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(Adapted from a previous editorial I wrote for interactions Magazine) This editorial is from a controversial issue on measuring usability. This special issue covered CIF usability testing (a seemingly innocuous if important topic). Upon publication many took strong esxception to our coverage of CIF testing. But perhaps these critics also took exception to our criticizing…

This editorial is from a controversial issue on measuring usability. This special issue covered CIF usability testing (a seemingly innocuous if important topic). Upon publication many took strong esxception to our coverage of CIF testing. But perhaps these critics also took exception to our criticizing a practice all too often employed: how to lie with…

A series on prototyping In the 10 years since my book on prototyping first came on the scene there was precious little written about the professional way to prototype. Today prototyping seems to be the hot topic, unfortunately most of the current stuff available on the internet only give an isolated tip or trick. What…

In my last post I discussed what a prototype does. Now here comes a far trickier question: what is a prototype. A prototype turns out to be quite complex, and rightly so. Because to get the benefits of prototyping (the subject of my next post), a prototyper must understand these vital concepts, otherwise you are…

In Part 1 of what is a prototype we discussed many dimensions of what a prototype is, but this covers only part of the story, actually half there are many more layers of complexity and if you do not understand them, instead of controlling a prototype, the prototype will control you or worse victimize you.…

Professionalism seems to be an amorphous concept in the UX profession. And why not, it seems anyone with an unembarassing resume can get a UX job doing the most unqualified work imaginable. Luckily, rarely does anyone outside of UX really know when someone is doing a bad job. This is a quiz I wrote tongue-in-cheek…