Urban Design: A Software Developer’s Perspective
by janderson on September 28th, 2010 at 3:15 pm
I am constantly considering the human user aspects of applications and systems. How do I bolster activity and desired interactions? How can I help the user achieve their intended goal for using the application? I think this focus on human interaction bleeds over to another subject matter: urban design. As a designer, it seems critical that we consider the areas we inhabit or tend to visit more frequently, and how these areas bolster or hinder our social activity. I’m curious, so I took some time to reflect on the design of two well-known local areas.
Software designers work to maximize an application’s usability. But what makes a city space well-designed for human interaction and “usability”? What elements should be included? Retail? Restaurants? Sidewalks? I would argue that all are important. But how should they be distributed? Let’s start by looking at a notable area right here in Saint Louis: the Delmar Loop.
Good retrospective facilitators help teams celebrate success
by mphilip on September 27th, 2010 at 12:00 pm
As many people over the years have noted, celebrating success in teams is important, and a natural place to reflect on, appreciate each other for, and understand the reasons for success is in a retrospective. And what better way to reinforce the beauty of a clean, smooth and elegant release than with food? Abra, one of our fine retrospective facilitators, combined her facilitating skills — after all, as Johanna Rothman notes, you need to plan to celebrate — and her considerable baking skills to help one of our teams savor (literally and figuratively) their recent successful release:
Snow-covered chocolate crinkle cookies
How “agile” is design?
by kwhite on September 22nd, 2010 at 8:26 am
Design happens, regardless of whether or not it is planned. However, many clients in the software industry are not design-focused, they are not brand-focused, and are instead in many cases loosely “experience-focused”. In some cases these clients are developers or engineers themselves, who more times than not will be happy with a functional solution to their needs. Agile is a process born of software production, and focused on function. However, designers respect that form and function go hand in hand, and with the right mixology, you have a very desirable experience. It’s a great feeling when the users AND the client are enjoying the product. So how do we get clients thinking about a better user experience, while at the same time, delivering working software frequently? Consider principle number nine of the agile manifesto:
“Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.”
Ok, so it doesn’t help that design is number 9 on the list of 12 principles. So in the spirit of being agile, maybe we should revisit when, where, and how we incorporate design. Maybe the principle might read something like this:
“Early and continuous attention to user centered design enhances working software.”
Asynchrony Twitter Feed
- asynchrony: Debuting on Twitter: Our new logo! We'll be rolling the new look out to the website soon! Kudos to our designers for their hard work. April 27, 2012
- asynchrony: Tonight is @STLMobileDev! @MarkSawyier on his startup, @BonfyreApp; @markshiz on cross-platform dev with Android NDK. Talks start at 6:30p! March 22, 2012
- asynchrony: RT @railsgrammer: Kanban: It changed my life. A new post at @asynchrony 's blog http://t.co/cHTryvNi February 9, 2012
- asynchrony: RT @StlMobileDev: Thu Jan 26th: Doors: 6p Talks: 6:30p. @jessitron on Android storage; Srdjan Grubor on a factory dashboard for Android. ... January 24, 2012
- asynchrony: RT @SandiStJohn: Asynchrony is looking to hire java/andriod developers for perm opportunities. Call me today for more details 314-678- ... January 11, 2012
