Centralis Blog

One of the interesting presentations at the 2009 Usability Professionals’ Association Conference was “Secrets of Simplicity ” presented by Giles Colborne.  During this presentation, Giles posited that a key component of usability is simplicity and presented guidelines for creating simple designs.  At Centralis, we believe guidelines are great as a starting point when creating a design, but ultimately it’s the user who determines if a device is simple to use.

Hillcrest Labs may just change the way we watch TV.  As cable and satellite providers redefine television by increasing programming choices and integrating with home networks and the Internet, users are left to shoe-horn these new offerings into their old concepts of how TV works.  Hillcrest Labs’ Loop Pointer and interactive navigation system break the TV mold altogether and establish a new schema for interacting with in-home entertainment.  Driven by user research and grounded in user needs, Hillcrest’s design dovetails with Centralis’ experience with designing for TV – it’s critical to provide a clear, fun experience for driving engagement and promoting acceptance of new offerings.zwmf2v7qyt

During a usability test, most people are focused on the main event — what’s happening in the testing room.  Everyone watches the moderator and the participant, eager to see how the product or website performs.  While most usability practitioners are taught to manage what happens in the testing room, what if you’re in charge of managing the room full of people watching the sessions?

Those of us charged with creating useful, usable products come from many academic traditions, work in multiple settings and offer a wide variety of technical skills.  Despite these differences, our recent discussions with colleagues at the Usability Professionals Association annual conference suggest that effective usability professionals share skills, experience and personality characteristics that transcend the diversity of our backgrounds.  The best usability professionals offer well-developed skills honed by experience, and attack their challenges with tenacity, pragmatism, empathy and a sense of humor.