Better usability equals lower costs

Pragmatic Marketing has a really good article on how McAfee reduced its support costs by improving usability. The article also contains a list of 23 tips to improve a UI. I’ve summarized the list here, but it doesn’t do the full article justice.

Start the UI design before you build the product.
Understand your software from a [...]

What does the on/off glyph represent?

Nathan Zeldes has a very cool article on the history of the On/Off power switch glyph.

10 Mistakes in Icon Design

Turbo Milk has got an interesting article on icon design. As far as I am concerned, it’s a usability study of icon design. Here is the top 10 list:

Insufficient differentiation between icons
Too many elements in one icon
Unnecessary elements
Lack of unity of style within a set of icons
Unnecessary perspective and shadows in small icons
Overly original metaphors
National [...]

Who sells the Multi-handy Tool?

UPDATE: A friend of mine found a new and improved version of the tool! It’s by Kikkerland Designs. The product is called Classic Survival Tool. You can buy it at Fishboy.com.
In my recent blog entry, Clever simple designs of everday tools, I referenced a tool called the “Multi-handy Tool.” I found the original pictures [...]

Clever simple designs of everday tools

I love simple tools. The fewer parts, the fewer the movements, the better. Nathan’s Possibly Interesting Web Site has put together an eclectic but very cool list of some great, simple tools.
This multi-handy tool is my favorite.

The one thing I always have with me is my wallet. Now all I have to do is get [...]

Bad usability calendar

Netlife Research has their new Bad Usability Calendar out for 2008. It’s a funny way to learn good usability by looking at poor usability.
“It´s here; a new edition of the (in)famous Bad Usability Calendar. The past three calendars have all been successful in distributing examples of bad design around the world. Check out the fresh [...]

Stick to the standards

I have another TV related usability story. We have a cheap TV we use in the basement. It’s a Konka (I’ve never heard of them either). It was given to me so I can’t complain too much. It’s a decent TV. Good picture and all of that. But there’s something that really bugs me about [...]

Marketing is good usability

Vincent Flanders wrote an article a few years ago called What Would Amazon.com do? The following quote gives a good synopsis of the article.
“It’s an important question because Amazon.com has probably spent more time and money researching what works and doesn’t work on a web site than anyone. If you don’t see a web design [...]

Texture and placement improve usability

Texture and placement can improve usability. After all, many user interfaces have at least some spatial or physical component. Even if every interface you design is web based, your users are probably going to be using a mouse. And they’re certainly going to be affected by the placement and layout of navigational elements on the [...]

Accessibility and usability are different

I used to think accessibility and usability were the same thing. The terms even seem to suggest the same idea. They both sound like concepts which indicate how someone interacts with something. But they are different.I’ve looked at the definitions out there and most are long and complicated. So, I thought I would try to [...]