Some History to THAT Document

Catriona Campbell of The Usability Company has given an insight into the development process of the Quality Framework for Website Design that has been causing news recently. She was speaking at the AIGA Experience Design meeting on eGovernment in London last week.

She described how she and Brian Shackel fell into their involvement with the document. It was a team of designers, webmasters and the creative directors of a couple of external agencies meeting originally to plan a document on design which Campbell and Shackel found themselves joining.

'I raised my hand and asked: are you going to talk about design, or user-centred design?' said Campbell. 'Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to say it until the third meeting.'

The embryonic document was subsequently changed to be more concerned with usability, but much came as an add-on to a design rich, research poor starting point.

'It was meant to be about design and it was lucky we got something about ucd and usability in at all,' concluded Campbell.

The document has been criticised by the usability community for poor integration of usability practices, ignoring the value of iteration and a - now perhaps demystified, though still inappropriate - over-reliance on a couple of voices. Nonetheless, everyone has seen the value in a Government document that formally embraces user-centred design as a recommendation for public sector websites.

All change at the top for System Concepts
Source: System Concepts Ltd, 3 July 2009
 
Leslie Fountain has been promoted to joint Managing Director of leading usability consultancy System Concepts.

Life in UCD immortalised in fiction: you couldn't make it up
Source: UN, 2 July 2009
 
Sarah Herman's fictitious book on life in a user-centred design company has hit the shelves and The Guardian's book pages...

Interfaces Magazine - Issue 79: The Education Issue
Source: Interaction Group, 1 July 2009
 
The latest issue of Interfaces is now available as a free download from the Interaction Website.

Two new Behavioural research Tools from Noldus
Source: UN, 30 June 2009
 
Tool updates make on-site behavioural data collection easier.

Cell Phones that Listen and Learn
Source: MIT Technology Review, 29 June 2009
 
New software tracks a user's behavior by monitoring everyday sounds.

Top Six Don’ts for Usability Testing
Source: FutureNow Inc., 27 June 2009
 
Six tips for creating quality usability tests to ensure useful feedback from testers.

Usability: ‘Lovely software. But I can’t work it’
Source: FT.com, 26 June 2009
 
In a recent survey by Global Graphics, 77 per cent of office workers estimate they lose up to one hour a week because business software is difficult to use.

And what do you do?
Source: Dexo Design, 25 June 2009
 
How do you describe your job role? Here are the results of a recent 'Preferred UX/UI Title' Poll.

Most Doctors cite Usability as critical to Electronic Health Record Adoption
Source: TMCNet, 24 June 2009
 
It's all about 'meaningful use'.

Glossy monitors look good but can hurt
Source: QUT, 23 June 2009
 
A new advisory cites research which suggests high gloss monitors make users sit awkwardly.