Apple GUI Interface Macintosh OS X Software
Everyone’s favourite uninstaller for OS X, AppZapper, recently generated a bit of a buzz as it metamorphosed into version 2 and acquired a slick new interface. AppZapper also seems to have grown beyond being a simple uninstaller, several pundits are now describing it as an “application manager.”
As an application manager one can view one’s applications in a pretty interface, sort them with various filters and even store their license codes within AppZapper. I have to say that license code management seems to me to be an odd addition to an uninstaller. There’s no synergy between the tasks of uninstalling applications that are no longer required and retrieving licensing details for those that are.
But that’s not my biggest issue with AppZapper. To me, whilst the application itself is extremely useful, the interface is completely redundant and, pretty as it is, it shouldn’t be there at all.
Graphics GUI Imaging Photography Software WordPress
An interesting WordPress plugin from Joen Asmussen. I don’t think I’ll employ it at the moment but it’ll be worth keeping an eye on the plugin’s development.
Design GUI Interface Internet Web 2.0 Web Design
An online tool that makes it easy for you to create, link together, preview, and share mockups of your website or application. Wireframes, on-the-fly, in the browser. Cool.
Apple GUI Macintosh Open Source OS X Software Vintage Virtualisation
SheepShaver is a PowerPC emulator that runs under Mac OS X. It started life over 10 years ago as a commercial application for BeOS, but it is now open source and free. SheepShaver is a universal binary, so it runs natively on an Intel machine. SheepShaver lets you run any older system between Mac OS 8.5 and Mac OS 9.0.4.
Design Essay GUI Software Web Design
When I said users don’t read anything you put on the screen, I was lying. Users do read. But users will only read the absolute minimum amount of text on the screen necessary to complete their task. I can’t quite explain it, but this kind of user myopia is epidemic. It’s the same problem, everywhere I turn.
How do we treat user myopia? How do we reach these users?
More and more, I’m thinking we need to put the [important information] — for new users only — directly in their line of sight. Nothing complicated. But at least then it’d be in the one — and apparently the only one — place myopic users are willing to look. Right in front of their freakin’ faces.
The next time you’re designing a UI, consider user myopia. You might be surprised just how myopic your users can be. Think long and hard about placing things directly in front of them, where they are not just visible, but unavoidable. Otherwise they might not be seen at all.
100 Ideas for Envisioning Powerful, Engaging, and Productive User Experiences in Knowledge Work is an online reference for product teams creating new applications for work involving thinking, with a heavy emphasis on visualization in the example domains used throughout: Clinical Research (data analysis visualization), Financial Trading (market analysis visualization) and Architecture (building information modeling visualization). Specifically written for use during early, formative conversations, it provides teams with a broad range of considerations for setting the overall direction and priorities for their onscreen tools.
The work is freely available by the creative commons license as a browsable website, as a set of highly summarized idea cards, and as a 143 page PDF book. [via]
Enabling single-application mode means that you can quickly and easily build a custom list of visible applications, and that list is dynamic. In other words, you can achieve a lot of what you might use Spaces for, without having to switch between spaces or manage which applications show in which spaces.
The main advantage to this single-application mode is that clicking an application in the Dock has always brought all that application’s windows to the foreground. So, when I click Terminal’s icon in the Dock, not only do all other applications immediately disappear from view, I see the window for my local shells, the window for the remote shells on my mail server, and the window for the remote shells on my primary DNS server. These windows are exactly where I want them on the screen and there are no other windows cluttering up the view.
Apple GUI Hardware Macintosh OS X Software Vintage
I’m stuck in computing’s yesteryear. I’m using a recently-obsoleted Macintosh as my primary computer, a Power Mac G5. This once cutting-edge computer was to be the last of Apple’s PowerPC machines. Furthermore, Apple’s latest OS, Snow Leopard, doesn’t run on PowerPC-based computers, so I can’t upgrade my G5 beyond Leopard. As a consequence of this, my operating system can now be considered antediluvian too.
It seems only fitting then that I’ve used a couple of software hacks to add a few retro touches to my aging Macintosh.
Changelog Essay Experimental GUI Imaging Web Design Weblog WordPress
Back when I rebooted the Urban Mainframe and made my big switch to WordPress, I registered with wordpress.com and started recording traffic data for this site — looking for an ego boost, like you do. I also installed the WordPress.com Popular Posts plug-in and it is this which drives the “What’s Popular Here?” widget in the sidebar.
I had hoped that the Popular Posts widget would drive some traffic to some of my older posts and indeed it did, but with an unexpected consequence.
The Ministry of Type highlights a small but significant feature on the UI of the Xerox Star, a computer with an early GUI: precise positioning of icons on a dithered background in order to avoid rough edges. [via]
