Category: User experience, web, technology

  • HTML form fields that, when not selected, do not even send a field name upon submit

    Checkboxes and radio buttons that have not been checked and multiple select lists that have no selection submit nothing upon submission of the form. It’s as though they aren’t even there. At first, this may seem obvious (Well, yeah, you didn’t select them, dummy!), except that it runs counter to every other form field. If…

  • Ladies and gentlemen: introducing REGEXER.COM!

    My friend Adam has been tapping at the keyboard and pacing again. This time, he’s working on a project called Regexer. For many programmers and Web developers, having to write up a regex (regular expression, a pattern matching utility found in many programming languages) involves having to dig out a book or look up a…

  • Surge in UX jobs?

    Is it just me, or is there a surge in job openings in the information architecture and Web usability fields? Over the last couple months, I’ve been contacted about or seen 8 or 9 job openings. Today, for instance, I received a message about a usability specialist position for a really well-known IT consulting firm.…

  • Revision: Using Javascript to add instructive text for input and textarea form fields

    OUTDATED POST: HTML5’s placeholder attribute creates the behavior that this javascript did. Just use the placeholder attribute. This is a code update to a prior post. The Javascript I had posted earlier fell short in one important arena: when you submitted the form without entering your own text, the form would send in the instructive…

  • I finally did the right thing and joined the Usability Professionals Association

    After years of crashing UPA-sponsored events, I finally shelled out the membership fee and joined the association. The Usability Professionals Association is a professional organization that is focused on supporting the development of the field of usability.

  • Perspective: Websites are fleeting.

    I was glancing through some files in some webspace I’ve had for a while, and ran across a fairly old portfolio page I had. It listed seven websites that I had worked on around that time. This was probably about seven years ago, so sometime in 2001 or so. Not only is there not a…

  • Zen rock gardens, accessibility, information architecture

    I was walking into work this morning, thinking about 1st, 2nd, 3rd orders of order (“Everything is Miscellaneous” by Weinberger) and came across a frozen pond. The pond is shaped like a teardrop and has three clumps of grass growing from it. As I considered the space between the clumps of grass, it reminded me…

  • Perspective 2 Studio is hopping!

    This past summer my friend Adam (of Envision Internet Consulting) and I worked with Lynne Brown and Matt Schulert of MediaGraphics, Inc. on a website for an exciting concept of Lynne’s, called Perspective2. The idea was to create a studio space for the artists and producers in the area, and, wow, has it taken off!…

  • Using Javascript to add instructive text for input and textarea form fields

    OUTDATED POST: HTML5′s placeholder attribute creates the behavior that this javascript did. Just use the placeholder attribute. UPDATE 2008-04-13: This code has been refactored. Please view the updated posting. Over the last year or so, I’ve worked on a number of websites where I wanted to add instructive text to form fields, but didn’t want…

  • Nephtali

    Oh! Nephtali! Alright, so if you look up “Nephtali” on thinkbabynames.com, you see it listed as a variant of “Naftali.” The boy’s name Naftali \n(a)-fta-li, naf-tali\ is of Hebrew origin, and its meaning is “struggling”. Biblical: a son of Jacob and one of the ancestors of the 12 tribes of Israel. “Struggling.” Apt. How many…