Semantics . . .

Glossary of Naval Terms - Circa 1943
Passed on by my mother, a WAVE Captain during WWII:

Take necessary action - It's your headache now.

We should confer - Send your yeoman over to see mine.

Forwarded - Pigeon-holed in a more ornate office.

A growing Body of naval opinion - Two brass hats have agreed.

Take immediate action - Do something in a hurry before we both catch hell.

For your information - Let's both forget it.

Your observations are desired - Do the dirty work so I can write "forwarded".

Your department is negligent - I have just been given hell.

You are to be commended - This is a particularly dirty job coming in the next routing.

Naval tradition demands - I have just been talking to an old Chief.

Give this your immediate attention - For God's sake find the papers.

You will show him every courtesy - His uncle is an Admiral.

The inspection party has departed - How about a binge tonight?

Let's have a little more hubba - To hell with the priorities, let's get the routines out of here.

Much Ado About Shoes

This was posted on Twitter today: BillPilgrim The holes in the soles of a lawyer's shoes have become a legal issue during a civil trial in Palm Beach Co http://tw8.us/XT

In the article, a lawyer (with, I assume, intact shoes) vehemently insists that the lawyer he is opposing has a great and unfair advantage by virtue of having (and displaying) a hole in his shoe.

Precedent might suggest otherwise. Consider Adlai Stevenson, democratic presidential candidate, much beloved for the hole in his shoe, yet still defeated by Eisenhower.

For the record, most of my shoes look like Adlai's - or worse.

What Would Dewayne and Charlie say?

I didn't design this layout. But I liked it, that is, until I started to hear the persistent voices of my previous boss and of my mentor nudging me to really analyze it.

Maybe sometimes hearing voices is a good thing. Dewayne was saying "why does it waste so much real estate?" and Charlie said "why doesn't it conform to standards?" Good questions guys (as usual). Here is the original interface and a suggested redesign. (click on thumbnails for larger view)

Original Layout: http://mycrains.crainsnewyork.com/smallbiz/

Issues:

• A tab control that doesn't look like a tab.
• A tab-like presentation that uses almost one third of the screen space.
• An unnecessary breadcrumb trail.
• Non-standard positioning of Search entry field.
• Horizontal scrolling.

Suggested Layout (based on same amount of screen real estate)

Design Suggestions:

• Combine title and subtitle text to conserve vertical space.
  
• Move Search entry field and button to standard upper right position to provide consistency and conserve vertical space.
  
• Eliminate breadcrumb path to conserve vertical space.
  
• Provide standard tab presentation to allow for three panel presentation of information.
• Provide standard tab presentation to eliminate horizontal scrolling.
• Divide third tab into text area and contact area, eliminating need for fourth level of data presentation.
  

I need to get out more . . .

We went the Apple Store on Saturday because my son is looking for a new computer. As a former Mac user I should not have been surprised at all to see: a 60+ man in tibetan monk robes with a crew cut and a screaming eagle tattoo. Yes, he seemed very contemplative.

Where to put the farm animals & the beauty of design

"It's odd to think for history's most famous architect being as obsessed with animal smells as he was with scale and proportion. But not being afraid of the ordinary side of his job was a key component of Palladio's genius. To him, architecture existed to solve problems, and he seems to have given equal weight to elevating the image of his clients, making their lives function more smoothly, and creating beautiful objects for the world. Figuring out where to put the farm animals and shaping designs of transcendent beauty were all in a day's work."

All He Surveyed, How Palladian was Palladio?
by Paul Goldberger
The New Yorker, March 30, 2009

My Least Favorite UI Control

*to view control in action: http://bit.ly/19Qb5T

Issues:

• A tab control that doesn't look like a tab.
• A tab-like presentation below instead of above the tab content.
• A tab used as a toggle to show/hide just one entry field.
• An entry field that seems to serve double duty yet is mutually exclusive, i.e. the user can only search by a City OR a Postal Code. Because a user can enter the City and Postal Code sequentially, he may assume that he is searching on the combination of his two inputs. However, his search results will be based solely on the last entry.
  
• Radius dropdown menu has label embedded and no reasonable default. (If user does not make a selection, when the search is enabled the radius defaults to 20 miles in the search results list. Therefore, would expect the radius default on the entry screen to be 20 miles.)
• Actions: the user can Save this search and have the results emailed to him or he can perform the Search. Based on placement, it is not clear that these are the action choices.
  

Suggested Layout (based on same amount of screen real estate as control above):








Design Suggestions:

• Use radio buttons to present mutually exclusive choices.
  
• Disable field associated with deselected radio button.
  
• Enable field associated with selected radio button.
• Provide an appropriate default for the Radius dropdown.
• Present action choices next to each other to emphasize that the user can select Action A or Action B.
  

A Tiny Bit of Fun

Who doesn't love dinosaurs?

Especially really tiny dinosaurs?

Tinysaur