Blog of the Week: Icon-O-Cast

There aren’t very many design-related podcasts out there. A select few are of consistently high...

In the Details: Button Hook

All of the cars I’ve driven in the past have had pretty standard switches for the automatic windows....

Instant Winner

The internet has improved a lot of things and created wonderful new experiences. Due to this...

Web Form Design

Luke Wroblewski’s new book, Web Form Design: Filling in the Blanks, has just been published by...

Free Speech

I was traveling this weekend to attend a cousin’s wedding. On the drive there, my car was damaged...

Blog of the Week: Brand New

What do Ford, Starz, Discovery Channel, the Seattle Founders FC, Thomson Reuters, SanDisk, and...

Keyboard Tradeoffs

For the past four and a half years, I’ve been using Apple’s Bluetooth keyboard and mouse. I love the...

Upgrade

Tonight, I’m saying goodbye to an old friend and welcoming a new member of the family. I purchased a...

Sent from my iPhone

Thus reads the default signature in Mail on the iPhone. Thus far, I have not made the effort to...

In the Details: Volume Control

Another feature of my new Mazda5 that I really like is the automatic volume adjustment. The volume...

Synchrosurprised

Back in November, I wrote about Microsoft’s new Sync system, which is currently available in Ford...

“Never tell me the odds.”

Han Solo, Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back How many times have I heard a respected...

Roulette Vendor

There’s an elaborate vending machine in the building at which I’m working this week. Rather than...

Hit with the Ugly Sticker

I was riding to lunch with a co-worker the other day and noticed that he had one of those paper...

Sorry Safari

Now that the iPhone SDK has been released and third-party apps are on the way, nobody is claiming...

Talking sMac

I love my Mac… which makes me all the more sensitive to its faults. I often commend Apple for...

DesignAyear

It was exactly one year ago today that I began this little blog. I’m happy to report that...

Blog of the Week: Adaptive Path

I typically attempt to bring something new to the blogosphere on DesignAday, rather than simply...

It’s Not Easy Being Green

Rachel Hinman made a very useful post to the Adaptive Path blog about a CHI presentation by Elaine...

Narrative II

Building on the Time Series, Tufte gives examples of a few distinct types of narrative...

Narrative Visualization by Andrew Carnill

Narrative II Detail

Grate Expectations

I’d never consider myself to be a great movie buff—I don’t see all that many movies. However, I do...

In the Details: Cruise Control

Seeing as how the new Mazda5 is my wife’s car, this weekend was the first time I had driven it for...

Blog of the Week: I Love Typography

As an Interaction Designer who spends most of my time limited to the fonts that come standard with...

How often do you think this motion-sensing paper towel...

Designer’s Toolbelt: xScope

I recently became aware of a great little utility from The Iconfactory called xScope. It’s comprised...

A Promising Vision

Autodesk has posted a video showing the results of research into green building design through a...

Can’t Touch This

On Friday, Engadget posted a video demonstrating a working prototype of a touchless remote control....

Blog of the Week: Design View

As regular readers have likely noticed, I’ve begun featuring design-related blogs in my Friday...

Missed Opportunity #7: Incremental Brake...

Several years ago I was driving to work and brainstorming ideas for new automobile features that...

In the Details: Speedometer

The speedometer on the dash of my new Mazda5 is quite large, which makes sense, as it is typically...

Mazda5 Speedometer

rEject

One of the products featured in the Greener Gadgets Design Competition, which I wrote about last...

Lazy Validation

The agency that handles my local taxes just made on-line filing available. I decided to take...

Required Fields

Blog of the Week: A Brief Message

I spend entirely too much time reading blogs. It keeps me up late at night. It isn’t healthy, but...

Literarture

I had been planning on posting about another interesting product design, but that will have to wait....

Brian Dettmer’s Book Art

Safari, So Good

Apple released an update for Safari yesterday, bringing it to 3.1. While they have added a lot of...

Web Inspector: DOM

Web Inspector: Network

Greenery

The winners of the Greener Gadgets Design Competition held during the month of February have been...

In the Details: Rain Sensor

The evolution of auto design is relatively slow due to a number of factors. I don’t expect to...

Blog of the Week: Logolog

When I see a really clever logo, one that just nails it, I get a quick rush of adrenaline. Call it a...

If Apples Could Talk

Apple is famous for keeping its design process a secret. Interaction Designers regularly speculate...

disSolution

Iconocast, the podcast produced by Lunar Design, just published a presentation by Jeff Smith,...

Blast from the Past

Based on an idea published by Robert Scoble, a wiki has been created to collect all of the skills...

You Can Never Leave

To anyone who has been reading this blog regularly, it is no secret that I choose to use Macintosh...

Log Out Blocked

Another Ding in the Universe

Apple has been getting a lot of press—most recently from Fortune’s Top 20 Most Admired...

Interaction Design in the Wild

Some Interaction Designers believe that Interaction Design is strictly about digital products:...

Easy Open Tab

zoom zoom

I wrote the other day about my disappointment with Chrysler’s new line of minivans. We had...

Holy Banner Ads, Batman!

I typically don’t mind banner ads. Having been desensitized, I very easily ignore them....

Pitching Manure

There was a discussion on the IxDA list last week about “de-skilling”, and someone...

Satisfraction

ChangeWave released a report today on the trends in corporate smart phone purchases. It’s no...

Morph

Nokia has a video up on YouTube showing a futuristic concept device based on nanotechnologies. While...

Techsuck

Time has been weighing on my thoughts lately. I never seem to have enough of it. I’m involved...

Choice Bits from Alan Cooper

I don’t take a lot of notes. I did, however, make sure to write down anything that really made...

Driving a Living Room

Being a relatively young adult, I have only owned three cars thus far: a Dodge Neon, a Chrysler PT...

Luke Arm

Dean Kamen is at it again. The inventor of the AutoSyringe, the first insulin pump, the all-terrain...

Pseudo Tabs

I’m in the market for a new car, looking to replace a Chrysler Voyager. I was checking out the...

Pseudo Tabs

frAgile

Interaction 08 saw quite a bit of debate around the role of design in an Agile development...

Designer's Toolbelt: Thermo

The most exciting thing I saw at Interaction 08 was a demo of Thermo, Adobe’s upcoming user...

Design Delivers

One of my co-workers told me the other day that he started out with the typical engineering mindset...

I'm a Designer

On Sunday, as I was walking between the River Club and the Sheraton on my way to another session, I...

Sharing the Pain

Saturday night’s reception at Interaction 08 was hosted by Microsoft. Aside from the four...

Things I Learned at Interaction 08

Bamboo chairs are aesthetically pleasing, but they aren’t very comfortable. Appetizers are...

Schwag Bag

One of the most important questions to be answered about any conference is, of course,...

I'm a Selfish Social Butterfly

I’m back from Interaction 08, and I’ll be posting about it for several days. This was an...

Interaction 08

I’m catching a plane for Savannah this morning. I hope to gain a lot of inspiration (and a few...

Starting Off on the Wrong Foot

I’ve been quite happy with my Verizon FiOS internet service. It’s fast, reliable, and...

Designer's Toolbelt: Axure

The Pittsburgh local IxDA group held their first programmed event last night. Their were...

iTunes as Design Pattern

I was having a discussion with one of my co-workers about the UI design of one of our products. I...

Design on the Soles of Her Shoes

One trait of a good designer is that they are observant—much more so than the average person. They...

CrowdVine

Interaction 08 is only a week away, and I’m getting pretty excited about it. This is due in...

Narrative Visualization

Based on Tufte’s categorization, one of the assignment’s in the class I taught last...

Tarannum’s Narrative

Narrative Detail

...but who’s counting?

I’m beginning to wonder if I will ever have a good air travel experience again. I booked my...

Designer's Toolbelt: TextWrangler

While I prefer to leave implementation to the developers, I do have to muck with code on a regular...

Let’s It Snow

I’m not sure which is worse: the fact that this gift bag was designed, printed, shipped,...

Made in China

Everything Old...

I heard a news story yesterday about a new, innovative method of ship propulsion that will conserve...

Time Series II

In this second example from my course on Information Design and Visualization, another time series,...

Time Series Version 1

Time Series by Tarannum

In the Details: Head Phone

One of my favorite iPhone features has nothing to do with the innovative multi-touch screen or the...

Time Series

One of the early assignments in my course last semester was the design of a time series data...

Enlarged Area of Visualization

Time Series by Marcie Kent

Pump Stumper

A good friend of mine related the following story to me last Friday.  After breakfast today, I...

Which button do you press after entering your zip code?

Simplehuman

It always excites me to see companies succeed due to exquisite design innovation. For OXO’s...

Jello is GUI

The new version of the iPhone software added a number of quite useful features (although I’m...

Time Capsule

I’ve been planning for some time now to put together my “ultimate” back-up system....

Powramid

One of the few things coming out of CES that actually perked my attention was Kreative...

Alarming Clock

The clock/radio/CD player in my hotel room last week almost stumped me. It had multi-position...

Alarming Clock

SelectShun

I realize that what I’m about to say is obvious, but using the iPhone for all of my email and...

Pretty dumb bird! Brraaaaauwk!

One of the toys that my daughter wanted most, and received, this Christmas was the FurReal Squawkers...

Every Day

When I originally started DesignAday, I did intend to post every day, and I did post every day for...

In the Details: Contextual Volume

It is readily apparent that Apple thought a lot about the context of use when designing the iPhone....

Aptera Typ-1

Looking more like a small airplane cockpit, devoid of wings or tail, than a car, the Typ-1 is a...

Registration Frustration

Now that the holidays are over and I’m back home, I have a stack of product registration cards...

Xmas Xperiences

Santa was pretty good to my family this year. Here’s a few brief gift observations.My...

Mystory

As it is Christmas Eve, and I’ll probably be up early tomorrow, I wanted a quick post for...

I iz making ur logoz

I saw yesterday that a new version of Macware’s Logo Design Studio Pro had been released....

I'm Sorry Too

I was reserving my hotel room for Interaction 08, the first IxDA conference being held in Savannah...

I’m sorry too.

A Few Observations

Designers with formal design education often believe it to be extremely valuable and important to...

Missed Opportunity #6: Smart Folders

A couple years ago, before the release of Mac OS X Tiger, I was designing a file library for one of...

sdrawkcaB

I occasionally take frozen dinners to work for lunch. I appreciate that the Hungryman meals include...

Making Good

Back in September when Apple announce the new Ringtone feature in iTunes, I posted about...

A Legacy of Poor Design

I’ve been singing tenor in my church choir for years. As do most churches, we have filing...

10 Print "Happy Birthday C= 64!"

20 goto 10 run  I am fortunate to have a very intelligent, well read, forward-thinking man for a...

Email Evangelism

I’ve always considered it part of my job description to be a design evangelist. I try to...

Voicemailigned

Don Norman spends a good many words relating the problems with telephones in his book The Design of...

Designer's Toolbelt: OmniOutliner

The Omni Group makes a lot of outstanding applications for the Mac. OmniOutliner is a tool...

Robo-Guitar

Gibson recently announced a new “Robot Guitar”. No, it doesn’t play itself, but it...

In the Details: Nicknames

Here’s another little detail that has bugged me for a long time. Apple’s address book in...

Raleigh Ringers

I attended a concert by the Raleigh Ringers Saturday night. They are an internationally acclaimed...

Putting the "No" in Innovation

I was just looking over the CES Award winners, and with a few exceptions, find them rather...

All or Nothing?

Jermaine Dupri, a music producer and president of Island Urban Records, published a rant in favor of...

In the Details: Dating

I’m quite impressed with the new “detection” capabilities in Mac OS X...

Hippo Flasher

Some months ago, I wrote about a toothbrush with a flashing light that acts as a timer, teaching...

Disection Paste

When I purchased my Photoshop upgrade, I was, of course, given a new serial number. After...

Photoshop Junkie

I’ve been a little behind on upgrading my personal copies of a lot of the software I use....

Kindle

Having a background in Graphic Design with some knowledge of bookmaking and letterpress, and being...

In the Details: Spring-Loaded

Since way back in OS 9, Apple has had a feature in their OS called “Spring-Loaded...

Hide and Recycle

I finished a bottle of shower soap. This one happened to be Zest Energizing Effects Body Wash....

In the Details: Coupling

It has been said that truly great design is invisible. When I used a Treo, I had a Logitech...

Car Command

I ride Microsoft pretty hard for poor design decisions in their products. I really don’t care...

In the Details: iCal

Ever since the advent of Mac OS X, I’ve been bothered by the fact that iCal’s dock icon...

The Immortal Floppy

We Interaction Designers have a skeleton in our collective closet. Back when the desktop metaphor...

Design View

I’ve been reading Andy Rutledge’s Design View blog regularly for some time now. I...

Showoff