard Rheingold’s article mainly bases on the “Ten Principles of Technology” that Postman proposed and adds on his own responses and insights, providing arguments about the divide between the “know-how” and “don’t know how” populations, and biases in many respects.

Reading: Flattener #8--Insourcing

2005-10-30T17:35:00.000-08:00

The points of insourcing:

1. the deep collaboration--
UPS is really deeply located inside the clients, and acts as a part of the clients.

2. multi-function--
UPS is not only shipping parcles, but also providing smart business solutions.
For example, for Toshiba customer service. UPS cut the trouble course into simple steps:
pick up broken notebooks--repair in UPS--send them back.

3. develop and supply a great global supply chain--
UPS makes big componies act small, and makes small companies act big.

4. reduce costs and time, increase service and credit--
UPS makes delivery superefficient and superfast, and also in huge volumes.

5. level customs barries and harmonize trade
UPS is creating enabling platforms for anyone to take his or her business global.

Week 4: Comments on Supplemental Readings

2005-10-26T11:58:00.000-07:00

Traditional Media in the Digital Age

I look upon the contents of this article as an extension of our assigned readings. It tells that what is keeping on along with the Internet coming across the news media.

In this article, data and analysis focus on consumer habits, economical reckoning and prediction of traditional media in the digital age. In an extensive analysis of the impact online media is having on its traditional print and television counterparts, evidence is found to support the claims that the latter are facing annihilation.

But on the other hand, even for long-term Internet users, there is only a fractional reduction in newspaper readership. Among these relationships, advertisements will be an important factor to decide who is the winner.

Abstract:
Ahlers and Hessen discuss how data about news habits and advertiser spending lead to a reassessment of media's prospects and possibilities. As the Internet developed into a ubiquitous source of news and information, many observers and industry professionals have openly questioned the long-term viability of printed newspapers or network television news programs.

http://proquest.umi.com.offcampus.lib.washington.edu/pqdweb?did=912481481&sid=2&Fmt=3&clientId=8991&RQT=309&VName=PQD

Week 4: As We May Think

2005-10-25T12:36:00.000-07:00

From telegraph to telephone, from calculating machine to information high way, from photography to television, As We May Think and Technology of The Third Mediamorphosis both give me a clear-cut clue of the history of media technology. From Roger Fidler’s opinion, the third great mediamorphosis inaugurated by the powerful agents of technological change has had a profound influence upon nearly every individual, society and culture. The development of increasingly faster methods for transporting goods, which drove industrialization, created a supervening social necessity for high speed communication carrying huge amount of data.

Fidler focus on the transforming technologies that have emerged since the onset of the third mediamorphosis and the role that digital language is now playing in the development of new media and the transformation of established media enterprises.
Traditional communication systems were no longer adequate to deal with the rapidly increasing demands for faster exchanges of information. Communicate directly and instantly without the assistance of trained operators to technically mediate messages.

Vannevar Bush analyzes the progress course on a more philosophical level. He points out there is increased evidence that we are being bogged down today as specialization extends. He provides an important question: “Of what lasting benefit has been man's use of science and of the new instruments which his research brought into existence?” First, they have increased his control of his material environment. There is an example in Bush’s article. Two centuries ago Leibnitz invented a calculating machine embodied most of the essential features of recent keyboard devices, but it could not then come into use because the economics of the situation were against it. The world has arrived at an age of cheap complex devices of great reliability; and something is bound to come of it. That is the point.

From his review on the progress of making records in photography, impregnated papers, facsimile transmission, television equipment, to Voder/Vocoder, we can conclude that new media technologies will be far more versatile than present commercial machines, so that they may readily be adapted for a wide variety of operations.

Bush also realized the needs of business, and the extensive market obviously waiting, assured the advent of mass-produced computers just as soon as production methods were sufficiently advanced. “It is readily possible to construct a machine which will manipulate premises in accordance with formal logic”. I agree that this process, however, is simple and rapid selection. People cannot hope fully to duplicate this mental process artificially, but we certainly ought to be able to learn from it. In minor ways we may even improve, for our records have relative permanency. Again for instance, about the records, memex, there is, of course, provision for consultation of the record by the usual scheme of indexing. It affords an immediate step, however, to associative indexing, the basic idea of which is a provision whereby any item may be caused at will to select immediately and automatically another. This is the essential feature. From this case, we can say that the process of tying two items together is the important thing.

The arguments I like best and supposed be the theme of this article is: “In the outside world, all forms of intelligence, whether of sound or sight, have been reduced to the form of varying currents in an electric circuit in order that they may be transmitted. Inside the human frame exactly the same sort of process occurs. Must we always transform to mechanical movements in order to proceed from one electrical phenomenon to another? It is a suggestive thought, but it hardly warrants prediction without losing touch with reality and immediateness.” “Presumably man's spirit should be elevated if he can better review his shady past and analyze more completely and objectively his present problems.”

Comments on Informing Ourselves To Death

2005-10-16T14:31:00.000-07:00

This article is full of fascination. Postman reflected on the action of technologies and information in our society by standing on a philosophical level. I don't exactly know the situation 15 years ago, but I clearly remember the discussion on information explosion 5 years ago all over the campus. Whatever 15 years or 5 years, human beings have not found the right answer yet until now. Postman presented some essential questions:

* What technologies do/undo to culture?

* It creats more/less than it destroys?

* Does new technology tend to favor some groups/harm other groups?

* What does technical change always result in? ---winners/losers

* What is dangerous? ---technologies/ourselves

I agree with Postman that the actual society is cruel. Winners win more by using new technologies, whereas losers lose more by succumbing new technologies. Scientist develop technologies for human's better life originally, but they are always being used as a kind of tools finally. Although the winners are not always doing that consciously, in a sense they are given more power by new technology.

The small experiment and the trope are so interesting. A brand new deck of cards or a shuffled deck of cards is just like our belief system. This is root of the problem. Unsure belief amplified the din of information. Computers merely manipulate and generate information. People are drowning in sea of information because of themselves.

So, the tie between information and action has been very important for us. In a way, when we create some information, we should think about the use of it. That namely means specialization, diversification, and narrow communication.

Comments on Chapter 2: Before the speaking telephone

It seems that wise people often do same thing by different means at the same time. The battle between Bell and Gray is such an example. The article focuses on these two precursors and extends its visual angle into a crowd of scientists. The process that they were making continual effort to improve the devices before speaking phone was so moving. Human beings are always able to invent a new item when they need it. What about the supervening necessity? For prototypes of speaking telephones, it was the need to validate Helmholtz's discussion of waves.

Comments on chapter 3: The capture of sound

In a way, telephone is an outcome of the commercial development. The social need, namely the modern business corporation asked for its emergence. Another example of supernening social necessity is the jukebox, which was arisen by the amusement requirements of the urban masses.

The most important element of the suppression was the law of patent, besides the failure of vision. On the other hand, the problems of technical diffusion are existing. My question is what on earth is the category of supervening necessity?

hello

2005-10-08T11:26:00.000-07:00

This is my first post.
Today is nice.
I hope every one has a nice day!