Apparently is prototyping elements day on jeffcroft.com. Here’s an awesome-looking PSD full of iPhone widgets. Via Wilson. Visit site »
Small flexible magnets with GUI widgets on them, designed for use while prootyping on a whiteboard. Freaking great idea. Via J.B.. Visit site »
Michael Heilemann says that pagination widgets should always point left for older stuff. I’m not sure I agree — but I totally se his point. It’s a tricky thing to solve with things like blogs, as they’re naturally in reverse chronological order. I know I’m not consistent about it; I tend to just do what feels right at the time.
To illustrate the problem, consider two scenarios: a blog has “next” and “previous” page links. I would say “next” should pointing to the right, so left is newer stuff. Now, a daily archive page shows all the content posted on one day, and has links to “next day” and “previous day”. I would say “next day” should be on the right, meaning left is older stuff. Clearly, this results in inconsistent interfaces (in one scenario, older stuff is to the right, and in the other, older stuff is to the left). What do you think? Should this be consistent? Visit site »
The great Massimo Vignelli:
Personally I feel I no longer have anything to share with the so-called graphic design of today: not the concept, not the typefaces, not the layout—nothing. Therefore, I conclude that I am no longer a graphic designer, but an information architect, and from now on that is how I will describe the meaning of my work and the scope of my activity. For me, to be an information architect means to organize information in a way that is essentially retrievable, understandable, visually captivating, emotionally involving, and easily identifiable. Information should be semantically rooted, syntactically correct, pragmatically efficient. It doesn’t work otherwise.
This is very similar to the Seth Godin bit I just posted. Vignelli seems to be trying to distance himself from the brand-whore, trend-driven aesthetic world the public thinks of when it things of “design”, and he’s doing so by re-framing himself as an information architect. But really, he’s always been an information architect, and information architecture is design. Massimo can certainly call himself any damn thing he pleases at this point — but personally, I just wish the public understood that design isn’t purely aesthetic-driven, so we didn’t have to resort to calling ourselves something besides “designers.”
Sidenote: it’s interesting that a term, “information architecture”, which came almost entirely out of web and interactive work, is now being applied to someone who does almost entirely print and static work. I love it when language works like that. Update: Wilson Miner tells me this article was probably written before the therm “information architecture” become some predominantly associated with the web. My bad. Visit site »
If you use Django and Omnigraffle and find yourself mocking up Django admin screens, this could be useful. Visit site »
My co-worker and good friend Tom Watson covers the basics of information architecture in this post at the Blue Flavor blog. The Blue Flavor blog is more active than ever, with new articles about web design and our industry being posted every week. Subscribe, yo! Visit site »
Helen over at DesignInterviews.com talks with my co-worker Nick about Information Architecture and other web matters. Good stuff. Visit site »
Via Nick at Blue Flavor, check out this nice palette for wireframing web sites with OmnoGraffle. If you do IA and wireframing on a Mac, this looks to be a must-have. Visit site »