I am always looking for better ways to communicate UX requirements to designers and developers.

I have had some discussions with developers about the best way to specify Rich Internet Applications (RIAs).  Some say ‘just prototype it’, others say ‘workshop it’ and more reckon ‘you should document it in detail.’ But how?

On UX Matters Richard Cecil claims ‘documenting the design of any page that uses Ajax (RIA) is a challenge, because the page—and, more importantly, components on the page—can have different states.’

Richard describes how to document RIAs using modified workflows that include an indication of asynchronous and synchronous events combined with wireframes that include interface components in their various states. Actually, he calls them ‘Wireflows’.  That is, the workflow includes elements of the wireframe in it, indicating the state of the page.  I believe it is very important to include the state information on the same diagram as the workflow, not on a separate state diagram.  If they are separate then it simply makes it harder to interpret.

It was interesting to note in the comments to his post that a couple of people said Axure is the right tool right for this job.  We have used it and found the dynamic panels help to clearly capture complex information about page interactions.

Do you think Axure is the answer? Have you used it to communicate?

Forrester’s Groundswell blog (that supports a new book they are writing) talks about the objectives that businesses should consider before jumping into online communities with their customers.

1. LISTENING. Finding out what your customers are really saying
2. SPEAKING. Connecting with your customers in new ways
3. ENERGIZING. Getting your best customers to evangelize your products
4. SUPPORTING. Helping customers solve their own and each other’s problems
5. EMBRACING. Working with your customers to make products better

A consideration, that I support, raised in the comments is that ’speaking’ should be changed to ‘conversation’ as it works best if it is bidirectional.

The biggest thing for me here is ‘Supporting’. People will evangelise your products with more fervour if you make their lives easier or better in some way? Do you want to provide them with: 

• New ways of connecting with other people with the same interests/background
• New perspectives on their particular personal or business context
• Digestible information that would not normally access
• Guidance in new ways of doing things (making money, saving money, having fun etc)
• Up to date information
• Free stuff ;)  

How are you using social networks in your business and what are you achieving?

How do we manage Facebook(ing) at work?

I was at a party last night.  340 odd people invited through Facebook [well done guys!].

Chatting to a number of people I kept hearing thigs like ‘You know how facebook has time stamps on stuff… well can you believe that people are writing long winded posts at 1030 am on a Monday?  They’re in professional jobs and ought to be working?’

Where do you draw the line?  I am in an interesting Back to Social Networking in the Enterprise group in FB.  We are discussing how Social networking (Facebook) is used commercially now for many things: 

• Research on customer perceptions
• Research into new ways of doing things Advertising
• Job seeking/advertising
• Business Networking Support - that means they didn’t have a business card when we met so I looked them up on Facebook
• Business oriented networks for fun, client management and staff communication
• The list goes on.

I met Nyree Ciorby from Topia last night. She was splashed all over the Sydney Morning Herald last week for banning facebook in her business. Well, she didn’t actually ban it, instead instituting a FB hour at lunch time.  Pretty good idea I reckon.

How should this be managed?  

I use it to keep in touch with all contacts. friends, business partners, staff, clients, prospects. Can be a waste of time, but it can also be very useful.

Last night I met someone who didn’t have a biz card.  But this morning we connected on Facebook and I sent him his proposal using the Inbox in FB by about lunch time. (I didn’t have his email either ) Great!

But if you are a consulting (non-sales) person how can we manage the distraction that Facebook can create… we’ve all experienced the ZOMBIE app…

Thoughts?

 For what it’s worth…A list of the ‘top’ 10 gurus in the user experience space. Let’s get some Aussies on it!

So were all saying Facebook is a flash in the pan and we will get bored.  I have even defended Facebook, saying the ‘people’ will keep it alive.

Facebook will implode…

Tonight I set myself a goal of going through all my facebook groups (only 26) and either responding to a discussion topic, writing something on the group wall or deleting it so I don’t waste my time reading fluff. 

Over three hours I ended up in some good conversations that were relevant to my new business and was sorting out some really useful conceptual problems around social networking, investment and business process etc. ALL THIS WITH THE HELP OF REAL PEOPLE ALL OVER THE WORLD IN REAL TIME.

Doing this alerted me to a fatal flaw in the design of facebook.

Think about my permutations.  I have 26 groups, an average of 5 discussion topics on each.  Web2.0 (Entrepreneurs) has 179 discussion topics (My average was wrong!). I responded to a couple here and there. Jeez it was fun, but…

I go to bed and when I get up tomorrow I probably won’t remember where that really cool discussion topic about social networks in developing countries was. I’ll search through the 3 likely groups and finally find it.  Not only will I find my interesting stuff there but I’ll also find that 10 other people had also written on it - And I would have been none the wiser!  I might have missed out on all that additional creative thinking… What if.

Discussions happen everywhere on facebook.  Web 2.0 (Entrepreneurs) has 514 posts on its wall. What about your ‘wall’, your ‘notes’, you friends’ ‘wall’, their ‘notes’, other group ‘walls’ on the group ‘discussion board’ to name but a few. How can we possibly manage this massive distributed mess of ‘fresh and alive’ information.

It’s less important when you are chatting with your friends and linking up to people or playing with silly applications.  However, if you are generating knowledge or doing research this task is mammoth!

How can we solve this? Help!!

What about RSS?
Talking with Leisa Reichelt (on my ‘notes’) tonight, she suggested that RSS would solve the problem.  But that’s only the half of it!  You’d need a good RSS ‘Manager’ like Netvibes to help you make sense of the screeds of content. I’m sure that was an assumption Leisa made
But still, it’s not going to solve the problem.

What about search?
You certainly would find it hard to quickly browse for what you want in the groups on Web 2.0 (Entrepreneurs). The order of the topics changes. Every time one is updated it goes to the top of the list! Great for hearing your own VOICE but not for organising information so you can find it again.

You can’t search within groups at all, let alone discussions? Full stop.

What about listing people’s comments on their profile somehow?
So much data…and it is only growing exponentially. Hard work.
Just see the Facebook article Australian Financial Review yesterday, called ‘Power in charting human relationships’ .  This thing is growing so fast - and how long have we all been contributing here.. a couple of months??

This mess is just another case of poor planning.  They just didn’t think through how people might leverage this platform and how much information would be created.  Most importantly that people might like to find that information AGAIN!

So facebook has drawn us all in with a highly usable, fast and easy login process and easy way of finding and inviting friends.  Where does that leave us now? Fighting against screeds of information in this new found world and striving to share and create knowledge.  Or going back into our hermit introspective lives where MySpace was too hard to be bothered with.

Maybe we’ll be RSS’ing out facebook discussions back out to our blogs for easy storage? I am certainly going to start cutting and pasting important ones onto my blog.

Blogging, Facebook, YouTube and MySpace might be fun but it’s there for all to see - for ever more! Are you managing your reputation on the Net?  Here’s a funny video about what employers (or potential girl/boyfriends) may know about you before you arrive for your interview!

I’m using the events section to your left now. Stay up to date with what I’m up to! 

An anti-Getting Things Done post…

Check out this retro Pacman download, bad graphics n sound and all! 

i originally thought I’d write, ‘I challenge you! Write a useful comment on all the blogs on your feedreader!’  And I’ve just tried it over the last couple of days.  So hard.. has anyone done it? Perhaps I should delete some of my feeds?

I am, I mean not really…

And McCue puts it perfectly on ZDNet.

Do you read all the emails that land on your blackberry (even before they hit your email app)?

It’s a very useful tool for Getting Things Done and keeping the business moving when I’m out an about.  BUT I certainly get interrupted when I should be relaxing. 

It’s all about productivity vs work/life balance.

I should really manage the emails that pop up all the time and make sure only really important ones get through… But it is kinda cool to know when a friend has written on your Facebook ‘Wall’… isn’t it?