calm ranting

usability blog

Category | Requirements and Definition

RSS feed for this section

User Experience is not Graphic Design

I have a new job as a UI designer, and my company just doesn’t understand User Experience. Development runs the show, and they think my job is to design icons and color palettes. What’s the best way to explain UX so that everybody gets it?

We think the best way to explain that UX is more than graphic design is with a graphic (yes, that’s ironic). We think of [...]

Usefulness vs. Usability

In usability tests, people say our application is easy to use. But in the field, very few users are actually using the app. What should we do?

Your user adoption could be low for many reasons. A common reason is lack of usefulness. That’s what we’ll discuss here. Usability testing typically focuses on how easily and efficiently users can complete their tasks. Those are important. Just as important is [...]

Customer requirements and end-user requirements

By kellie on May 15, 2007 in Free UX Advice, Requirements and Definition

My company thinks about customer requirements but does not think about end-users. What’s your advice?

For a software company, “customer” and “end-user” often are different. A customer is the one who buys the software, and an end-user is the one who’s stuck using it. Customers and end-users can have very different goals and requirements for the software. Customer requirements are usually driven by Product Management, while a User Experience [...]