The visualisation accompanied the web site that Rational designed and built to accompany the satellite’s launch.

Both sites were based on the ‘campaign’ template from EUMETSAT’s new  web site, designed by Rational and incorporating the following features:

• A ‘touch-friendly’ interface design, incorporating HTML5 and CSS3.0 with jQuery functionality enhancements
• Integration with EUMETSAT’s social media channels, including Twitter, Flickr and YouTube

The MSG-3 satellite launch web site was published in early April and ran until the satellite was successfully launched in May.

The second launch web site, for their Metop-B satellite, ran from August until the successful launch in September.

ZenGobi’s Curio is a ‘digital notebook’ which has just the right balance of tools to manage tasks & activities, collect ideas & samples and integrates one key process I aways use which nearly all PM tools ignore; mind mapping.

It also supports a vast range of document and file formats, including:

• Mindjet MindManager maps
• Photoshop
• InDesign
• Email
• Images
• PDFs

It also integrates with several services I find essential, including Evernote, Google Docs and Subversion.

If you’re looking for a visual PM tool which is easy to use but has great complexity just a few clicks away, then give Curio the once-over.

This time, we were given free reign to design the site from the bottom up, utilising all our user experience and interaction design expertise.

The brief was to ensure the look and feel conformed to the newly approved EUMETSAT brand, to fix the usability and interaction issues we had highlighted with the existing site and to ensure it was accessible to EUMETSAT’s global audience, accommodating as wide a range of ICDs as possible, whilst respecting the bandwidth constraints imposed by the locations of some audiences.

We introduced the following innovations during this design revision:

• A ‘touch-friendly’ interface, suitable for smartphones and tablets as well as traditional desktop computing devices
• Audience-specific landing pages, to suit the needs of defined target audiences
• HTML 5 & CSS3 functionality and interaction mechanisms
• Replacing Flash content with Javascript-based interactive features, where appropriate
• Content compression, using expandable areas
• Consolidated style for display of pages, articles, search results, etc.

The design is currently being integrated into the Oracle UCM 10 Content Management System, with assistance from Rational, where additional advanced features are being added,  including automatic publication of content from EUMETSAT’s Document Management System and single sign-on for web applications.

Click here to view the design prototype.

A lack of contribution is often attributed to well-known issues, such as lack of resources, lack of time or the usability of the contribution tool (e.g. the CMS) but there are other, sometimes more fundamental barriers, which can be harder to diagnose, including:

• Management perception
  work time spent contributing to an intranet can be perceived by management as being a ‘fun’ or time-wasting activity, rather than a valid business-related task;
• Identity
  a lack of openness, which may stem from the fact that users are often personally identifiable, rather than afforded the anonymity of the ‘screen names’ common to most Internet-based services.

Given the right advice, even these issues can be resolved fairly easily with straightforward measures.

Contact us to find out more.

When we were asked to come up with a concept for the timeline, we took inspiration from BeeDocs excellent Timeline 3D, which adopts a novel approach to displaying timelines by presenting them in isometric 3D.  The benefit of this approach is that the user can see more of the overall timeline context whilst being able to review the detail in the content.

Our version of that concept allows the visitor to ‘pan’ along the timeline at will and features a very simple interface for interacting with timeline ‘milestones’ and any additional content they contain using simple mouse clicks.  The ability to switch to ‘fullscreen’ allows the visitor to become fully immersed in the experience.

The timeline was built in Flash and is rendered in 3D by PaperVision v2.1 (Great White). The ‘milestones’ and their  content and assets (images and videos) are read from an external XML file, which allows the client to easily add content at will.

PV3′s MovieAssetMaterial class allows you to apply a library asset as a material, complete with any interactivity the asset contains. However, dynamic items within an asset (dynamic text fields, movieclips, etc.) are not directly accessible from the main AS3 class, as the property type of items within the MovieAssetMaterial is defined as DisplayObject rather than MovieClip or Sprite and are therefore not visible to AS3 using standard reference notation.  I was able to solve this problem by creating variables which store the paths to the movie asset’s dynamic items and then referencing the dynamic items through these variables. Here are some examples:

var myMaterial:MovieAssetMaterial = new MovieAssetMaterial("[library asset name]", true, false, false, true) // Set the library asset as a MovieAssetMaterial in PV3D
var myClip = MovieClip(myMaterial.movie); // create a variable to store the path to the asset


// Add text to a dynamic text field within the asset
var myText = myClip.getChildByName("[text field name]");
myText.text = "Here's my text";

// Load something into an empty clip within the asset
var myItem = myClip.getChildByName("[dropbox Label_mc]");
var myLoader:Loader = new Loader();
myItem.addChildAt(myLoader,myItem);
var itemPath = [path];
myLoader.load(new URLRequest(itemName));

Thanks to Ryan Robinson of Infinite Array for providing the majority of this solution.

An intranet is communication

First an foremost, an intranet is a communications tool. We are all taught that good communication lies at the heart of every successful business – however, all too often, communication via intranet is limited in large organisations to ‘top-down’, corporate-style news articles which do little to foster open communication amongst employees.

Successful intranets provide users with easy to use tools and an open, friendly environment in which to conduct discourse with their colleagues. Some of the features we’ve introduced which provide for these requirements include:

• Wiki and Discussion fora
  These are obvious inclusions but often quite tricky to implement successfully. A major issue we encounter is an unwillingness for users to express their opinions for fear of ‘reprisals’. However, we overcome this issue through a variety of means, including providing employees with the ability to remain anonymous.
• Intranet-wide messaging
  We’ve pioneered the use of open, non-intrusive IM services which allow the broadcast of messages intranet-wide. Every user can see these messages, but they don’t detract from day-to-day work in the same way as email messages can.
• User focus groups
  Focus or reference groups composed of service users are crucial to the successful development and evolution of the corporate intranet – they foster a sense of involvement in the service, group members act as champions out in the business and the groups themselves provide a forum for discussing and testing new ideas and enhancements.

Don’t underestimate the power of your intranet as a communications vehicle.  Get it right and you will reap the many benefits that good communication brings to your business.

1 – Consider accessibility first

We get accessible design.  There are a host of good reasons why designs should be accessible to disabled visitors and, in some countries, strict laws which enforce accessibility as a legal requirement.
However, accessible sites requires a different design mindset to rich-media, interactive designs.  This is because accessible designs hinge primarily on clean code and ordered content, rather than visually engaging themes or interactive elements.

During planning, consider the question of accessibility first.  If the site should be accessible, follow the principles of progressive enhancement and build a basic, clean design which can be enhanced in non-obtrusive ways, whilst respecting user preferences.

2 – Involve target audiences

A truly usable design is customised to its audiences. That customisation should be based on facts about those audiences.
If you are lucky enough to be working for an organisation which has already defined its target audiences in their communication strategy, don’t assume that their assumptions about these audiences are correct. Do some research of your own with focus groups composed of members from your customer’s target audiences and learn about them from the horse’s mouth.

Many ineffective sites are based on assumptions about target audiences, rather than the hard evidence of interviews and focus groups. Such measures are sometimes considered unnecessary or expensive, but stick to your guns and explain to your customer why they are the key to understanding users and their needs.

3 – Test, test and test again

Testing measures the success of a design and there are many rounds of testing that must be undertaken.
systems testing engineers will run functional and system-level tests, infrastructure engineers will run load and balance tests on their web servers and you will need to conduct usability and acceptance tests with users.
Conduct these tests directly with your focus groups. Get them to use the design and observe them while they do it, preferably using non-intrusive techniques such as video cameras or software like Silverback rather than some of the more traditional approaches, such as one-way mirrors, which we find place users outside their comfort zone and make them feel ‘observed’ which, in turn, makes them less likely to operate normally.

We also find it better to run tests with users in groups rather than individually, as your users will be less self-conscious if they can confer with their colleagues. We find this generates better quality data from which you can draw your conclusions.

Finally, test your designs regularly and especially during early development. Early testing helps to identify potential issues before designs become ‘baked’.

ICT departments can be funny creatures.  You ask them for help they’re always willing and able to provide you with valuable advice on operating systems or software applications.  However, if you return the favour during requirements gathering or on usability matters related to platform selection, it’s not always well received.

In some organisations, ICT departments have been relied upon to provide all solutions to user needs and don’t like it when some fancy pants UX guy/ess turns up on their doorstep and starts telling them how to do their job.  This is understandable when you consider that they are probably well versed in the foibles and vagaries of their users.  However, this does not mean they can design user-centric systems, since their selection criteria are based primarily on technical architecture and leveraging economies of scale, rather than usability.
As technical practitioners, ICT are best versed in the available/possible technical options and, as a UX practitioner, you’re best versed in usability.

You can illustrate this by pointing out some of the core differences between functional and usable systems:

• Customised user interfaces nearly always improve usability, despite the cost of that customisation
• Conformity with or tight integration into pre-existing desktop software helps users transition easier to any new service
• Conformity with prevailing standards in popular design (on the web, in consumer tech, in fashion) is preferable, as it helps users feel ‘at home’ with the service being developed.

When it comes to tool selection, open source applications are often inherently more user-centric and can represent a viable alternative to big business brands where the expertise to maintain them already exists in-house. You should, however, steer clear of labouring over the merits of open software, since it is not really your role to argue this point as a User Experience practitioner. It certainly doesn’t hurt to put your point across, however.

Overall, don’t be deferrent but neither be arrogant. Don’t labour your points too heavily, especially when they are conceded but cannot be implemented for technical or budgetary reasons. Treat ICT with respect and they will show you the same courtesy, leading to a successful project rather than one fraught with arguments.