Posts Tagged: Usability & Design
Roadster: Mapping on Linux
Posted by on Tuesday, February 22, 2005 in - 6 comments
I spent last week in New England visiting some clients, friends, and geeks. The geeks part was at the Linux World Expo and Fedora Users & Developers Conference. I’ve posted some photos from the trip. • The Linux World Expo was comprised mostly of creepy salesmen at booths with microphones giving …
Consistency in Save Confirmation Dialogs in Gnome
Posted by on Wednesday, January 26, 2005 in - 11 comments
For slice of readership to whom this type of thing is relevant, I have compiled an overview of of the inconsistencies in file-save confirmation dialogs in Gnome. There is also a page with screenshots of the dialogs in question. I’ve posted the overview to the Gnome desktop development mailing list …
Cleaning Your Bedroom and Improving the World
Posted by on Wednesday, December 29, 2004 in - 15 comments
When I was growing up, my bedroom was always a mess. Every week or two, my parents would get me to clean my room. I wasn’t interested in cleaning my room, but I had to get it to at least pass a quick visual inspection my mom or dad. • To make sure I passed the informal inspection with minimal …
Emblems in Gnome
Posted by on Sunday, December 26, 2004 in - 16 comments
This might seem obvious to anyone who uses the Gnome desktop environment for Linux, but since most of you don’t, I thought it worth pointing out. In Gnome, You can put “emblems” on files or folders. The emblems are small icons that help differentiate and identify particular items. They work …
Creative is not a noun
Posted by on Thursday, December 16, 2004 in - 24 comments
Pet peeve: people who use the word “creative” as a noun. Example: • “ • “The ad will run on Friday, but the creative will be ready by Wednesday.” • ” • If you say things like that, I don’t like you. Don’t bother offering justifications. • (disclosure: According to Dictionary.com …
Feature Request: Google Suggest for Firefox
Posted by on Saturday, December 11, 2004 in - 8 comments
Weblogs are abuzz* today with the the Google Suggest beta featuring javascript-powered auto-complete in the search box. • I’d like to float an obvious (I think) suggestion for Firefox. I would like to see the Google search bar that is built-in to Firefox have this Google Suggestion auto-complete …
An Article Buried in Junk
Posted by on Tuesday, December 7, 2004 in - 12 comments
I came across an article on LinuxWorld.com today that was so buried in other site features and advertising, that I had to share it. • This full-size screenshot (1.5MB) shows the full length of the page, with the actual article text highlighted in red. This smaller version gives a good feel of …
Some Good Firefox Extensions
Posted by on Saturday, December 4, 2004 in - 14 comments
I use a few Firefox extensions that I thought might be useful to others. Here’s a quick overview of the extensions I use and why I like them. • Linky • I’ve written about Linky before, and I still use it regularly. Linky is a simple extension that adds the ability to open a group of links in …
A Plugin Idea for Gaim: Buddy’s Time Zone
Posted by on Thursday, December 2, 2004 in - 9 comments
Here’s a quick idea I had while chatting with someone in Australia via instant-messaging this morning. • I would like to see a plugin/extension for Gaim (or any other instant messaging application, but especially Gaim, since it’s the one I use) that showed the local time zone of the person …
Memo to Mac users: Please stop sending .SIT archives
Posted by on Monday, November 29, 2004 in - 29 comments
Occasionally I will get an email attachment from someone compressed in a .SIT archive. This StuffIt format is (I think) primarily a Mac format. Utilities to handle .SIT archives are available for Windows and Linux, but are not include by default on either platform. • Since the ZIP format is …