January 2004 Archive
Dear Apple, Please Make Automatic Source Switching an Option in iTunes
Dear Apple,
iTunes is indeed the best digital jukebox on the planet. However, I have one small request: please make automatic source switching an option. By “automatic source switching,” I’m referring to how iTunes automatically switches the source whenever I connect my iPod or insert a music CD. I realize it may not be clear why I’m requesting this, so I came up with two scenarios from my everyday use of iTunes:
I have a 20 GB iPod, and as you know, it stores a lot of music. I rarely need to move songs to it, so I rarely need to view the contents of it. Even if I do want to move songs to the iPod, I don’t care what’s on it because iTunes only adds songs that aren’t there. In my case, one of the only times I want to see the contents of my iPod is when I’m deleting songs or albums, but this is rarely the case immediately after I connect it.
In the case of music CDs, sometimes I immediately want to see the contents of the CD, sometimes I don’t. Often when I’m creating playlists and I then insert a CD, I don’t immedately want to see its contents. When I do want to immediately see the contents of the CD, I don’t at all mind clicking on the CD title in the source list.
I hope you’ll come to the same conclusion as me and realize there’s often no need for iTunes to automatically switch the source whenever an iPod is connected or a music CD is inserted. If I could, I’d like to suggest a simple solution: make it an option in the iTunes Preference panel.
I hope you’ll consider this in future versions of iTunes.
Sincerely,
Joshua Kaufman
Expose for Prototyping
Mac OS X Panther’s Expose feature is a useful tool for prototyping. For example, if you have a bunch of interface layouts in windows on your desktop, Expose can help you simulate the interaction more easily by showing all of the current application windows so that you can quickly select the interface you need.
Always Open
There have been many occasions when I’ve felt like I wanted to take a break from the weblog. I either became bored with it, overwhelmed by it or I was simply too busy for it. But I never closed unraveled. I never took the site offline. I never announced that I was officially taking a break, even when I was. I never pulled the plug because I knew I would come back to it. I knew that at some point in time unbeknownst to me, I would find something that I really wanted to write about. Something that I wanted to create. Something I wanted to express. I wanted unraveled to be there for me when I was ready.
This is why unraveled will always be online. I won’t ever announce that I’m taking a break, even when I am. I don’t need to provide reasons why my site hasn’t changed in a month or even a year. It’s my life. It’s my website.
unraveled is and always will be open.
unraveled Sans Boxiness
Some designs get more boxy with time, some get less boxy. unraveled became the latter. Besides the most obvious differences, everything else remains unchanged.
I updated the design simply by modifying a few lines of CSS. Because this is so easy to do, I’ve been making these types of changes quite frequently over the past year, usually whenever I’ve felt like it. For me, it’s just fun. For e-commerce, small design changes can have a serious impact on the bottom line. Many e-commerce websites understand this and some smart designers are cashing in on it. Eventually, when more e-commerce websites use XHTML and CSS, it will be much easier for them to make small design changes. Smart designers will always be needed, but instead of using meaningless tables with other bed and breakfast markup to present the changes, they’ll just modify a few lines of CSS.
Map Design
I was to meet a friend at The Place, a dance school in central London. I didn’t know where it was, so I checked their website and found the following map.
Not having quick access to a printer, I pulled out a notecard and drew a small map showing Euston Road, Eversholt Street, King’s Cross, the British Library and The Place. I quickly grabbed my things and left.
I eventually was walking westward down Euston Road when I turned right on Eversholt Street. The Place was no where to be found. I knew it must be closeby because I had just looked at the map on the website. Was the website outdated? Did I write down the wrong street names? What did I miss?
There was a Starbucks just down Euston Road. “They might know where it is,” I thought. I explained to the clerk that I was looking for a place called The Place, that it was somewhere nearby but I didn’t know exactly where. I received only confused looks.
“Sorry I don’t speak English well,” the Indian man said.
I didn’t have time to reexplain myself. After thanking the clerk for his time, I left Starbucks and asked a few more passers-by if they knew where The Place was, but none of them were from the area. I walked back down Euston looking around in all directions for any clues that might give me some direction.
There. Down Duke’s Road, I saw a large sign with The Place logo. Relieved, I entered the building at reception and noticed The Place brochure. I picked it up and paged though, looking for the map that supposedly showed the location of this Place.
This map was different than the one I saw on the website and looked similar to the following map.
It’s amazing what good use of color can do for a map.
How about the map to your place of business? Is it really as easy to use as you think it is? I encourage you to find out and update it if necessary. You might never know how many customers never made it there the first time they tried.
Roundup: When Friends Bail
- Lance Arthur: Becoming Dated. “You’re The Prize!”
- 37signals: Basecamp. Coming “January 2004”
- Paul Ford: Ceiling. “That was the beginning of this life.”
- Jeffrey Veen: Stop Stealing Gas. “A quick review of an interaction design basic: affordances.”
- Paul Coates: An illustration of spam…. “Unrelenting Massive C*cks Destroy Innocent Pussies!”
- Steven Berlin Johnson: The Book, At Last. “The book is an attempt to look systematically at the question of what brain science can tell you about yourself as an individual.”
- Jason Zada: Deedle Dudes.. “I was obviously not cool enough to know about these before we received them, but I guess they are becoming quite popular.”
- Andrei Herasimchuk: DxF Design Exercise: Google’s Search Results.
- Derek Powazek: The Ring. A very warm congratulations to two beautiful, creative, inspiring people.
Update: Yes, I’ve updated this entry five times because of ridiculously stupid mistakes. This will be the last update. Promise.
Menu Transitions
Since I started helping out over at Widgetopia, I’ve been paying much closer attention to Web menus and how they work. The aspect of menus that’s been on my mind the most is the menu transition often used in Flash UIs, such as the “choose a model” menu on the current Volkswagon homepage. What intrigues me about menu transitions is not their effects, but their experience. As an experiment of sorts, I thought a Nielsenesque miniguide to menu transitions would be fun to write.
What are Menu Transitions?
Menu transitions are visual (and sometimes audio) effects that connect two separate menu states.
A flashy yet well produced example of menu transitions (Flash with sound) can be seen at Joshua Davis Studios. In this example, the two menu states for the “portfolio” button are the resting state and the point at which the three submenu options appear and come to rest.
When Are Menu Transitions Appropriate?
Simply put, menu transitions are appropriate when they convey an idea or meaning without gratuitous or long effects. Joshua Davis’s aforelinked menu transitions are appropriate because they convey the idea of an environment submerged in water. They do take a few seconds to complete and may frustrate some visitors, but the designer knew this when he was creating the menu. It’s a trade off that he made in an attempt to improve the experience of using the menu, and more importantly, the site it was designed for.
Another example of menu transitions can be found on the Elf movie homepage. Moving your mouse over any of the snow globes causes them to rise and reveal a menu. There may be some meaning there, but I have no idea what it is. The movement is simple and unexciting. The woosh sound could have come from any stock sound effect collection. In short, these menu transitions are pointless cheese. Then again, it is a Will Ferrell film.
Gratuitous transition effects are sometimes worse than meaningless effects because they’re either just too much or force the user to wait. What makes a “gratuitous” transition effect? It’s subjective, but solid user testing should reveal these types of transitions. A good rule of thumb is to keep menu transitions under two seconds.
Here’s the lesson: if users aren’t sure what idea the menu transitions convey, or if they’re gratuitous, don’t use them. Either don’t use any menu transitions or improve the menu transitions by using them to support the overall experience.
Wild About Widgets
I recently started helping Christina Wodtke explore the world of web widgets on her newish blog, Widgetopia. When you get a chance, please stop by and comment on our widget comments.
Reason #243 I Love Apple
Safari tells me when my caps lock is enabled directly in the password field, subtly yet effectively. This is what a good user experience is all about and yet another reason why I love Apple.
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