theChickenTest : Bryce Johnson

New pictures in my Toy Comic Toolkit

I have taken some new pictures for my Toy Comic Toolkit, some Stock Characters. I needed just some simple people shots where I could: Crop or extend the canvas Change the background colours Combine characters into simple cells That is the update. It is a simple one, check it out I hope you like them.

The making of the PowerPivot icon

It was a privilege to be part of the team for Microsoft® PowerPivot, a new product that will change business intelligence by empowering information workers with the ability to conduct ad-hoc data analysis on massive amounts of data. I’m going to tell you a tiny part of the PowerPivot story which is how the product [...]

How could I not repost this – Death Metal Rooster

Data is Information. Information needs IAs.

The Data, Information, Knowledge, & Wisdom hierarchy has shifted. Systems that store and transform data automatically apply simple or semantic metadata to the records they process. What most consider data is really information in an early stage of refinement. Raw data off the sensor is something that a human will rarely see. Information architects have [...]

Review? : How To Increase Usability Of Government Websites and Boost Your ROI – Howcast

Having a website people can easily navigate is common sense. It can save taxpayer dollars and help your agency achieve its mission. Here’s how to dramatically improve your website by focusing on your customers’ needs and adopting some basic usability techniques. How To Increase Usability Of Government Websites and Boost Your ROI on Howcast is [...]

Paula Thornton’s notes on #SharePointSearch from March 30, 2010

Paula Thornton (@rotkapchen) tweeted some great notes about Tagging and Taxonomies in SharePoint 2010 along with some valuable insight into deciding whether or not to pay for the FAST search license. Materials being presented by Smartlogic, with product Semiphor — a taxonomy product integrated with FAST search. Why are taxonomies needed? Terms have different meanings, [...]

Usability Beyond the Classroom – Jon Bell

Consistency is great. Predictability is better. Simple isn’t neccessarily easy isn’t neccessarily good design. Testing is vital and unreliable.

wireframes: Sample sketches exploring alternate ways to access…

wireframes:

Sample sketches exploring alternate ways to access site level commands in SharePoint 2010. (via Microsoft Office 2010 Engineering : UX Design Tools & Techniques)

Veronica and Sadie are on the gondola in Banff, AB

Another Great Canux in Banff, AB

So Canux 2009 has passed and I had a great time. Great conversations with old friends and new one and I even got to take my family to Banff this year. In past years I have tried to take notes of all the presentations but I am usually to enthralled to write down anything useful. [...]

Fly me to Canux is actually quite catchy

You should really go check out the Canux site to get more info on the conference so you can decide to come and participate in one of the most intimate and rewarding conferences you will ever go to. I continue to go because the environment that the nForm team and the Banff Centre create re-energizes [...]

Healthcare Napkins All by Dan Roam is a great explanation of the current US Healthcare options

Healthcare Napkins All

This is a great presentation, definately the best concise explanation I have seen.

Multitouch pressure sensitive keyboard – simple and useful

A group of Microsoft researchers has built a kind of multitouch for the conventional keyboard… It allows a keyboard to accept pressure-sensitivity data, from which it can infer user intentions. - Chris Dannen for Fast Company

I really love how this looks like it can be a simple inexpensive way to have new gestural interfaces enhance the work and play we do today.

Kid playing Guitar Hero Guitar Hero On Expert While Solving Two Rubik’s Cubes [VIDEO] – via @duanebrown

Watching this video is like staring at the incoming tsunami. I’m excited and also terrified by the fact that in my career I will not only be designing experiences for kids like this but his kids.

Waiting for the Ferry at Friday Harbor (Seadragon – Silverlight req.)

Seadragon.com launches so you can publish really large images online. (Silverlight req.)

I took this photo’s URL from Flickr and pasted it into the SeaDragon input box and I was done. The picture is from the Diablo Lake Overlook.

Microsoft Environmental practices video. The next step should be…

Microsoft Environmental practices video. The next step should be more vegetarian food choices at work.

Vision Slides for a knowledge portal for a group of hospitals. – Design for Care

Vision Slides for a knowledge portal for a group of hospitals. - Design for Care:

Years ago I worked on an knowledge portal for a group of hospitals. These slides were the result of interviews with a number of group on what they need in a portal. These are fairly preliminary but it was a very useful exercise.

HealthCare Knowledge Portal Vision Slides View more documents from brycej.

I really think that default avartars should make you want to upload a picture

I really think that default avartars should make you want to upload a picture:

The link is to the Gallery of default anonymity: A work in progress.

Recovery.gov $18m is not that shocking but as Sunlight Labs says transparency is a must. It must be from ALL parties.

People on twitter are all buzzing about how $18M Being Spent to Redesign Recovery.gov Web Site and at first glance that does sound like an insane amount of money.

According to the GSA, Recovery.gov will be rebuilt over the course of five months for a total of $9,516,324. The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board then has the option to exercise options that can take the contract through 4 more years for a total of $17,948,518.

While I am shocked by the $9.5m in the first five months I’m certainly not shocked by $8.4 million to manage and maintain a government site for four years. I have done enough government work to know that warrenty commitments, change requests, uptime guarentees and managing a client in a bureaucratic culture costs a lot of money.

Sunlight Labs hits the nail on the head when they say:

The real problem is transparency. The real problem is that while many are outraged at the cost, you can’t presume that the government isn’t spending its money wisely unless you know both what Government is paying and what they’re paying for. We don’t know what they’re paying for, yet.

I hope that this gets rectified soon and that the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, along with Smartronix works with our community to make sure of three things:

That people know what every dime of that $18MM is being spent on,

That Smartronix works with the community to make the process of building Recovery.gov open and transparent, and

That Smartronix works with the Sunlight Labs community to make the data published on Recovery.gov accessible and machine readable to developers.

That last point is a little self serving but I’m willing to let that slide.

My two cents on this whole thing is that facilitating this transparency should be mostly on the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board plate. The public servants should serve the public. This transparency also needs to apply to the processes and commitments of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board as well as to the work of the vendor,Smartronix.

So let the people know what their government is doing in addition to letting them know how their tax money is being spent.