Resources | Web Directions - Part 3

Resources

Podcasts, slides and other presentation materials

We have dozens of presentations online from previous conferences. Explore the links below to see slideshows and hear podcasts from leading experts in:

• accessibility
• ajax
• coding
• css
• data
• design
• development
• government
• html
• innovation
• interaction design
• interface design
• javascript
• mobile
• project management
• social media
• strategy
• usability
• user experience
• user research
• visual design
• w3c
• web apps
• web standards

August de los Reyes — Predicting the past

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 4.05pm.

A new inflection point in human-​​computer interaction is upon us. Along with other technologies, Microsoft Surface marks a departure from graphical user interface or GUI into the world of Natural User Interface or NUI. This talk begins with discussion of emotional design and its importance in the future of society. The lens shifts to how one design team is thinking about designing for a new era in which emotional intent and intuitive interaction are the imperative. Using theoretical models drawn from a mix of history, science, philosophy, and even video game design, this presentation reveals principles behind experience design for Microsoft Surface and beyond.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Nick Bolton — The evolution and commercialisation of online video

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 2.40pm.

Internet video has come a long way from the postage stamp generic media player to the commercial success it is today.

This session looks at this journey, and examines the multitude of online video options available. We will look at content creation (simple single piece, to multi-​​platform, and user generated), distribution methods and publishing strategies.

Then once the video is published, how do you justify it (the ROI), commercialise it (leverage the content) and monetise it through syndication, advertising, sponsorship, or pay-​​per-​​view/​subscription. There will be real time demos and case studies.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Jeff Croft — Elegant web typography

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 2.40pm.

Even in our day of web videos and podcasts, text is still the king of content on the web. Great typographic sensitivity is one of the hallmarks of sites that exude a professional confidence. From type sizing and coloring to leading, kerning, and measures to proper usage of quotes, dashes, and bullets, to choosing appropriate typefaces, this session will demonstrate using CSS and other modern web technologies to display type on screen with elegance and impact.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Hurol Inan — Informing experience architecture with quantitative insights

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 1.40pm.

Quantitative insights gathered through online analytics can contribute greatly to the design and optimisation of online experience architectures.

The success of an Experience Architect depends on the business impact of their architecture. Quantitative techniques can be used in benchmarking before and after performances of a website demonstrating the impact of the new architecture.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Panel — Javascript libraries — putting the cross in cross-​​browser compatible

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 1.40pm.

No longer are search engines the main contenders when you’re shopping for JavaScript solutions. For sophisticated, cross-​​browser effects which degrade gracefully and don’t impede accessibility, libraries are the new heavy weights. But which library do you want in your corner?

The crop of polished, opensource libraries bring a vast array of visual effects and functionality to leverage in your projects and we’ll introduce you to the power houses. We’ll run jQuery, the YUI, and Prototype up against pure Javascript in a tag team event that will challenge even the hardiest code warriors.

In this special 2 hour session local and international developers will run libraries through their paces giving you real world insights in to how a library can help you knockout the toughest scripting challenge.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Gabriel White — Sensing context in mobile design

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 1.40pm.

Mainstream mobile devices are being loaded with sensors. These devices can be used to create experiences that are tailored, adaptive and responsive to the way people live and work. Location-​​awareness allows devices to respond to place, networked address books enable socially rich communication experiences, and motion and gestural sensors empower designers to respond to context of use. All these elements are creating a ’sensitive ecosystem’; mobile devices that adapt gracefully to context and use.

This presentation will explore some of the design and technology trends that are shaping design for mobile devices, show examples of devices and services that are starting to take advantage of these trends, then explain how designers need to rethink design problems to take advantage of this technological ground-​​shift.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Grant Young — Strategies for social media engagement

• In: Resources, cool, trends
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 11.45am.

With so many social networks blooming, all with different participants and methods of interaction, it can be hard to determine where to invest your energy, time and $$.

The session will provide ideas and a “background briefing” to help you answer the question:

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Teale Shapcott — From ordered to managed usability in an Agile environment

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 11.45am.

Usability practice closely resembles the traditional software development approach in its formality and insistence on up-​​front analysis and design. Usability and design is an iterative process, but not agile. So how can design and usability be effectively embedded into an agile development environment? In this presentation, the tension between agile development and usability is examined and how Suncorp design and development teams overcame the challenges to bridge the gulf between these approaches.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Pete Ottery & Tim Lucas — Developing for iPhone

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 11.45am.

The release of Apple’s iPhone brings new opportunities for web sites and web apps on handheld devices, though not without its share of challenges and best practices.

Tim and Pete will look at the best examples out in the wild and share their experience creating iphone​.news​.com​.au — one of Australia’s largest news sites, news​.com​.au, tailored to the iPhone.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Kay Smoljak — Starting and running a successful web development business

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 10.45am.

Working for yourself is a dream that many web designers and developers have. You can pick and choose your clients, work in your pajamas, and sleep in until 10am every day if you want to. But there’s a more serious side to starting a business, and lots of factors to consider if you decide to head out on your own. Kay will share the story of Clever Starfish’s journey from a seed of an idea to a thriving small business, with lots of handy hints for both things to do, and things not to do, along the way.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Dmitry Baranovskiy — Start using web vector graphics today

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 10.45am.

With the growth of interactivity in web applications we are pushing Javascript to its limits, not to mention the limits of HTML and CSS. And so we spend our days resorting to Flash, waiting for that distant time when browser support for CSS3 will come to our rescue and allow us to create the UIs we dream of. But this is not the way it has to be: there is a little known secret weapon right here in most modern browsers. Yes, even in IE6.

Dmitry Baranovskiy is here to tell you about Canvas, SVG and VML. Come along and be amazed by standards based UI wizardry you can start implementing in projects right here, right now.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Derek Featherstone — Accessibility beyond compliance

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• June 19, 2008

Web Directions South 2008, Sydney Convention Centre, September 25 10.45am.

New technologies for web applications open up interactions to a highly sophisticated level. Learn how these new technologies can help designers move beyond simply complying with accessibility rules to create applications that work for everyone.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Lisa Herrod — Usability: more than skin deep

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• March 27, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions Government, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

Web Usability is far more complex than user testing and interaction design alone. And while interface design is an important consideration, there’s more to a usable site than what’s on the surface.

We all know the importance of accessibility and web standards, so let’s take that knowledge one step further and into the realm of usability. In this session Lisa Herrod will redefine the common definition of usability by introducing a greater focus on accessibility and web standards. By taking a more holistic approach you will soon see why usability is more than skin deep.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

David Hayward — Mapping

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 26, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions Government, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

Government has huge amounts of information but how can this be effectively managed and delivered through the web? This session will ‘lift the lid’ on web mapping technology and identify some of the key issues that must be addressed to achieve a successful outcome.

The NSW government SIX Viewer web mapping portal will be used as a case study to demonstrate how terabytes of data can be integrated and delivered via the Internet.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Scott Gledhill — Real world web standards

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions Government, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

Those initial stages of converting your company to web standards are much like trying to score that first kiss with the princess. You seduce them with the business benefits of web-​​standards development, and the rest of the arguments we have all read, written, and preached to anyone who will listen. But getting corporate web standards in place is just a sign that the real relationship is about to begin. The honeymoon is over, and now it’s time to figure out what has gone wrong and why the prince and princess now seem to be constantly bickering—when they were meant to live happily ever after.

Scott draws on his experiences leading the development of eight large media web sites for News Digital Media to examine the ideals of web standards and how they translate within a large organisation. Learn how to make web standards work for you, when rules must be broken and how to deliver a final product that meets deadlines and still keeps project teams happy.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Robert Hoekman Jr — The essential elements of great web applications

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Town Hall, May 16 2008, and Web Direction Government, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

Most great web applications have a few key things in common. But can you name them? Better yet — can you achieve them consistently in your own projects?

In this closing keynote, Robert Hoekman, Jr., author of the Amazon bestseller Designing the Obvious (New Riders) describes the seven qualities of great web-​​based software and how to achieve each and every one of them by learning to communicate through design. See why it’s important to build only what’s absolutely essential, apply instructive design, create error-​​proof interactions, surface commonly-​​used features, and more in this informative session that will change the way you work and enable your users to walk away from your software feeling productive, respected, and smart.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Ralph Douglas — GovDex: Collaborating online in a secure environment

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions Government, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

This session will look at the government collaborative tool Govdex, how it is currently used by agencies, what it provides, and how you can use it for your projects. GovDex is a resource developed by the Department of Finance and Deregulation to facilitate business process collaboration across policy portfolios and jurisdictions.

GovDex, managed by the Australian Government Information Management Office (AGIMO) in the Department of Finance & Deregulation, promotes effective and efficient information sharing, which is core to achieving collaboration. It provides governance, tools, methods and re-​​usable technical components that agencies can use to assemble and deploy information services on their different technology platforms. GovDex is a key enabler to a whole of government approach to IT service development and deployment.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Patrick Lee — One paper clip, a box of matches, and some JavaScript

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions Government, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

Whoever you are, if you’re writing JavaScript, there’s some aspect of your development that you would love to change if you had the chance. But the reality is you’ll never find yourself working in this ideal environment: dealing with legacy browsers, platforms and content management systems will be your constant as a developer. Patrick Lee is going to show you some tools and techniques that will help you make your peace with this fact.

This session will explore how you can find ways to do the cool stuff you really want to do with JavaScript whilst working in the real world. And you won’t even have to sell your soul in the process.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Oliver Weidlich — The mobile web user experience — we’re starting to get it right!

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Town Hall, May 16 2008.

Historically the mobile web has been a terrible experience, but things are starting to change. Really! We are now at the point that the mobile web is becoming easier to access, both on-​​deck & off-​​deck, there’s useful & tailored services out there, and killing some time on the train home doesn’t cost more than your weekly train ticket. We’ll check out the latest and greatest in the world of mobile web and what makes them different from the others. We will also cover the important things to keep in mind for making a better mobile web customer experience.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Matthew Hodgson — Social computing for knowledge management

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions User Experience, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

The world is abuzz with social computing: Facebook, My Space, YouTube, Flickr, Wikipedia, blogs, wikis and other spaces powered by Web 2.0 technology. It’s a social revolution, empowering individuals to communicate, share what they know online, and help others locate information that is important to them in both their private and working lives.

Some see all this as a big waste of corporate time, but is it? Is there value in handing over control of collaboration and sharing knowledge to individuals, rather than hoarding it in records systems, knowledge systems, and thousands of network dive folders? Is there a way you can harness this social revolution to help improve our organisation’s knowledge management practices? Is there actually a solid business value proposition for social computing?

Matthew will look at knowledge management in modern organisations, and how you can benefit by learning from the principles of social computing and Web 2.0 technologies. Matthew will introduce two case studies in government that demonstrate successful and not-​​so-​​successful ways of employing social computing tools, the factors that contributed to their success, and the pitfalls to watch out for. In particular, he will look at the issues in relation to corporate culture by drawing on recent research in blogs and wikis based on work in organisational psychology by Hofstede.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Mathew Patterson — Delivering user experience to the inbox: designing for email

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Town Hall, May 16 2008.

So you’ve designed a fantastic website for your client, tested in all the major browsers and everything looks great. Now they want to send an email newsletter to all their customers, using the new design.

No problem right? Just need to test in Outlook 07, and 06. Yahoo and Hotmail too, of course. Oh, and Gmail, Lotus Notes, AOL…Of course, the design may not work that well for an email anyway, and isn’t there some kind of anti-​​spam laws?

Like it or not, HTML email is here to stay and the responsibility for doing it right belongs to web designers. Learn how to plan, design and build an email newsletter that will provide a great user experience to the recipients, and great value to your clients.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Lisa Herrod — User testing for the rest of us

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Town Hall, May 16 2008.

Everyone knows they should be doing it, but like software testing, it’s one of those things we often don’t get round to. In this presentation, Lisa Herrod looks at some sure fire user testing techniques that produce proven results, don’t cost the earth, and are easy to implement. After this session you won’t have any more excuses for not doing solid user testing of any site or application you develop ever again.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

José Manuel Alonso — Improving Government through better use of the Web

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions User Experience, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

It’s no secret that just as the web has revolutionised business, the media, and many other parts of our lives, it is also revolutionising how governments and citizens interact, and how government provide services.

But how to do it well is still something of a black art.

In this keynote presentation, the lead of the W3C’s eGovernment initiative, José Manuel Alonso, looks at the opportunities the web provides governments, the challenges, old and new, the web poses, and the role of the W3C in helping to develop underlying, interoperable technologies with which to build these services.

José’s presentation will cover best practices and methodologies for providing eGovernment services, and look at case studies of how governments and communities are connecting via the web around the world.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Jenny Telford — Opening up government data

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions Government, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

Mapping and other mashups have taken the web world by storm — driving innovation in business and government alike. While much of the focus has been on the actual mashup applications, without the data to mashup, we have no mashups. Government, from local to Federal level, collect and manage a significant amount of data, across a very broad range of areas. But giving access to this data to web application developers has technical, policy and legal challenges. In this presentation, Jenny Telford of the ABS looks at these issues from their experience of opening up data from the Australian Census.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Jason Ryan — Govt 2.0: the public management challenge

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions User Experience, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

Technology changes present complex challenges and rich opportunities for senior public sector managers. Finding the balance between innovation and risk management is not easy in an environment where successful engagement depends upon relinquishing control. Using examples from New Zealand’s experience, Jason will share lessons and observations about the inevitable growing pains of public sector agencies as they evolve towards Govt 2.0.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Jackie Moyes — Converting research findings into business speak

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Town Hall, May 16 2008.

Getting your company to adopt a user-​​centred design approach can be an uphill struggle. The first stage typically is to get them to agree to incorporate usability testing in to the development process, at a stage early enough to actually implement any design recommendations. The second stage is to convince them to do more ethnographic style research to understand the larger context of the task that the site is trying to support. The biggest challenge comes last – how to help the business owners make the mental leap between the in-​​depth findings from the research and the implications and opportunities it presents to your core business strategy and product roadmap.

This is the challenge that the User Experience team at News Digital Media have been addressing. In this presentation, Jackie will discuss this issue in more depth and present examples of ‘design tools’ the team have been experimenting with to try and bridge this gap and help the business develop more user-​​centric strategies.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Donna Spencer — Getting content right

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Town Hall, May 16 2008.

We all know that great content is a core part of the website user experience. So why is it so hard to find content that isn’t dull, lifeless and uninteresting — blah, blah, blah?

Web content can be vibrant, interesting and fun. It can draw you in, fill your head and make you learn without having to think. And it’s not really hard to write. Three simple tricks can turn poor content into a great experience — remember that readers care more about themselves than you; write in real words with authentic voice; play show and tell.

This presentation will discuss these principles, with plenty of funny and not-​​so-​​funny examples. You’ll go away with practical steps to make your writing kick-​​ass. And you won’t even have to think.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Andy Budd — Designing the experience curve

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Town Hall, May 16 2008.

These days people expect more from a website than a handy set of tools and a pretty interface — they want an experience. From the moment somebody enters your site they’ll be judging you on everything from the way the site looks to the tone of your error messages. And they won’t just be judging you against other sites. They will be judging you on every customer experience they have ever had, from the rude man at the train station to the lovely hotel clerk that checked them in on holiday. So in order to compete, we need to up our game and look at experiences both on and off-​​line.

In this session Andy Budd will look at the 9 key factors that go into designing the perfect customer experience. By taking examples from the world around us, Andy will discuss how we can turn utilitarian experiences into something wonderful.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Andrew Kesper — ABC’s election site: making the most of dry data

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 10, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Town Hall, May 16 2008, and Web Directions Government, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.

While elections can be exciting times, the underlying data — swings, booth counts, and the like is probably only riveting to psephological tragics. Yet the ABC’s election web site managed to take this raw data and make it attractive, compelling and interactive.

In this session, the ABC’s Andrew Kesper takes us through the election site, looking at the design decisions, and uses of technology like Ajax, Flash, and interactive maps — tools which have wide applicability for government sites looking to present data in more user-​​friendly and attractive ways.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Steve Baty — Analysing user research data

• In: Resources
• By: Maxine
• March 5, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Australia, May 16 2008.

In our efforts to better understand the end users of the sites & applications we design, we generate a great deal of data. That data is useless to us until it has been analyzing and interpreted. This presentation looks at some of the methods & techniques we can use to make sense of user research data in a meaningful & rigorous way. The presentation will look at some of the common types of quantitative data collected during user research, and the statistical analysis methods we can employ to make the most of our data-​​gathering efforts. The session covers practical examples such as task completion rates, time-​​to-​​completion, page view comparison, as well as some basic concepts in statistics.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Jeremy Yuille — Web visualisation: do you see what I see?

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 15, 2008

A presentation given at at Web Directions User Experience, Melbourne Town Hall, May 16 2008.

In this session Jeremy Yuille from ACID looks at information visualisation from a user experience perspective, overviewing new and old examples and how they can help (or hinder) the experience of using the web. You’ll see what kinds of amazing things you can do within the browser platform these days. More importantly you’ll learn why (and when) you’d want to use visualisation at all.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Anil Dash — Serious business: Putting social media to work

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

You know what blogs and wikis are, and you know your YouTube from your Facebook. But do you know how to make a compelling business case for these technologies? Social media and social networking tools are poised to have as much of an impact on business as they’ve had on the way we communicate with our friends and family online.

Anil Dash, a blogger since 1999 who’s helped thousands of businesses make use of social media through his work at Six Apart, shares real-​​world examples of how companies are using social media to build their business. Six Apart is the world’s biggest blogging company, behind such platforms as Movable Type, LiveJournal, Vox, and TypePad.

And even more important than where technology has been is where it’s going: Learn about cutting-​​edge technological initiatives like OpenID and OpenSocial, and how these aren’t just about new ways to poke your Facebook friends — they’re business opportunities.

Finally, no change this big happens without thinking about the social and political realities of the business world. What works in convincing your company, your coworkers, or your boss to spend their time and money trying new things? This session will lead a conversation to find out.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Kimberly Elam — Five Essential Composition Tools for Web Typography

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 30 2008.

Have you ever seen a web site so clear, logical, and exquisitely composed it made you stop in your tracks? Have you wondered how the designer achieved such a stunning and cohesive design?

In this presentation, Kimberly Elam, designer and author of the best-​​selling “Geometry of Design” and “Typographic Systems” will reveal the mysterious relationships between proportion, visual systems, composition and aesthetics.

Too often excellent conceptual ideas suffer during the process of realization, in large part because the designer did not understand the essential visual principles. This presentation explores these elements and how they work by examining how the use of visual principles informs, even creates, beauty in typographic design, but, more importantly, how you can use these techniques to create cohesiveness in your own design. The wide range of visual examples are both informative and insightful, and any designer can benefit from learning or revisiting the rules governing the basics of typographic design.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Josh Williams — Bedroom to Boardroom

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 30 2008.

What happens when a designer decides to quit his day job, hang his shingle, and wakes up seven years later nowhere remotely close to where he imagined he would be? This frank, semi-​​informal discussion on the pros, cons, and potential progressions of a designer’s career

will explore the following:

• Niching your design services
• Crafting a salable product
• The Web Designer of Tomorrow

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Gina Trapani — Better Gmail: How Google Opened Gmail’s Web Interface to Any Developer Who Cares (And Why You Should)

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 30 2008.

Last year, Google released an experimental Greasemonkey API for Gmail: coding hooks that let anyone add CSS and Javascript to Gmail that enhances how it looks and behaves. Why would you want to do this? Why wouldn’t you? Hear how Google’s using Greasemonkey to distribute Gmail development amongst independent web developers–and how those developers are integrating their own product into Gmail — resulting in a Better Gmail for everyone.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Matt Webb — Movement (Web Directions North Closing Keynote)

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

We’ve always had metaphors to understand and design for the Web.

The original conception of the Web was as a library of documents. Our building blocks were derived from spatial ideas: “breadcrumbs,” “visits” and “homepages” were used to understand the medium.

Website-​​as-​​application was a new and novel metaphor in the late 1990s. The spatial concept of navigation was replaced by concepts derived from tools: buttons performed actions on data.

These metaphors inspire separate but complementary models of the Web. But the Web in 2008 has some entirely new qualities: more than ever it’s an ecology of separate but highly interconnected services. Its fiercely competitive, rapid development means differentiating innovations are quickly copied and spread. Attention from users is scarce. The fittest websites survive. In this world, what metaphors can be most successfully wielded?

Matt takes as a starting point interaction and product design, with ideas from cybernetics and Getting Things Done. He offers as a metaphor the concept of the Web as experience. That is, treating a website as a dynamic entity — a flowchart of motivations that both provides a continuously satisfying experience for the user… and helps the website grow.

From seeing what kind of websites this model provokes, we’ll see whether it also helps illuminate some of the Web’s coming design challenges: the blending of the Web with desktop software and physical devices; the particular concerns of small groups; and what the next movement might bring.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Eric Rodenbeck — Information visualization as a medium

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

Information visualization is becoming more than a set of tools and technologies and techniques to understand large data sets. It is emerging as a medium in its own right, with a wide range of expressive potential.

Stamen’s work in visualization and mapping is among the most high profile online today, with the live dynamic displays at Digg Labs and Cabspotting being just two of many examples. The studio’s approach is deeply pragmatic, always starting with real data and aiming to work with graphics on screen as soon as possible. Though all analysis is a work in progress, a project is usually finished when it shows something nobody has seen before, or builds a vocabulary for describing a system, or offers more questions than answers. And then the process begins again.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Tara Hunt — Government 2.0: Architecting for collaboration

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 30 2008.

What does Web 2.0 mean and, specifically, what does it mean for the future of governments? Tara Hunt has been speaking all over the world, talking to government audiences on this subject. She believes that Web 2.0 has very little to do with the technology and everything to do with people. Her talk will cover the main tenets of Web 2.0: openness, collaboration and community and what it means for government.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Brian Fling — Mobile web design and development

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

Mobile technology is poised to revolutionize how we gather information. By 2010 half the population of the planet will have access to the internet through a mobile device, making the mobile web an essential part of our lives. Yet the mobile industry has few if any resources to help would-​​be mobile developers from diving in other than applied experience from within the industry.

Brian Fling dicusses the mobile ecosystem in Canada and abroad, how you go about developing an integrated mobile web strategy, mobile design and development principles and best practices, and most importantly, practical techniques and information to start creating mobile websites today.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Douglas Crockford — Ajax security

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

Security design is an important, but often neglected, component of system design. In this session, Douglas Crockford, creator of Javascript Object Notation, will outline the security issues that must be considered in the architecture of Ajax applications.

The design of the browser did not anticipate the needs of multiparty applications. The browser’s security model frustrates useful activities and allows some very dangerous activities. This talk will look at the small set of options before us that will determine the future of the Web.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Daniel Burka — The why and how: UI case studies

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

User interface design is an iterative process — the design of Digg and Pownce have been a study in evolution and adaptation. This talk will inspect the why and how of these iterations by looking at specific case studies from the two projects as well as previous client work Daniel has tackled.

The case studies will examine specific user interface challenges that have arisen and will chop them up into their various bits. How do I identify a challenge? What is the best approach for getting started? How do I solve the problem conceptually and technically? How will I know if I solved the challenge successfully? Case studies have been selected that are especially pertinent outside of their specific contexts to help you in your everyday UI design.

The presentation will focus on design inspiration, decision-​​making processes, technical solutions, and learning from missteps as part of a designer’s iterative process.

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Cameron Adams — The future of web interfaces

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

We’re at an exciting time in the development of web-​​based interfaces — along with a maturing front-​​end toolkit (CSS & JavaScript), there are so many technologies, trends and exciting ideas emerging that are enabling us to push the boundaries of interface design.

Author, designer and code cowboy Cameron Adams will explore some of these areas and how they will apply to our development of online interfaces, including: the possibilities of front-​​end customisation, application interfaces, browser-​​native vector graphics, and the general duty of all web developers to make things interesting.

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Brian Oberkirch – “Plays Well With Others”: Simple Things to Make the Social Parts of your Service More Social

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 30 2008.

Not only are most Web applications going to have (or utilize) social components — they’re also going to have start sharing social information like profiles, contact lists and such with other services. The ’social network fatigue’ users feel and the inefficiencies of keeping this information in multiple spots will drive us to play better with other social apps. This session will focus on using simple building blocks and emerging design patterns to keep it simple for users, for you and for the open social Web at large.

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Jared Spool – What Makes a Design Seem Intuitive?

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 30 2008.

Everyone wants an “intuitive” interface: the users, the designers, and the content publishers. But building them is hard. User Interface Engineering’s recent research has given insight into why it’s hard and how to get past major obstacles.

To build an “intuitive” interface, a designer has to do two things: (1) Take complete advantage of what the user already knows, so what they see is completely familiar to them and (2) make the act of learning anything new completely imperceptible to the user. It turns out, if the interface requires the user to realize they are learning something, the “intuitive” label disappears instantly.

In this talk, Jared will show:

• How users need both tool knowledge and domain knowledge to complete their tasks
• How simple problems with designs can cause big problems for users
• What successful teams are doing to create experiences that delight

Jared will show examples from Microsoft Word, MSN, Google Talk, Flickr, Avis, and many more.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Jeffrey Zeldman – Return of the King of Web Standards

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 30 2008.

Dubbed “the King of Web Standards” by Business Week, Jeffrey Zeldman co-​​founded the group and movement that brought standards to our browsers. Through A List Apart Magazine, his books, and endless advocacy, he brought wisdom to our industry and benefits awareness to the people who approve our budgets. Ten years into the web standards movement, how are we doing? What agreements have we reached? What battles no longer need to be fought? What hurdles still prevent us from reaching standards and accessibility utopia?

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Jonathan Snook – Working with Ajax Frameworks

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 30 2008.

It seems like there’s a new Ajax library or JavaScript framework coming out every week, and there probably is! Which is the best one to pick? Will you be up the creek without a paddle if you choose the wrong one?

“Working with Ajax Frameworks” will delve into some common Ajax design patterns and how various frameworks can be used to meet those needs. We’ll also take a look at how we can keep our own code flexible as we bridge the gap between it and the various frameworks.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Derek Featherstone – Real World Accessibility For Real World People

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 30 2008.

When we follow the principles of web standards, we write valid HTML and CSS, unobtrusive JavaScript and follow WCAG and other accessibility guidelines. This simple act goes a long way to creating an accessible web site, application or service. At the same time, many sites that don’t utilize all that is good and wholesome about web standards perform surprisingly well when they are used by people with disabilities.

How can we get the best of both worlds to create standards-​​based solutions that are highly usable for real people (including those with disabilities) in the real world?

In this session, we’ll dissect several examples from real sites and apps to learn about accessibility problems that arise from design and development decisions and what we can do to create a more accessible user experience for all people, regardless of their ability.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Indi Young — Innovation With Mental Models

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

In his recent book, The Myths of Innovation, Scott Berkun argues that innovation does not happen in a flash of inspiration. Instead, it takes years of research to deeply understand a problem space. A designer who methodically examines, adopts, or discards various hypothesis about the topic is the one who comes up with the best solutions.

In this talk, Indi Young will present a methodical (but rapid!) approach to invention. Using a mental model diagram depicting the behavior of a customer segment, she will show how to recognize when your current offerings could do better at matching needs and how to synthesize new ideas.

With the ideas in this presentation, you will be able to think up new product ideas and improve upon old product features in a guided, strategic manner.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

Andre Charland & Walter Smith – Developing With Adobe AIR and Microsoft Silverlight

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

Crash Course in Adobe AIR

There comes a time when web developers need to reach beyond the browser to allow users to go offline, use local files or get rid of the hideous browser chrome. The Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR) is an up an coming runtime technology that allows desktop applications to be developed with HTML, JavaScript, Flash or Flex. The AIR runtime and SDK are completely free so anyone can get started immediately.

Andre Charland will will give an overview or AIR, the APIs you get access to and how to build a simple Flex and HTML application with it. From there we will explore some of the tools available to make AIR development easier and faster. We’ll finish up with a few important usability guidelines and real world case studies of AIR projects.

A real world overview of Silverlight

Seattle-​​based Jackson Fish Market helped deliver the Silverlight based search engine Tafiti, one of the earliest commercial Silverlight applications.

In this presentation, Jackson Fish Market co-​​founder Walter Smith will give us a detailed overview of Microsoft’s RIA technology Silverlight. We’ll learn from Walter’s first hand experience the strengths and weaknesses of the platform, and see real world examples of what Silverlight can be used to achieve.

If you are looking to evaluate RIA frameworks, or just get a sense of the emerging RIA landscape, this session will prove invaluable.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

John Allsopp & Dave Shea – Where’s Your Web At? Designing for the Web Beyond the Desktop

• In: Resources
• By: jessie
• February 12, 2008

A presentation given at Web Directions North, Vancouver Canada, January 31 2008.

Since the advent of personal computing, we’ve been tied to one place — typically sitting at a desk, with a keyboard and mouse, and in isolation. Even the advent of the web and the wifi-​​enabled laptop hasn’t much changed this quarter century old paradigm. But with the rise of mobile phones and devices like the Nintendo Wii and PSP featuring first class web browsing, our experience of the web will change dramatically over the coming years. In this context, which design and user experience patterns and techniques we’ve developed over the last 15 years hold up? And… which break?

In this session, Dave Shea and John Allsopp consider the challenges we’ll face as the web devolves onto a myriad devices, and the web is “always on” wherever we are.

See the slides and hear the podcast »

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