Don't Assume...Your UI Should Help Guide, Not Hinder
Tue, Mar 2nd 2010 9:12p Chris Blatnick Today I was working with an internal system. I was filling out a web-based form and got to a required field in which I could not enter any data. It was rather annoying and at the time I couldn't figure out what the problem was. I knew I was probably working on one too many things at once, so I left it to come back and try to figure it out later. Sure enough I did, but even on second glance it wasn't obvious. The sad thing was, I had filled out this form once before and had the same problem, but [read] Keywords: application
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See All Of Your Facebook Friends
Thu, Feb 11th 2010 8:42p Chris Blatnick Just a quick public service message for you Facebook users out there. Most people have received the new user interface by now. I only just received it myself, so I haven't lived with it long enough to render judgment. However, one of the things I noticed right away (besides the fact that they broke the Blackberry app for a few days...grrrr) was that I was not seeing all of my friends' status updates. So, after remembering what they did last time, I checked and indeed they throttled back the numb [read] Keywords: blackberry
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Folder Name Issue Causing Java UI Rendering Problem In Notes 8 Mail File
Wed, Jan 27th 2010 11:07a Chris Blatnick I was working with one of my customers and was told about an interesting problem. They are currently in the process of upgrading to Notes 8.5.1 and so far, most of the client upgrades have been nice and smooth. One user had an unusual issue that was causing a bit of angst. After being upgraded and getting the new mail template, most of his folders were not visible in the UI. Here's what it looked like. Notice anything odd?br /br /div style="text-align:center;"img src="http://interfacematters.com [read] Keywords: admin
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Changes Ahead For Interface Matters
Fri, Dec 18th 2009 8:48a Chris Blatnick The winds of change are blowing here at Interface Matters and in my opinion are way, way overdue. The only excuse I have is lack of time to devote to these changes (or at least lack of desire to devote the time since other things have been occupying my attention of late). I have been wanting to make some changes here for quite some time, and as the new year rolls around, it's probably as good a time as any to make the leap. First, I want Interface Matters to expand beyond a single voice. This h [read] Keywords: domino
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On Productivity: My Paper Processing Workflow
Thu, Dec 17th 2009 10:55a Chris Blatnick I've always been a fan of performing tasks as efficiently as possible and eliminating the drudgery of those tasks that don't add a lot of value to my work or personal life. One of those tasks which is a necessary evil is the maintenance of paper-based documents. Everyone has them...bills that need to be paid, bank statements, tax documents, owner's manuals, receipts. As much as possible, many of us have tried to digitize these things so we don't receive them as paper in the first place. I've pre [read] Keywords: collaboration
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Sweet Drag and Drop Actions In the Lotus Notes Client
Wed, Nov 18th 2009 3:17p Chris Blatnick I've mentioned once or twice before that I really like using drag and drop. Although it is often a bit slower than other actions and you sometimes have to show the user how to do it, I find it to be a preferred method for executing certain tasks in an application. Lotus Notes itself offers many cool and useful drag and drop actions. I've been showing end users some of these for a long time, and always there are folks that had no clue drag and drop actions were even available. I wanted to share a [read] Keywords: document
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RSS Feeds For Notes Documents
Mon, Nov 16th 2009 10:13p Chris Blatnick Yes...I haven't fallen off the earth. Thanks for asking. Just spending a lot of time learning other parts of the Lotus collab stack and having to crack open the books to study up on admin topics leaves little time for development stuff anymore. I still plan to change that. :-) I thought I'd throw this very simple but highly useful tip out here because I have found that not everyone is aware of it. In fact, I was asked about this topic the other day. The question at hand: Can I create an RSS fe [read] Keywords: admin
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Lotus Knows...It's Time To Do It Again!
Mon, Sep 21st 2009 8:44a Chris Blatnick It's an exciting day to be sure, as the Lotus Knows campaign officially kicks off here in the United States. It's been a long time since Lotus has had a highly visible nationwide campaign and it's awesome to be on the inside now to see it begin to take off. Lotusknows.com is now (kinda) live and it's pretty cool. It officially launches tomorrow, but I know people started looking for it as early as this weekend. It is certainly is different than your normal IBM site. Of course, a big part of [read] Keywords: ibm
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I'm Already Stressed Enough, Thank You...
Tue, Jun 2nd 2009 8:10a Chris Blatnick As I was once again forced to use one of the most horrible software products I have ever laid eyes on, it occurred to me that it's worth repeating one of my favorite mantras, even at the risk of sounding like a broken record (do any of you kids even know what that means? ;-) --> Simplicity in your design is your goal. If you can get to the point where the interface "disappears" and the user can just get in the flow and do their work, then you've really got something there. So many of the thi [read] Keywords: application
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Cheap UI Trick: Add Whitespace With Borders
Wed, Mar 25th 2009 1:44p Chris Blatnick When I'm building a new UI or composing a document to send to an audience, I like simple elements that make a big difference in the final presentation. I thought I'd share a trick that I use to add whitespace to designs when using graphics with wrapping text in Lotus Notes. If you've not tried it before, first let me point out that you can paste or import an image into a Notes form/document and set the properties of the image so that text can wrap left or right. This is analogous to using floa [read] Keywords: document
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The Inaugural GTD Summit...Did It Change The Way The World Works?
Mon, Mar 23rd 2009 10:59a Chris Blatnick After attending the GTD Global Summit a little over a week ago, my mind is still swirling with all kinds of thoughts. I wanted to write a final post to close things out earlier, but I hit the road to visit customers literally a couple of hours after I arrived back from San Francisco. Now that I've been back for a day, it's time to process my inboxes, update my lists and get some things done. One of the main items was to write this post, so here we go. First, I'll try to distill down some of my n [read] Keywords: document
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Wrap up and final comments from GTD Global Summit
Fri, Mar 13th 2009 7:49p Chris Blatnick Always loved to watch Peter Drucker on stage. Admits to not being able to live up to what he did. Great tip to relax quickly: lower your standards! ;-) Shout out to the audience about how we're all "crazy like him". 88,000 people now following David Allen (@gtdguy) on Twitter. Amazing...22,000 in the last couple of days. All that from zero in a few weeks. What he didn't hear during the conference: That anyone has the silver bullet. Structured thinking can make profound change in your li [read] Keywords: blogger
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Best Practices to Good Habits: Can I Make GTD Stick?
Fri, Mar 13th 2009 5:16p Chris Blatnick Live blogging from the GTD Global Summit. Panelists: Meg Edwards, Dean Hering, Alan Nelson, Jim Whitton Moderator: Danny Bader First hearing about the panelists and how they got started with using the GTD methodology. Hearing common themes throughout the conference such as "it's easy to fall off the wagon, but easy to get back on as well" and "the weekly review is the hard but essential part of GTD" Why keep it going? We know why...but let's talk about how to keep it going? "The Brain th [read] Keywords: workflow
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David Allen: Making It All Work At The GTD Global Summit
Fri, Mar 13th 2009 12:34p Chris Blatnick Day two is starting off with a presentation by David Allen on Making It All Work. This will be another live blogging session in an attempt to capture the thoughts as they fly. Opening video testimonials (Evan Taubenfeld). Well spoken and interesting to see that creative types can embrace GTD too. Ben Saunders - Polar Explorer & Motivational Speaker gives testimonial about how GTD helped him immensely in his solo explorations. David now on stage talking about Evan and Ben and how they've [read] Keywords: blogger
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Entrepreneurs and GTD - Making It Up and Making It Happen
Thu, Mar 12th 2009 6:58p Chris Blatnick We're getting ready to begin another session at the GTD Summit. This one on Entrepreneurs and GTD together. Panelists: Buzz Bruggeman, Peter Gallant, Frode Odegard, John de Souza Moderator: Bruce Somers Every corporation that exists today was due to an entrepreneurs. The importance of GTD is about clearing the path and allow this thought process to happen. Peter - Got to have a couple failures under your belt. Serial entrepreneur. Entering next stage as his company has been acquired. Love wo [read] Keywords: application
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A GTD Workforce: Is There a New Industry Standard?
Thu, Mar 12th 2009 5:54p Chris Blatnick The afternoon kicked off with another GTD Summit panel. This time, the conversation centered around whether or not GTD Panelists: Todd Brown, Randy Harward, Jeff Irby, Ron Kaufman, Sara Larch, Brian Lowery, Eric Ly Moderator: Mike WIlliams Todd - No...there is not a standard. Not seeing GTD skills on resumes yet. This is very important, however, due to globalization and the economic crisis we are seeing right now. A lot of distractions in life (Twitter, Facebook, etc.). Are these adding valu [read] Keywords: facebook
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GTD @ Home: From the Boardroom to the Living Room
Thu, Mar 12th 2009 2:53p Chris Blatnick OK...this is my first attempt at live blogging, so we'll see how it goes. I'll likely expand on my thoughts later. I usually tend to write longer pieces, so doing a stream of conscious blast of info will be interesting. The first breakout session of the day is "GTD At Home: From the Boardroom to the Living Room". This panel is being moderated by Eric Mack with panelists Med Edwards, Ismael Ghalimi, Kim Hagerty, Brian Lowery, Bruce Somers, John de Souza and Mike Williams. Two other excellent sou [read] Keywords: workflow
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Twitter People At The GTD Summit
Tue, Mar 10th 2009 5:54p Chris Blatnick T minus 1 day to the GTD Summit. This event is bringing together some incredible minds to have a dialog around our rapidly changing world and how we can get more things done with agility, flexibility and speed. I'm thrilled at the prospects of learning about raising my potential to the next level with this great group of speakers as well as my fellow attendees. I'll be blogging and tweeting the event. As you know if you've been here before, I tend to write rather long pieces, so I'm not sure if [read] Keywords: blogging
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It's All About The Whole Package...Designing for the User Experience
Mon, Mar 9th 2009 6:53p Chris Blatnick While the title of this site is Interface Matters (because I thought it had a good double meaning to it and it reflects an area where many Notes applications have issues), I'm really more inclined to think about the entire user experience (UX). Now certainly, the user interface is one important aspect of the user experience, but UX is much more than just what the screens look like and what the user sees. I'm an advocate of taking a holistic approach to the art and science of application design. [read] Keywords: notes
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GTD, Lotus Notes & the eProductivity Challenge: The Weekly Review
Mon, Mar 2nd 2009 11:03p Chris Blatnick Webster defines a coach as "one who instructs or trains." I'm a big fan of coaching. Whether talking about a presentation coach to help hone your skills on the stage, a performance coach to help you better your 5k time or a life coach to get you to focus on your overall goals and objectives, coaching is a fantastic way to help you achieve your potential and then reach for loftier heights. In fact, I'm writing this post right now while waiting for my son to get out of his teen life coaching sess [read] Keywords: lotus
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Embedding GTD Into My Life Systems
Thu, Feb 26th 2009 11:39p Chris Blatnick Hi Gang...For you frequent visitors, just a quick note. I do not plan on turning this into an "All GTD, All The Time" blog...I promise. It's just been on my radar a lot lately for a few different reasons, so I thought I would share with those that are interested. We'll return to the regularly scheduled programming soon (along with an announcement about this site). In any case, if you'd like to delve into why I GTD, feel free to keep reading. Getting Things Done, the enormously popular personal [read] Keywords: ibm
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Why Do Enterprise Applications Suck? And How Can We Fix It?
Tue, Feb 24th 2009 10:09p Chris Blatnick Originally, this post was just going to be a link to a great article, but as usual, I seem to have a little more to say. Before you read my thoughts on the subject of sucky enterprise apps, please check out what Michael Nygard has to say on this topic. Good stuff and I whole-heartedly agree. To summarize, Michael postulates that there are four main reasons that enterprise applications suck in terms of the user experience. They are: 1. The serve their corporate overlords, not their users. 2. T [read] Keywords: designer
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Thoughts on the eProductivity Install...Smooth Sailing Really
Tue, Feb 24th 2009 5:53p Chris Blatnick As part of the eProductivity challenge that I'm working on with creator Eric Mack, I promised to blog about the process and my findings as I went along. I thought this would be very useful for those people that are interested in the promise of achieving higher productivity using Lotus Notes. The first part of getting things done with eProductivity was to actually perform the install. This is very easily accomplished since this tool was designed specifically for Lotus Notes. You'll be using you [read] Keywords: acl
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A Paper Prototyping Testimonial
Thu, Feb 19th 2009 5:55p Chris Blatnick [Hi Everybody...Chris here. I'm thrilled to present another guest post to you here on Interface Matters. Please welcome Kathy Brown, who recently started blogging over at Kathy's Running Notes. She was inspired to try low-fi prototyping after attending my session with Tom Duff at Lotusphere and I was really happy to hear about her success with it. Below is a post about her experience. Thanks, Kathy! Don't forget to check out her blog...] I frequently spend many hours in meetings with users, ema [read] Keywords: designer
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On the Road to Greater eProductivity!
Tue, Feb 17th 2009 10:38p Chris Blatnick Hi again, folks. Those two or three of you that have been coming here for awhile now know that I am a fan of productivity systems and that I am a follower of the GTD methodology. While not a black belt by any means, I've found that it is the best system for me, helping me keep on top of the ever increasing pile of work I find thrust upon me (or that I volunteer for) and assisting me to close open loops. I first read David Allen's Getting Things Done several years ago and it really struck a cho [read] Keywords: ibm
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Lotusphere 2009...Some Quick Thoughts
Fri, Jan 30th 2009 5:51p Chris Blatnick Another Lotusphere is in the can and I can echo many of the voices in our community by saying Best. Lotusphere. Ever! Perhaps due to my IBM job now, Lotusphere has a different flavor and between speaking and various job related events, I didn't get to attend nearly as many sessions and labs as I wanted to. I'm amazed at the number of sessions available this year that were of super high quality and I wish I could have seen them all. I think a highlight for me was Benjamin Zander's appearance at t [read] Keywords: ibm
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Speedgeeking: The Amazing Tabbed Table
Fri, Jan 30th 2009 5:51p Chris Blatnick I had the pleasure of being able to participate in Speedgeeking this year at Lotusphere and while it's hard on the voice, it's really a lot of fun. For those not familiar with speedgeeking, it's much like speed dating. Each presenter is at a separate table and groups of attendees spend 5 minutes getting a "crash course" in whatever that presenter's topic is. After 5 minutes, they go to the next station and so on for 1 hour. To keep it fun and lively, an MC is continually calling out the time and [read] Keywords: lotus
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Come Say Hello At Lotusphere
Wed, Jan 14th 2009 11:54p Chris Blatnick Well...it's almost time for our annual pilgrimage to Orlando, and like most of you that are going, I can't wait! For those of you that can't make it, I've been in your position as well...totally bummed about it...and all I can say is that at least this year, more than ever before, you'll get to live viscerally through the many social networking mechanisms that people in the community will be taking advantage of. I know that's not nearly as good as being there, so we'll raise one (or two or...) i [read] Keywords: ibm
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Flashback: The Low Down On Low-Fidelity Prototyping
Thu, Nov 13th 2008 9:16p Chris Blatnick Note: This is a repeat of one of my more popular articles. It is reprinted here after several requests. Since I have a lot more readers now than I did when originally posted, I thought it would be a good time to recycle it. :-) You don't have to be on this site for very long before you'll start picking out some common themes. Two of the topics that I am very passionate about when it comes to the development process are low-fidelity prototyping and usability testing. I truly believe that every d [read] Keywords: notes
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Balsamiq Mockups...A Very Cool Tool For Building Prototypes
Thu, Nov 6th 2008 7:51p Chris Blatnick As long-time readers know, I'm somewhat of a zealot when it comes to singing the praises of low-fidelity prototyping. Over time, I've found that it allows me to get to the best possible user interface faster than any other method. While I love breaking out the crayons, markers and paper, I do admit that it sometimes becomes more time consuming than I'd like if I have to keep redoing a certain screen. This is where I see a computer-based tool being very helpful. In a past post, I introduced you [read] Keywords: desktop
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SnTT: Quick Follow-up To "Universal Toolbar"
Thu, Oct 23rd 2008 8:52p Chris Blatnick It seems some folks liked my idea from last week, especially the example screenshot showing a drop down menu in this "universal toolbar" area. I received a comment and a few e-mails asking how this was done. Well...I actually wrote this up (along with a sample database) a couple of years ago, so today's show and tell will be a cheat, as I am just going to link you over to that entry. With that, here you go. Enjoy. SnTT: Cascading Navigation In Notes Editor's Note: The sample database that i [read] Keywords: lotus
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SnTT: Add A "Universal Toolbar" To Your Lotus Notes Applications
Thu, Oct 16th 2008 7:57p Chris Blatnick Hey, look at that: A Show-n-Tell Thursday post. Woohoo! OK...I've got to think up a better/more descriptive name than "universal toolbar", but I'm creatively challenged today. At least I got a post out...geez. :-) If you think about most of your applications, there are probably certain functions that are executed more than anything else. Perhaps it is a particular search mechanism, running a certain agent or navigating to a given document. Whatever the most common action is, do you make it easy [read] Keywords: agent
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Lotusphere 2009 - Getting to WOW
Sat, Sep 27th 2008 8:12p Chris Blatnick Yesterday was the deadline for Lotusphere abstracts, so I hope you got your ideas in. I'm really excited that there seems to be such a buzz around the conference this year (even more than normal, it seems). One of my former colleagues submitted a couple of ideas too, so I'm hoping he gets a chance to get up there and show off his stuff. I actually ended up with two entries thrown into the hat and one Birds of a Feather idea. Both of the session submissions are with a couple of fantastic speaker [read] Keywords: lotus
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Epic Fail...Error Message Worst Practices (And How To Fix Them)
Tue, Sep 9th 2008 9:59p Chris Blatnick Error messages...the bane of users. We all dread the software crash or programmatic wrong turn that sends our productivity crashing into a brick wall. To add insult to injury, I think most of us would be hard pressed to find examples of good error messages in the software we use. Remember that one of the key goals of interface design to strive for is making the interface unobtrusive so that the user can focus on the task at hand, not on how to use the software. When users encounter an error, we [read] Keywords: policies
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WOA vs SOA...The Battle of the "Oriented Architectures"
Sat, Sep 6th 2008 9:52p Chris Blatnick Everybody Loves Web Oriented Architecture Hmmm...interesting read indeed. While this isn't the party line for my employer, I think WOA is the way to go personally. It just seems lighter weight to me and more "agile", which of course I like. Then again, a lot of this stuff is all semantics anyway! ;-) [read] Keywords: soa
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Lotusphere 2009...Should I Even Try?
Thu, Sep 4th 2008 7:59p Chris Blatnick So Lotusphere time is upon us again in a few short months and people are getting all hyped up and excited since registration opened yesterday. This is always a fun time, as the folks in the blogging community start talking about some of the sessions they hope to submit, while others keep their thoughts very close to the vest. I'm currently wondering what, if anything, I should submit as an idea this year. Are there any topics that you'd specifically like to see at Lotusphere based around the s [read] Keywords: lotusphere
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On Total (e)Productivity In Lotus Notes
Wed, Sep 3rd 2008 7:59p Chris Blatnick I've mentioned the eProductivity system a few times here and there and wanted to share some additional thoughts about it. It's great to see applications that enhance and extend the power of the Lotus Notes platform. Eric Mack and his development team have done a great job in this respect. (Don't forget to check out the video demo) If you are a practitioner of Getting Things Done (GTD), David Allen's system for managing the overwhelm almost all of us feel due to the myriad things that require o [read] Keywords: lotus
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Domino Web Developers...Will Our Apps Be Better In New Google Browser?
Mon, Sep 1st 2008 10:00p Chris Blatnick Exciting times, eh? Tomorrow, Google is releasing "Google Chrome", a new, built-from-the-ground-up web browser that promises to be a modern platform for applications and web pages. With announcements like this, plus all the new goodies like xPages coming from IBM, you really do need to start brushing up on your web skills. While I *love* rich client development, I believe it's equally important to be able to use your skills when developing for the browser. I've met far too many Domino develope [read] Keywords: domino
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OK Lotus Geeks, Time To Pump Up!
Mon, Sep 1st 2008 7:59p Chris Blatnick Hey Everybody...Are you ready for a challenge? I came across the OneHundredPushUps site a few weeks back and put it on my list of things to explore in more detail. I finally did this weekend, so I'm ready to get started. The gist of the program is that you do the required work for six weeks with the goal of being able to do 100 pushups (consecutively) at the end. I've been running lately and doing a bit of lifting, all in an attempt to get back into prime fighting condition. I'm lucky enoug [read] Keywords: lotus
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Twitter...Are We Doing It Wrong?
Tue, Aug 12th 2008 11:20p Chris Blatnick I should be spending a little more time preparing for the social software proof of technology seminar that I am giving the next two days, but instead I'm spending time reading blogs about social software. Hmmm...maybe that actually counts. :-)
There's been quite a bit of buzz about Twitter in our community lately. Rocky asked what all the fuss was about a few days ago. I saw Andrew talking about Twitter being used incorrectly on Twitter yesterday, which I thought was funny and ironic. Toda [read] Keywords: connections
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Where Are These Coming From?
Sun, Aug 10th 2008 11:29a Chris Blatnick I don't know about you, but I've always been a fan of the Muppets. That said, I've been loving the fact that these videos keep popping up on YouTube. Here are two of my favorites: [read] Keywords: application
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Is Lotus Notes Long In The Tooth?
Mon, Aug 4th 2008 9:12a Chris Blatnick By now, if you are a member of the Lotus community in any way, shape or form, you've probably seen the great new press release that articulates the momentum we've been gaining (quarter after quarter) over our competitors. It's so great to see the commitment we've all made to this platform be validated in real world terms. I, for one, welcome our new Lotus Notes overlords. ;-)
In light of all the great press and positive upswing I've seen out in the wild lately, I thought it was interesting [read] Keywords: ibm
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The Importance Of Micro-Experiences
Mon, Jul 28th 2008 9:08p Chris Blatnick Do you think about the simple bits that make using your application, website, etc., easier for end users? With the continuing specialization of certain applications, both within the firewall and out, I find that users are frequently interacting with these applications for very small chunks of time. Usually it is in the context of looking up some item of data, and it made me reflect on the ways I've tried to simplify life for end users, especially in light of short transactions. Here are some exa [read] Keywords: notes
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Application Decay...A Must Read Article
Thu, Jul 24th 2008 12:26p Chris Blatnick Once again, Nathan Freeman has provided us with a thought-provoking article that I think is a must read for every Notes developer. In this post, Nathan continues his "The Truth As I See It" series (also check out Part 1).
Nathan and I had a quick Sametime chat on how his ideas relate to the user interface. I think as a result we'll have another interesting post to read in the not-too-distant future. I was going to give my two cents on how this phenomenon also results because of our indiv [read] Keywords: lotus
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eProductivity for Lotus Notes...Want To Be Way More Efficient?
Fri, Jun 27th 2008 12:44p Chris Blatnick Many of you have already heard of Eric Mack's eProductivity software, a tool for implementing the Getting Things Done methodology in Lotus Notes. If you haven't, it's definitely something you should check out. If you want to increase your effectiveness and efficiency in dealing with all your stuff, then eProductivity might just be the application to take you over the top. It's an outstanding tool and a great example of the power available in Lotus Notes-based systems.
If you hurry, you might [read] Keywords: lotus
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Collaboration Comes To Mind Maps
Thu, Jun 19th 2008 8:55a Chris Blatnick One last post about mind maps and we'll move on, I promise! :-) It's no secret that I am a big fan of visual mapping techniques. Mind maps allow you to capture, quantify and organize information in ways that mirror how our brains actually work. They allow you to see beyond simple linear lists to understand relationships between ideas. While traditional mind mapping as developed by Tony Buzan utilizes paper and colored markers, pencils, crayons, etc., the sheer amount of information we deal with [read] Keywords: collaboration
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Heck Yeah - Of Course I'm Experiencing Cognative Dissonance!
Wed, Jun 11th 2008 2:02p Chris Blatnick One of the things I love about reading Tim Ferris' blog is that he gets a chance to sit down and talk with many very interesting people. I have to point out his latest post, since it's a dilemma I identify with...how to be a superstar at work (not doing so hot at that right now) while being a superstar at home as well. Usually, such conflicting demands diminish your performance in one or both domains, so the trick is finding the right path to balancing them as best you can. In today's post, Tim [read] Keywords:
New Blogger @ Dominoblog.com
Wed, May 14th 2008 4:23p Chris Blatnick Yo, yo...welcome to my peeps...Andrea Waugh-Metzger is now blogging at Dominoblog.com. She is one of my colleagues, but way, way smarter than me, so you should definitely get over there and visit. Tell her I sent you and maybe I'll get some brownie points. :-D Peace out... [read] Keywords: lotus
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Say It With Me Now...User Focused Design Is KEY
Thu, May 1st 2008 10:01p Chris Blatnick If there's a particular drum I bang over and over again, it's the "keep it simple, stupid" drum. This term has almost become a cliché , but hey, "if the shoe fits, wear it". (Oh sorry, that was bad...just couldn't help myself ;-) Anyway, when I was doing project work, I was always the guy advocating for people to "take it slow", "do things in stages", "no big bangs", "Amazon wasn't built in a day", etc., etc. I believe that quick, iterative steps yield better results, less bugs and get you to [read] Keywords: enterprise
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Unobtrusive JavaScript...You Should Totally Do This
Mon, Apr 28th 2008 10:40p Chris Blatnick In my JavaScript session at last year's version of LotusDeveloper (an excellent conference, by the way...you should go), I discussed the concept of unobtrusive javascript and showed several examples. Just as CSS was a blessing to us as we started to shift to the mindset of separating presentation from content (not so hard for us Notes folks really!), so is unobtrusive javascript the next stage of evolution. It's about separating behavior from content. If we can take out all the formatting junk f [read] Keywords: domino
javascript
notes
notes client
css
3
The Phantom Agony
Mon, Apr 28th 2008 6:24p Chris Blatnick Ah...cool orchestration, keyboards, a little Cookie Monster, soaring choir vocals, a beautiful mezzo-soprano, metal guitars. Life is good. :-) [read] Keywords: application
3
Spreading A Little Lotus Notes Love
Fri, Apr 25th 2008 12:07a Chris Blatnick Besides Lotus Notes, the other software product I'm most passionate about is MindManager from Mindjet. I've talked about it a little in the past on this blog, but for those unfamiliar with this product, it is an tool for creating mind maps on your computer rather than with paper, pens, crayons, etc. It has a UI that is as simple to use as paper, but with very powerful features that provide results you couldn't expect to achieve in the analog realm. I just upgraded to the new version the other da [read] Keywords: ibm
lotus
notes
notes client
php
wiki
5
Simulating Fieldset and Legend In The Notes Client
Sun, Apr 20th 2008 9:58a Chris Blatnick You may have noticed that the signal-to-noise ratio of UI posts on this blog has been rather low the last few months. This is, unfortunately, a bi-product of my current job at IBM. While I'm cranking away on a development project, the ideas are coming fast and furious. When I'm not, it's much harder to come up with ideas. It's really the fact that solving a business problem spurs creativity, while actively trying to come up with new ideas as you stare at a blank page doesn't result in much usefu [read] Keywords: designer
domino
ibm
notes
notes client
applications
css
database
development
interface
properties
2
Let's Help Kick Cancer To The Curve
Mon, Apr 14th 2008 10:44p Chris Blatnick A few months back, a little site called Planet Lotus appeared and took us all by storm. If you follow Lotus blogs at all, you know about it already, and if you're like many of us, you probably visit it first thing in the morning or several times throughout the day to see what the Lotus Community is up to. Well the incredibly cool guy behind Planet Lotus is also one hell of a dad and is doing something to help his son and indeed society in general. So, please, if you are a fan of Planet Lotus, he [read] Keywords: lotus
community
planet lotus
planetlotus
planetlotus.org
4
Free Meeting And Web Conferencing Service
Mon, Apr 14th 2008 10:10p Chris Blatnick Hi, everybody...Hi, Doctor Nick! (Whoops...another out of place Simpsons reference there) Bruce was looking for a web conferencing service today and although I got to him too late, I wanted to share a cool alternative for those of you looking for a "personal" web meeting space. The service is called Dimdim and it's billed as "the world's free web meeting where you can share your desktop, show slides, collaborate, chat, talk and broadcast via webcam with absolutely no download required for att [read] Keywords: ibm
lotus
sametime
desktop
unified communications
Easily Lookup Books From Amazon At Your Local Library
Thu, Apr 3rd 2008 12:39p Chris Blatnick I occasionally like to share some of the productivity hacks I use. This is one of them. If you're a book lover, it's likely that you have overflowing shelves of books at home (yes, Tom...this means you! ;-). I decided a few years ago to pare down on my actual book buying and try to utilize the local library more often. Even so, I find myself on Amazon quite a bit (either via a blog link, a suggestion from a friend or just to see what's new). If I find something of interest but I'm not sure I wa [read] Keywords: bookmarklet
2
Movie Quotes...I Have A Theory
Wed, Apr 2nd 2008 8:57p Chris Blatnick Sometimes, when my mind is on overload, I really enjoy the fact that driving lets me pause and get some good thinking done. Often, I come up with my best ideas in this way (and huzzah to Jott for allowing me to capture these so easily). Today, however, my mind was so blotto (translate: fried, frazzled, ready to blow), that I was just daydreaming. And on the way home from taking my son to drum practice, I hit upon this amazing, and most likely completely correct (;-) theory. The question at hand [read] Keywords:
3
Collaboration: And Knowing Is Half The Battle
Tue, Mar 25th 2008 3:58p Chris Blatnick Yes...I blatantly used a G.I. Joe-ism in the title. Why? Perhaps just to reel you in from Planet Lotus ;-) In my recent work with customers and all the hubbub around social networking and collaboration, it's quite evident that collaboration is cool again. I'd like to think that Lotus is playing no small part in this, as our offerings in this space are truly exciting. I'm more enthusiastic about Lotus than I have been in years and that's saying something since you know I'm a fanboy! :-) But one [read] Keywords: collaboration
, lotus
, notes
, consulting
, enterprise
, network
, networking
, planet lotus
Lotusphere Comes To You - Columbus Edition
Fri, Mar 14th 2008 12:01p Chris Blatnick Hi Folks...Just a quick note to let you know that I'll be coordinating the Open Labs at the Lotusphere Comes To You event in Columbus, OH, next Thursday the 20th. If you have a chance to come by, please do and don't hesitate to introduce yourself! The Open Labs give you a great opportunity to sit down and play with our new products, from Notes to Sametime, Quickr to Connections. Hope to see you there! [read] Keywords: connections
, lotusphere
, notes
, quickr
, sametime
2
Direct Note Access...This is Revolutionary!
Wed, Mar 12th 2008 4:50a Chris Blatnick (Disclaimer...this is not Notes related) If you are a musician or music geek (or if you want to be fascinated by the things you can do with music on a computer), you have to check this out: Wow! [read] Keywords: notes
2
ILUG...The Question of the Day
Thu, Mar 6th 2008 10:02a Chris Blatnick So...the question of the day is: How do I convince my boss to let me go to ILUG? In my current role at IBM, I'm in technical sales for the Cleveland and Pittsburgh areas. Thus, it seems a little hard to justify that heading over to Dublin in June will help me sell Lotus software here at home. Then again, I would be "expanding my thought leadership". :-) Hmmm...what do you guys think? Perhaps I could give out his address and we could all spam him! ;-D (Just kidding...I know he's started readi [read] Keywords: ibm
, ilug
, lotus
RIP - Gary Gygax
Tue, Mar 4th 2008 6:41p Chris Blatnick It's a sad day for gamers around the world, as Gary Gygax, the creator of Dungeons and Dragons and the man considered the father of the role-playing game, passed away today. He was 69. When I heard the news, I was surprised by how sad I felt. Although I haven't played the game in many years, it was a big part of my life when I was younger. I still remember the excitement when I saw that red box on the shelf at the toy store in the Foothills Mall. It had an epic picture of a fighter about to eng [read] Keywords:
Book Review: "Web Usability For Dummies"
Sun, Mar 2nd 2008 10:55p Chris Blatnick I've not read a lot of the "Dummies" series, but whenever I've picked one up, I've been impressed by the quality of the product. "Web Usability For Dummies" is no exception. In about 300 pages, the authors do a good job of laying the foundation for a solid understanding of the important aspects of usability. It looks like this book might be out of print now, but you can probably find a copy at your local library or via Amazon.com. What I particularly liked about this book was the focus the auth [read] Keywords: lotus
, notes
, application
2
I Killed My TV!
Sun, Mar 2nd 2008 11:46a Chris Blatnick OK...well, I didn't really kill it, but I did do something I've been threatening to do for a couple of years. I cut the hardline. Yep, no more signal getting to any of the TVs in my house unless they are coming via DVD or a related component (I still have my LaserDisc player! :-) We're free of so much of the complete and utter crap being beamed into our house and I have to say it is one of the best things I've ever done. Let me explain. I've never been a huge TV fan myself. There are certain sh [read] Keywords: forms
, lotusphere
, network
8
Building A Widget Dashboard
Thu, Feb 28th 2008 10:07a Chris Blatnick For me (and obviously a lot of other people based on the number of searches on Planet Lotus), widgets are one of the most compelling new features of 8.0.1. Version 8 is all about embracing the idea of performing tasks within the context of your work and the concept of widgets and Live Text is going to allow us to take this idea to a whole new level. I've seen some good initial references on creating widgets and actually created a quick primer myself for one of my customers. What I haven't seen [read] Keywords: ibm
, lotus
, notes
, google
, planet lotus
, widget
, widgets
2
Simplicity Sells
Mon, Feb 25th 2008 9:08p Chris Blatnick You've heard me talk about simplicity quite a bit on this blog and in my presentations. It's really one of the most important things I stress to designers. The easier you can make your software to use, the happier your users will be. For a bit of fun and some insight into the art of simplicity (and some enjoyable Microsoft bashing as well ;-), check out this great TED Talk featuring David Pogue, tech writer for the New York Times. David Pogue: When it comes to tech, simplicity sells (Thanks [read] Keywords: microsoft
3
Sample Database From Lotusphere 2008
Sat, Feb 23rd 2008 10:22a Chris Blatnick I've been remiss in posting here lately since I'm still working on getting up to speed in my new job. Next week, I'll be in Chicago for a few days working on a Dashboard Frameworks project. This is a really cool tool and I hope I get to both use some Domino data in building the dashboard as well as expose it for consumption in Notes 8. We'll see how that goes. Since I've been absent, I forgot to point you to the sample database from the Interface Matters Advanced session at Lotusphere. Hopefull [read] Keywords: domino
, lotusphere
, notes
, database
, interface
Book Review: "Don't Make Me Think"
Sat, Feb 2nd 2008 3:42p Chris Blatnick One of the must have books on my reference shelf is "Don't Make Me Think, A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability" by Steve Krug. I've recommended this book to many people, so I thought it was about time to give it a proper review. One of the things that first drew me to this book when it first appeared was the subtitle. I've said it again and again, but it bears repeating...much of the "science" of good UI design is just common sense. This begs the question as to why some people find it so h [read] Keywords: lotus
, notes
, notes client
, interface
3
Getting Things Done: The Cognative Science Perspective
Fri, Feb 1st 2008 8:33a Chris Blatnick I'm a big fan of the Getting Things Done (GTD) methodology, even if I occasionally fall off the wagon. The concepts of GTD helped me become much more productive than I ever was, which is vital for me as I struggle to accomplish a lot from a work perspective and still have quality time to devote to my family. This is especially true as Haleigh gets older, because being Autistic means many additional challenges on top of the normal things you deal with as a kid (i.e. she takes a lot of my time! :- [read] Keywords:
Interface Sessions @ Lotusphere - What Would YOU Like To See?
Mon, Jan 14th 2008 10:28p Chris Blatnick Hi Folks... If you are attending Lotusphere and don't already know about the incredible Lotusphere Sessions database that Ben Langhinrichs makes available every year, then you owe it to yourself to get over there and download it. It will make your Lotusphere experience immensely more productive and enjoyable. Thanks to Ben for making this available to the community! :-) Recently, he added a really cool feature allowing attendees to ask questions or tell us what you would like to see before the [read] Keywords: collaboration
, lotusphere
, community
, database
, interface
2
Bleeding Yellow...The Return
Mon, Jan 14th 2008 5:07p Chris Blatnick Alan seems to enjoy teasing us about Lotusphere as we get closer and closer. His latest post should definitely get people wondering. Head on over and check it out and don't be afraid to comment in an attempt to guess what is going on. I wrote a post last year entitled "Do You Bleed Yellow", but it's not my site...hmmm... [read] Keywords: lotusphere
2
Designing For Flow
Fri, Jan 11th 2008 3:43p Chris Blatnick If you've been around here for awhile or seen any of my presentations, you've heard me speak a little on the concept know as flow. When building your interface, the absolute ideal that you should be striving for is helping your users achieve a flow state, that frame of mind in which everything else seems to fall away and you become completely immersed in your task, distractions are eliminated and time flys ("I've been doing this for 5 hours??? It seems like 5 minutes!"). There's a new article on [read] Keywords: lotusphere
, interface
General Geekery
Fri, Jan 11th 2008 9:03a Chris Blatnick *Warning...this Friday post isn't about user interface design, Lotus Notes, Lotusphere or any of that stuff. Nope. There's more of that to come, but for now this post is just about being a geek. If you don't care or don't want to know more, stop reading now. You've been warned! :-) It seems to me that now more than ever it is the golden age of geeks. Everywhere you look, so called "normals" are getting into technology, especially the latest gadgets and gizmos, home theater gear and video games. [read] Keywords: lotus
, lotusphere
, notes
, quickr
, interface
8
SnTT: Canceling an Embedded Editor Transaction
Thu, Jan 10th 2008 9:55p Chris Blatnick If you use embedded editors in your design, you may have run across this issue. The user starts to edit a document, only to decide that they want to select another one from the view or cancel edit mode. Unfortunately, this isn't handled very elegantly by Notes. What you get is the error message shown below. Basically, once you start editing a document in an embedded editor control, Notes expects you to save the document. Since this is the case, we can use this fact to make a simple addition to [read] Keywords: document
, notes
, sntt
2
Happy Birthday, Haleigh!
Thu, Jan 10th 2008 5:33a Chris Blatnick Happy Birthday to my little girl! I hope your birthday is awesome and that you have a lot of fun eating those cool Hanna Montana cupcakes I got for your class! :-) Hey Friends...It's my daughter Haleigh's birthday today. She's autistic but is a big computer whiz and often loves to look over my shoulder as I write my blog. I know she'd get a kick out of seeing some birthday wishes from all over the place, so if you have a minute to leave a birthday comment and say where you are from, that would [read] Keywords:
2
Hey...Get Some Free (inter)Face Time
Wed, Jan 9th 2008 9:35p Chris Blatnick As mentioned by Chris and Mary Beth today, the UX lab is doing something very cool and very unique at Lotusphere this year. Read on for details... The Lotus UX Lab is going to offer a one-time opportunity for our customers at Lotusphere 2008 - "The 15-minute Usability and Design Evaluation" - in the User Experience Lab, Rm. Asia 4. We'll only be doing this from 1-5 pm on Monday afternoon. Here's the deal: you can bring in one application, working, and with data ideally, (Notes, Web, Sametime, [read] Keywords: connections
, designer
, expeditor
, lotus
, lotusphere
, notes
, quickr
, sametime
, application
, applications
4
Our Hairy Friend and Inattentional Blindness
Wed, Jan 9th 2008 9:19p Chris Blatnick So...some interesting results from the last post. I think that more people counted 14 passes than anything, although I think it is really 15. There's one hand off that's a bit hard to see. In any case, the number of passes really doesn't matter. What does matter is the fact that a lot of you didn't even see the gorilla walk through the video while you were intent on your task of counting passes of the basketball. (If at this point you are saying, "What Gorilla???!!!", go ahead and watch the vi [read] Keywords: lotusphere
, notes
, applications
, interface
3
A Cool Experiment
Mon, Jan 7th 2008 3:07p Chris Blatnick Hi Folks...this is related to the user experience, so bear with me. Check out the following video and while watching make sure you count the number of times that the white team (wearing the white shirts) passes the basketball. This is important, so make sure you count every change of hands. When finished, come back here and record your answer in the comments. View the video here...Remember: Count the number of times the white team passes the ball Don't look at the comments until you've watche [read] Keywords:
