LarryRoth.net

Space.com has a good article on catching Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn in the evening sky. You don’t need a telescope, they are all quite visible with the naked eye and you can even see a little detail with binoculars.

However, I think checking out a plant through a telescope—even an inexpensive one—is quite an experienence. I remember the first time I saw Jupiter with two moons lined up on each side. The minute I could recognize the banding, it all sank in. I am looking at another world! It was enough to keep me outside in 5 degree weather for several hours.

If you are thinking astronomy as a hobby, this is a great time to start, and planets are great objects to start with.

The folks at WEBLOG IT-eye have created an interesting screencast to demonstrate what it’s like to create a Web service and use JSF in Oracle’s IDE JDeveloper. If you are interested in how different IDEs work, or if you want to know what the draw is to Oracle, you will enjoy this screencast.

Here it is.

Henning von Vogelsang has written what I felt is a great article about The difference between categories and tags. Besides being a very concise comparison of tags and categories and when to use each, he has a fantastic real world example.

From the article:

Take a simple walk to a clothing store. Maybe you are entering the store with the idea to buy a pair of jeans. Chances are, you will leave the store with a pair of jeans, and a jacket, some socks, briefs, or two plain t-shirts. Why? Because you were surrounded with offerings that were not sorted by category but by association. You were allured by visual suggestions. That is the same like tags can work on a web site. They can draw you into something. Not because you were looking for it, but maybe out of curiosity.

What I like about this section of the article is that it helps me to overcome the idea that tags are simply a flat organizational structure for classifying information. They are indeed that, but when used appropriately can be much more. I must admit, I am often hung up on the fact that tagging can only be as good as the tagger, but isn’t the same true about an information architecture? I really like the notion of being inspired by a tag. Can you say the same thing about a categorized list? I can see a lot of situations where tags can not only help to create new information relationships, but also tie in an emotional attraction that quite frankly would be hard to create with an organized, categorized list.

The trick is to find the right tags, which are most universally understood and evoke the correct emotional response. This really makes me wonder where they can fit in the corporate world. For instance, should IBM tag their product page for Websphere application server community edition? Maybe so. It could be a great way to expose people to a lot more of what they have to offer. Having the tag community edition would be one-click to all of their free product offerings. Or java, leading to their expansive knowledge and offerings in that arena. What a great way to make a sticky site!

When planning out a project schedule for a new or redesigned Web site, one common question is when do we run usability tests? I don’t believe there is an one easy answer to that question.

My preferred answer is: If there is budget for it, test early and often! Setting up a test plan early on will allow you to not only incrementally test and tweak your designs, but if you are engaged in a site redesign you can also use the same repeatable testing procedures to get a baseline from the existing site. Not only will you be able to the new design is solid, but also you can show improvement over the existing site.

Testing could occur as follows:

• Baseline test of the existing site
• Low fidelity test of approved wireframes
• Test of graphic comps
• Test of completed site on staging server

In addition, the same test plan should be used after the site is live, to keep an eye on the site as it progresses.

Of course, the biggest concern is the cost—in time and money—of running so many test. Rather than give the overused response of how testing up front saves more money down the road, I prefer to point out that setting up the test and creating the report is the lion’s share of the time required, not recruitment and subsequent execution. It’s amazing how efficiently you can write up a report for an existing test the second time around.

Another issue is that clients will often be concerned that poor test results will affect the project schedule. Instead of jumping into a discussion about what is most important, I have found it helpful to let them know that the results of testing are usually minor tweaks that can have major impacts. It is usually the case that they feel poor results mean we will mean starting all over.

Despite the fact that I believe in testing early and often, at BrandLogic we have only every had one client that would allow us to engage in this level of testing. And it’s interesting, they were ranked by an independent third party to be number 1 in their vertical market with regards to usability. hmmm…..