#30622
Write Once, Use Many: Why and How We Make Product Information Modular 
Faced with growing demand from customers for specific courses, addressing only their needs, in very short time-frames, we had to re-examine the way we worked. Patching together one-shot customized coursework was labor-intensive for a non-homogeneous and unsatisfactory result. Each new customer request required repetition of the same amount of effort. With reduced turnaround time and dwindling human resources, a solution had to be found.
McClelland, Patricia J. and Alison Bourdel. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Documentation>Information Design>User Centered Design
#24109
Individual words are simply tools. Similarly, a particular color is a tool to a painter, and a given note to a musician. To write copy while focused on power words is like painting by numbers. You achieve a recognizable outcome with absolutely no creativity or life. No passion, no originality. Copywriting 'by numbers' may be good enough for some people. But if you have aspirations to write great copy, to make your mark -- you need to think beyond that.
Usborne, Nick. ClickZ (2003). Articles>Web Design>Writing>User Centered Design
#20363
This study attempts to: (a) to specify a theory that explains the historical character of change or transition in the production of written artifacts, and (b) use that theory to cast light on a particular instance of change or transition in the production of written artifacts, that of the Web, principally, the issue of structured markup and discussions about precisely what a structured Web should look like, the work it should do, and so forth. It attempts to identify, describe, and analyze, are the norms and conventions that govern the production of written discourse.
Wilkes, Gilbert Vanburen IV. Journal of Computer Documentation (2002). Articles>Information Design>User Centered Design>Rhetoric
#21251
Yahoo! Mail: Simplicity Holds Up Over Time
In many respects, email is the ideal web application: it's an application that people often need access to when they’re away from their 'home' environment, and the core user tasks (reading and writing) are easily accommodated with standard HTML interface elements.
Garrett, Jesse James. Boxes and Arrows (2002). Design>Web Design>User Interface>User Centered Design
#24112
Your Home Page Is a Direct Response Page
Visitors don't come to our sites to 'browse' or 'surf' - they arrive with a set of questions in their minds. They have a task to achieve. They want to get something done. When a visitor's needs are that specific, you can't afford to ignore those needs and spend your first screen talking about your wonderful company or organization. You don't have time. Your visitors won't allow you the time.
Usborne, Nick. ClickZ (2002). Design>Web Design>User Centered Design
#28428
If you already have a web site, or you have a site project in mind, what needs does it fulfil? How many different needs are there? How strong are they? Your job as a web site designer is to craft a solution that meets all the most important needs.
Hunt, Ben. Web Design From Scratch (2005). Design>Web Design>Planning>User Centered Design
#28430
Of course, the ideal solution is a win-win, where you achieve your goal at the same time as enabling your visitors to reach theirs. This section of the site introduces some tools to help find win-win situations.
Hunt, Ben. Web Design From Scratch (2005). Design>Web Design>Planning>User Centered Design
#20867
Zipf Curves and Website Popularity
Much available data suggests that Web use follows a Zipf distribution. The figure shows the distribution of incoming page requests to www.sun.com during a one-month period last year. Each datapoint represents one page, with the x-axis showing pages sorted according to popularity: the first page is the most popular one (the home page), the second page is the one that received second-most requests that month, and so on until we reach page number 10,000 which was only requested a single time that month.
Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (1997). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design>Usability
#26959
我们常常看到这样的新闻报道：飞机坠毁夺走了好几百人的生命，某次工业事故导致几百万英镑的损失，某新发现的系统医疗错误致使数千病患重返医院。几个月后，公布的调查结果如下：操作机器设备时的人为错误导致了这些事故。人们使用‘人为错误’一词来表达‘操作上的错误’，而经常的情况是，这些‘人为错误’ 根本就是机器设备的人机界面设计或安装上本身固有的问题。低劣的人机界面会导致使用效率降低或者容易发生错误，严重的则会造成财产和生命损失。
Dix, Alan. uiGarden (2005). (Chinese) Articles>Human Computer Interaction>Usability>User Centered Design
#27176
你有没有怀疑过你的同事或者客户是否真的理解“可用性”？在我们和同事的在商务、技术和设计讨论中谈论‘可用性’是什么时，经常充斥着一些标准和指导方针替代品。在本文中，我们通过了解可用性的五个维度，我们便能够围绕可用性目标达成一致的看法，并开始以这个可用性的定义为基础，来计划用户中心设计的工作。
Quesenbery, Whitney. uiGarden (2006). (Chinese) Articles>Usability>User Centered Design
#32144
In my work with Bumblebee I use an approach I call 'User-Guide-Driven Development,' or UGDD for short. The mechanics of UGDD is similar to that of Test-Driven Development (TDD), but before I write the test for a feature, I write a snippet of the user guide describing the feature I am about to implement.
Brolund, Daniel. Thoughts of a Goldfish (2008). Articles>Documentation>Usability>User Centered Design
#32171
If you document everything, you are giving everything an equal weight. Do that for a complex system, and you are buried in detail. In any system there are some aspects that are more important than the others, key aspects of the system that once understood, will help someone to learn more. The art in documentation is to find how to document these aspects as clearly as possible. In this you emphasize these areas, and leave the details for the code.
Fowler, Martin. Distributed Computing (1997). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design>Minimalism
#32271
Filtering and Withdrawing: Strategies for Coping with Information Overload in Everyday Contexts 
The study investigates the ways in which people experience information overload in the context of monitoring everyday events through media such as newspapers and the internet. The findings are based on interviews with 20 environmental activists in Finland in 2005. The perceptions of the seriousness of problems caused by information overload varied among the participants. On the one hand, information overload was experienced as a real problem particularly in the networked information environments. On the other hand, information overload was perceived as an imagined problem with some mythical features. Two major strategies for coping with information overload were identified. The filtering strategy is based on the determined weeding out of material deemed useless. This strategy is favoured in networked information environments. The withdrawal strategy is more affectively oriented, emphasizing the need to protect oneself from excessive information supply by keeping the number of information sources to a minimum.
Savolainen, Reijo. Journal of Information Science (2007). Articles>Information Design>Audience Analysis>User Centered Design
#32303
The Information User: Past, Present and Future
The emergence of research on various aspects of `information behaviour' is explored and its growth as a subject of academic research is documented. The origin of the field as a potential aid to the development of library and information services is noted, as is the transition from this status to that of a subject for research at PhD level and beyond. The development of the field has thus led to a division between the needs of academia for theoretically grounded work, and the needs of the field of practice for guidance for service development. There is, today, a disconnection between research and practice, to a significant extent: early research was undertaken by practitioners but today academic research dominates the scene. Suggestions are made as to how this disconnection can be repaired.
Wilson, Tom. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>User Centered Design>Information Design>Search
#32326
In this article, theories of human judgement and decision making are reviewed and their use by library and information science researchers examined. A different perspective on judgement and decision making is offered by the field of naturalistic decision making (NDM) and the implications of this approach are considered for an expanded understanding of how judgements and decisions are made during information seeking. This discussion is illustrated by a case from a recent empirical investigation into how judgements of enough information are made in the workplace. The article concludes with a critical evaluation of the NDM approach. It is argued that NDM, a recent development in decision theory, offers a new perspective from which to investigate judgements and decisions during information seeking.
Berryman, Jennifer M. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>Information Design>Search>User Centered Design
#32335
Information Behaviour Meets Social Capital: A Conceptual Model
Much research has been done on the favourable influence of social environment and social networks on knowledge production. The aim of this article is to design a theoretical framework where both information behaviour (IB) research and social capital (SC) research are integrated. Integrating these areas is seen as an advantage when focusing on the social construction of knowledge, and a model is proposed to illuminate sources and consequences of social capital and knowledge sharing. This framework will function as a basis on which to build when the authors proceed with a number of empirical studies involving the university context, social networks of the unemployed, and virtual networks of young people.
Widén-Wulff, Gunilla, Stefan Ek, Mariam Ginman, Reija Perttilä, Pia Södergård and Anna-Karin Tötterman. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>Knowledge Management>User Centered Design>Social Networking
#32349
Users Read Help Manuals Like an Encyclopedia, Not a Novel
Users turn to help to look for a specific question, just as someone consults an encyclopedia for a specific question. No one reads the entire encyclopedia/manual, nor is anyone expected to. Well-written encyclopedias allow users to find information through indexes, tables of contents, alphabetical organization, and search fields.
Johnson, Tom H. I'd Rather Be Writing (2008). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design>Help
#32356
Switching Between Tools in Complex Applications
Usability practice needs a procedure to identify, record, count, and highlight tool switch events for study. This paper describes one that supports the trained observers on which User-Centered Design relies to detect problems and causes, and evaluate design changes.
Schroeder, Will. Journal of Usability Studies (2008). Articles>Usability>User Centered Design>Methods
#32360
Examining Users on News Provider Web Sites: A Review of Methodology
This project implemented and reviewed several methods to collect data about users' information seeking behavior on news provider Web sites. While browsing news sites, participants exhibited a tendency toward a breadth-first search approach where they used the home page or a search results page as a hub to which they returned and then linked to other pages. Generally, they browsed before using search. Information seeking patterns were consistent within-user but varied somewhat across users. Most behaviors were characterized as visually scanning with users spending much time scrolling.
Gibbs, William. Journal of Usability Studies (2008). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design
#32452
Does Advanced Search Sound Too Advanced?
Should advanced search be called something else to sound more friendly and inviting, and would it make more people to use it when they need to?
Johansson, Roger. 456 Berea Street (2008). Articles>Web Design>Search>User Centered Design
#32494
Sometimes users find it difficult to perform tasks based on the information provided. Take a minute to understand why this could happen.
Abraham, Anitha. Indus (2008). Articles>User Centered Design>Audience Analysis>Cognitive Psychology
#32540
Documenting User-Centered Design Best Practices
When initiating or expanding the role of user-centered design (UCD) in an organization, consider documenting UCD best practices as they fit within existing processes and the best practice of other areas. Such documentation communicates the role and value of UCD throughout the organization in terms familiar to your organization. Because what best practices means varies from company to company, there is no single way to do this. Here are some questions to consider.
Bachmann, Karen L. STC Proceedings (2008). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design>Policies and Procedures
#32590
Use Cases for User Assistance Writers
It’s hard to find anyone who disparages use cases, but those who use them are still a minority. In a previous life as a UX designer, I used use cases and developed a great respect for them. But it wasn’t until recently that I began using them to design user assistance. Why did it take me so long to get back to these reliable work horses of user-centered design?
Hughes, Michael A. UXmatters (2008). Articles>User Centered Design>Writing>Technical Writing
#32596
Emotional Intelligence: Putting Theory into Practice
Social and emotional learning may seem difficult to teach, but there are activities out there that can help.
Edutopia (2008). Articles>Education>Emotions>User Centered Design
#32686
Writing as an Asynchronous Conversation
Conversation is a theme that flows through all the work we do as technical communicators. Every use of your web site is a conversation started by a busy site visitor.
Redish, Janice C. 'Ginny'. STC Proceedings (2008). Presentations>Web Design>Writing>User Centered Design
