Clover Leaf Consulting blogs

Come see us at InterAct08

psheridan — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 11:58:51 -0400

The CloverLeaf team will be exhibiting at this year's web 2.0 conference in DC.

We look forward to discussing web 2.0 development trends as well as the merging of Agile/Iterative development methodologies with User Centered Design principles.

RIA Industry Predictions - Reaching the 'Next Plateau'

psheridan — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 02:18:17 -0400

There are a lot of people out there trying to compete to be your front-end Ajax/ web 2.0 framework of choice.

In the midst of technical framework comparisons, ask yourself, "Where is the RIA Industry Going?"

Well, we'll tell you. Prototype and Scriptaculous lost the early mover advantage by not focusing on good documentation. After all, how good is a framework if the learning curve is too steep?

Extjs came out running, first focusing on documentation and benchmarks, then licensing, training, and, consulting. A more than cozy relationship to Adobe, and now the addition of GWT support means, [wink wink], looks like someone's positioning to get bought.

Extjs Stencil PSD file

psheridan — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 17:24:33 -0400

For those of you using pc's, we're also making the psd file available that we used to create the Extjs OmniGraffle stencil.

Just click the file link below!

Rich Internet Application Design Theory: End Users own the Last Mile

psheridan — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 14:07:59 -0500

Rich internet application architecture changes the very foundation driving user experience design to date. The gist of it is that user interface designers are no longer the aggregators and owners of the user interface per se, rather they are architects of a Framework for end user to define their own unique user interface.

I believe this fundamental shift scares most user interface designers out of their pants. Why? Well, the perception that the skillset is now obselete for one!

There has been an exponential growth in interface design. This natural evolution is meta-response to straight forward screen design. Instead of answering the question, "How is this screen best designed to meet user needs?" the question now becomes, "How can I best design a system that allows users to best create their OWN SCREEN DESIGN to better meet their individual needs?"

5 minute Case Study presented to DCIA at Motley Fool

psheridan — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 22:47:03 -0400

I had the opportunity to present a brief overview of how to use user stories to facilitate iteration planning.

The accompanying presentation details a recently completed engagement for a VOIP services company in which we paired down the existing product requirements documentation and prioritized user taskflows to be built in the alpha release.

Every Tug of War needs a rope...

psheridan — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 10:06:06 -0500

A quick warning to user experience professionals. Do not allow yourselves to become the rope in an organizational tug of war. As organizational awareness to the practice of user experience design grows, the first questions to be asked are, "Who does what?" Project teams and customers are familiar with traditional requirements gathering processes and business analysis teams may feel threatened by a new way of engaging customers and gathering information.

Approaches vary but people still do the work. Waterfall, XP, Agile, SCRUM, RUP are project structures and never replace project teams. Clearly defined roles and responsibilities ensure accountability.

Avoiding Management Centered Design

psheridan — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 12:56:15 -0500

The mantra of User Centered Design is "involve users throughout." To a manager concerned about time, budget, and the project plan, this can seem like a logistical nightmare. For internal application projects this can mean business analysts and interface designers are directed to get requirements by proxy from end user's managers. Too often, this approach leads to analysis and design failures not caught until user acceptance testing at the end of the release cycle.

It is paramount to leverage the "what's in it for me" factor to engage end user's at the beginning of the process. When end users feel ignored during the requirements phase they approach UAT as their only opportunity to voice displeasure with the development process instead of focusing on constructive feedback geared at improving the application they will have to use on a daily basis.

Non-visual usability concerns: 5 things NOT to overlook

psheridan — Wed, 07 Feb 2007 01:58:50 -0500

Let me start by saying layout and design are important. For the casual observer, usability means a visual design that is pleasing to the eye. Historically, web designers came primarily from print design backgrounds and as such, focused their talents on the static visual design aspects of early websites; headers, icons, logos, backgrounds, etc. While important, the implied focus of web design is too heavily weighted on expressing the individual creativity of the designer than it is on satisfying the needs of the customer.

Commercial websites and application must primarily address end user interactions to complete tasks efficiently and effectively. To that end, consider the following non-visual aspects of usability:

What to do when Web 2.0 becomes Web 2.uh oh!

psheridan — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 02:00:02 -0500

Aaah yes. Six months ago you discovered the prototype and scriptaculous javascript libraries. You've put together a sexy drag and drop demo with Ajax requests reloading content on the fly and convinced upper management that you hold the future in your hands.

Then comes the DOM bloating. Your test leads are struggling to automate testing and your dev team is now saying Struts ain't so bad after all.

Relax. Here's some practical advice to ponder before going all in with Web 2.0.

1. Define the business cases which support Rich User Interaction.
Not every web based needs animated transitions or real time lookups. Remind yourself that value is what the customer wants AND is willing to pay for.

Panel Discussion Topic submitted to UPA 2007 Conference

psheridan — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 10:50:32 -0500

Who's role is it anyway?

A discussion about how to best integrate activities and deliverables to ensure usability across analysis, design, development, and quality assurance teams.

Enterprise software projects are delivered with defined teams typically owning artifacts associate with an individual phase. The goal of the proposed discussion is to look at ways to integrate usability and user centered design principles into the software development lifecycle without adding more meetings.

The conversation will take a look at meeting facilitation techniques to drive consensus and document decisions as well as ways to inject best practices without creating a tug of war.