UI/UX Articles and Interesting Tidbits of the Week
May//10//2019
Here are some interesting finds on UI/UX of the week!
1.https://blog.marvelapp.com/beginners-guide-user-journey-mapping/
User Journey Mapping. Great article hailing from the Marvel blog, focused on Journey Mapping. The article details the process by which journey maps can be built, namely through the outline of scenarios, definition of expectations, characters involved, intentions, among others, while also illustrating some of the considerations using empathy maps. Highlight of the article includes:
“Journey maps should result in truthful narratives, not fairy tales. Even when a user journey is based on user research, it’s vital to validate it. Use the information from usability testing sessions and app analytics to be sure that your journey resembles a real use case. Gather and analyze information about your users on a regular basis. For example, user feedback is something that can be used to improve your understanding of the user journey.”
2.https://uxmovement.com/buttons/how-to-design-destructive-actions-that-prevent-data-loss/
Designing Destructive Actions. Very interesting article from UX Movement, focused on considerations to have when designing destructive actions (in overlays for instance). It’s a very specific topic, but one that focuses on important items such as readability, accessibility, localization and hierarchy of items. Highlight of the article includes:
“If you use red buttons for your normal call to actions, avoid this otherwise you’ll confuse users. Reserve red buttons for destructive actions only. Cool colored buttons are better suited for normal call to actions because they’re less alarming. While a red button alerts most users, some may not take it seriously. Adding extra visual cues would make the warning stronger for all users. It would help color blind and visually impaired users who need other visual cues besides color. To emphasize the seriousness of the action, the red warning signal needs more strength. You can achieve this by displaying an icon that represents the destructive action on the confirmation screen.”
3.https://theblog.adobe.com/why-i-dont-believe-in-empathic-design-don-norman/
Empathy in Design. Fantastic article from Don Norman, included in the Adobe Design Blog. The article focuses on the fact that Empathy as part of the Design Thinking process is a difficult quality & task to attain, since Designers and the professionals in that collective effort, can’t fully understand the realities of multiple users across the globe. It’s a testament to the need of design products to be more inclusive. It’s also a testament to the fact that the goal while attaining a solution, should always be driven by gathering insights, in order to provide solutions that address people’s needs but also work in tandem with their abilities. Highlight of the article includes:
“Instead we must really focus on the activities that people are trying to carry out. We must also understand people’s capabilities and their points of view and how to support them. That requires us to understand the wide variety of abilities that people have. Let’s look at reading, for example. More and more of our texts have become invisible, by which I mean that they are technically present, but illegible. I simply can’t read them. They have been taken over by graphic designers who say ‘text is ugly and gets in the way.’ So they make it prettier by using a really tiny font with very low contrast. If you’re a 20-year-old programmer, you can read it, but an 83-year-old grouch like me can’t. I always carry a flashlight with me, so I can shine it on the text, which increases the contrast. Maybe I can then read it. What a pain.”
