OK Sushi
Add a bulleted list in Microsoft Excel
There is no bullet button in Excel – this sucks.
To make a bulleted list:
- Go to where you would like a bullet inserted
- Go to insert > symbol
- Choose the bullet
- Click ok
There is something wrong with this technique – it takes a long time. A better way is to insert some text and then do a find and replace to insert all the bullets.
Or, a better solution, try using a different spreadsheeting tool
MODx as a rapid prototyping tool
Today I thought I would write about using MODx as a rapid prototyping tool. Regular readers and those people that know me in a professional and semi-professional capacity know that I love this content management framework, and I use it wherever possible in my projects.
My current role is redeveloping the Queensland Government Internet site which is currently using Teamsite to manage it’s content (although I always feel as though it works as more of a file management system and less of a content management system!). In the development process we have engaged various companies to conduct usability testing on mockups and wireframes.
Very shortly we will be conducting usability testing on working prototypes of the site. Exciting!
We were faced with a dilemma: should we create static pages, using our different templates to be tested, or should we use the exisiting functionality of a content management tool to do all the heavy lifting for us? The choice was obvious. Enter MODx
The steps I took to replicate the website were these:
- Create a new site in MODx
- Create pages to replicate the exisiting site map
- Create the little HTML modules as chunks in MODx
- Populate the pages that would be used by users during our task-based testing
- Create links to child pages in the chunks using the Ditto snippet
- Interlink relevant documents using the MODx syntax for linking to another page
whatever the number is - Apply the template(s)
- Implement the stylesheet switcher to allow testing of different stylesheets
That’s it! MODx is really a testers dream. I just wish I could convince the powers-that-be that we could dump Teamsite!
Usability Testing - Almost Done
Ok, so a full day of watching participants on a projected view is quite tiring. It’s been really interesting, I don’t think that I could do this for more than two days at a time though.
Out of my three designs, one is the obvious winner, however I have been told that yesterday, participants chose a completely different one. Damn those pesky users!
I think I have a better understanding of the challenges of user-centered design after today, however. I am looking forward to analysing the hard data.
people can come up with statistics to prove anything, Kent. Forty percent of all people know that.
Usability Testing, with Comic Sans?!?
Today I am sitting in the office of Peak Usabilty watching participants click about on some wireframes I mocked up in Visio.
This whole process has been really interesting. I installed a bunch of templates provided by GUUUI that allow you to use rough sketch-like lines and images and gasp comic sans to mock up very rough wireframes. The reason for making wireframes rough-looking is that people are more likely to offer criticism if something looks unfinished.
In my case, this was initially frustrating, as I had already mocked up the site I am working on in three different ways using XHTML and CSS, and they were looking good. Looking back, I can see the value in doing this rough style testing, though.
Peak have put the wireframes into an HTML document that the users look at using Internet Explorer 6, and then their clicks and mouse movements, as well as their facial expressions and voice, are recorded using Techsmith Morae – a pretty comprehensive tool for this kind of work.
I think I’m in for a pretty interesting day.
Optimise your PNGs!
I love the PNG image format. I like using gradients in site’s that I design, and nothing beats a 24 bit PNG for that. I also use PNG wherever I can, because they make my life easier.
They can be pretty hefty in file size, however. So recently I have taken to using OptiPNG to optimise the file size of each image.
I have set up a small shortcut on my desktop to the OptiPNG application, and all I have to do is drop files onto it and each file is stripped of extraneous data, sometimes drastically reducing the file size.
From the OptiPNG site:
OptiPNG is a PNG optimizer that recompresses image files to a smaller size, without losing any information. This program also converts external formats (BMP, GIF, PNM; TIFF support is coming up) to optimized PNG, and performs PNG integrity checks and corrections.
This is a compulsary download for all PNG lovers