Google Master Plan

Watch the video and get mesmerized!

Designing for AJAX

A great presentation shared on SlideShare. The presentation is about Designing for AJAX - principles and patterns for rich interaction.

Usefulness of Breadcrumb Navigation

I have always found Breadcrumb navigation very useful and Jakob Nielsen in his latest alertbox has written at length about usefulness of breadcrumb navigation which is considered to be secondary navigation.

Here are few important tips about breadcrumbs:

• Breadcrumbs show people their current location relative to higher-level concepts, helping them understand where they are in relation to the rest of the site.
• Breadcrumbs afford one-click access to higher site levels and thus rescue users who parachute into very specific but inappropriate destinations through search or deep links.
• Breadcrumbs never cause problems in user testing: people might overlook this small design element, but they never misinterpret breadcrumb trails or have trouble operating them.
• Breadcrumbs take up very little space on the page.

There has been an argument that breadcrumbs are so minute that many people overlook them and they benefit only a majority. So why to use such a design element?
Jakob Nielsen writes

As I've long argued, breadcrumbs are different than most other little-used design elements for the simple reason that they don't hurt users who ignore them.

To read the entire article, click here.

E-Mail Judo

Thats how we IT guys work! :P
Hungry for more Dilbert strips.. click here.

Light Painting

Interesting.. huh?! This is a product of Light Painting Workshop.

Light painting is a photographic technique in which light sources are projected or "painted" using handheld light source in selective areas during the camera exposure. All work is done in camera, no computer manipulation occurs.
Exposure can range from 20 seconds onwards to an entire evening to achieve!

For more on light painting, click here. Meanwhile check out more of our cool work:

Cheers!

Barcamp Bangalore's third edition is scheduled to be held on 31st March & 1st April 2007 at IIM-B. Theme of the event is Internet, Mobile and Society.

To read more on Barcamp Bangalore 3, click here. It should be a great event with the presence of lot of technology and design enthusiasts. To register, visit BCB3 Registration Page.

Cheers!

Mac v/s PC

Apple "Get a Mac" ad takes a dead aim at Microsoft Vista!

Dekoh: Integrated experience of Web and Desktop

Dekoh is desktop platform for applications that deliver integrated experience of web and desktop. Along with the free Dekoh Desktop, comes a gallery of personal media applications and Dekoh Network service that helps users share content/applications directly off their PC.

So far Desktop applications and web applications were built and deployed as silos. Desktop applications are usually written OS specific and offer richer user interface. Web applications are accessed through web browsers. They require Internet connectivity and user data uploaded or saved on websites. Collaborating and sharing data is easy in web applications.

Jay Pullur, CEO of Pramati says, "Dekoh bridges the big divide between Desktop and the Web. Using browser-based applications seamlessly when offline or online is a compelling value. Writing desktop applications using the same web standards like Java^TM, AJAX, DHTML, Flash, and PHP is exciting for developers".

A very interesting concept - I have signed up for Dekoh and will start using it. Lets see do they live up to the expectations.

To read the press release, click here or visit Dekoh's Home Page.

On a lookout for fresh new design!

I am bored of the standard blogger template and technophobic does need a new look. Now I am setting out for a fresh new design. I just hope I find enough time to wrap it up quickly.
Any suggestions/feedback for new design are welcome :)

Cheers!

Adobe to take Photoshop online

Hoping to get a jump on Google and other competitors, Adobe Systems plans to release a hosted version of its popular Photoshop image-editing application within six months, the company's chief executive said Tuesday.

Now this is exciting news but Photoshop is a heavy piece of software and how Adobe will take care of network latency while performing actions is going to be interesting.

Click here, to read the entire article.

Cheers!

SNAP Preview

Snap Preview Anywhere provides high quality link previews for site owners to add an informative and sticky experience for their users. By rolling over any link, the user gets a visual preview of the site without having to go there, thus eliminating wasted "trips" to linked sites.

Look, it works great here at technophobic:

Click here and try out this cool free service - SNAP Preview.

Cheers!

What is Apple's next product?

We all get fascinated and bamboozled by Apple's Product. They revolutionized the music player industry with the iPod, and now they're poised to take over the phone market with iPhone. But the big question is - what is the next hot thing that Apple is going to revolutionize?

Maybe we have an answer, have a look..

Is it IPiano?




Or is it iPottie?! :P




Worth1000 had started a photoshop competition to make people sneak into Apple's R&D facility and show us what new products they are currently giving the patented "Apple" look.

People came up with some real creative entries. Click here to see the list.

Cheers!

Do you have time?

Click on the image and see amazing interaction. [Courtesy: KrazyDad]

Eye Tracking: The 'F' Shaped Pattern

The 'F' shaped pattern

F for fast. That's how users read your precious content. In a few seconds, their eyes move at amazing speeds across your website’s words in a pattern that's very different from what you learned in school.

According to Nielsen (2006) users tend to focus on the left side of the body of a webpage when reading and fixate very little on information located on the right-hand side. Users maintain this ‘F’ viewing pattern with a few horizontal scans, the first one being longer than the second and a long vertical scan (Figure 1). Implications of this are that users may miss valuable information located on the right-hand side of the page.

To read more, click here.

Mobile Revolution: Apple's iPhone

Get ready for the Next Big Thing!

The mobile revolution is in place: iPhone combines three products — a revolutionary mobile phone, a widescreen iPod with touch controls, and a breakthrough Internet communications device with desktop-class email, web browsing, maps, and searching — into one small and lightweight handheld device. iPhone also introduces an entirely new user interface based on a large multi-touch display and pioneering new software, letting you control everything with just your fingers. So it ushers in an era of software power and sophistication never before seen in a mobile device, completely redefining what you can do on a mobile phone.

Related Links:

• Apple's Official Site
• YouTubeVideo
• Live from MacWorld

Cheers!

Gates, Jobs, & the Zen aesthetic

A great post examining the two contrasting visual approaches employed by Bill Gates and Steve Jobs in their presentations.
You will definitely enjoy this one. Click here to read this great post.

Cheers!

UI Cartoon

Designing using a systematic process based on the best usability practices is our mantra!

Ms Dewey

A search engine with a 'sexy' difference!
Ms Dewey comes and asks you strange questions, says spooky thing to catch your attention, powered by Microsoft's Live Search, Ms Dewey is an amazaing search engine.

Cheers!

Now thats Collaboration!

Talking with Orkut

Yes, you read it right.. talking with Orkut is now possible. Google is continuing with its innovation process and has built Google Talk into Orkut.

Sounds groovy.. right? For more details and how to use it, click here.

Cheers!