Useit.Com: Usability 101. Usability is a quality attribute that assesses how easy user interfaces are to use. The word “usability” also refers to methods for improving ease-of-use during the design process. [Tomalak's Realm]

Cooper Interaction Design: The Origin of Personas. Alan Cooper. The Inmates Are Running the Asylum, published in 1998, introduced the use of personas as a practical interaction design tool. Based on the single-chapter discussion in that book, personas rapidly gained popularity in the software industry due to their unusual power and effectiveness. [Tomalak's Realm]

MX 2004: New Versions of Dreamweaver, Flash, and Fireworks. Macromedia announced MX 2004 today, new versions of Dreamweaver, Flash, and Fireworks. Flash now comes in two editions, Flash MX (the update to Flash MX) and Flash MX Professional (a brand new Flash with a development model that will appeal to us application coders). I am… Continue reading MX 2004: New Versions of Dreamweaver, Flash, and Fireworks

Notorious applications for PHP. PHPQuébec is about to publish the first PHP DVD ever. The PHP Québec Conference, in Montreal, is leading this project. It will gather 7 hours of high level PHP sessions. Coming with the two DVD case, a CDrom will be included, with the most notorious PHP application, made for or with… Continue reading Notorious applications for PHP

Flash now works just like VB. In the past few years I have made a few attempts to learn Flash, but the timeline-focused authoring interface always felt akward to me. In an effort to reach out to developers, Macromedia is releasing a brand new version of the Flash MX authoring environment for developers. Flash now works just… Continue reading Flash now works just like VB

Making TiVo wireless isn't so easy. Illuminating write-up of the trials and tribulations one TiVo owner experienced when trying to add WiFi to his Series 2 TiVo so that it could update itself over the Internet without having to run an Ethernet cable from the box to the router. It took several different USB WiFi… Continue reading Making TiVo wireless isn't so easy

TechNews.com part of the Washington Post – Microsoft Windows: Insecure by Design . Between the Blaster worm and the Sobig virus, it's been a long two weeks for Windows users. But nobody with a Mac or a Linux PC has had to lose a moment of sleep over these outbreaks — just like in earlier… Continue reading TechNews.com

Business News from Wired News – BlackBerry Reveals Bank's Secrets. When a computer consultant buys a used wireless pager — once the property of a former Morgan Stanley executive — on eBay, he ends up with an unexpected bonus: a trove of sensitive corporate data. [ … ] After popping a battery into the BlackBerry's… Continue reading Wired News

Always On – Free Certificates! Doesn't everyone have a right to privacy? If you've ever built a Website that collects credit card or personal information, then you understand the importance of securing that communication with a digital certificate. If you work for a large corporation that is selling their catalog items online, no problem. Just fork over… Continue reading Free Certificates! Doesn't everyone have a right to privacy?

Working Knowledge, MA –HBS Working Knowledge: Marketing: Should You Sell Your Privacy? Regulation won't stop privacy invasion, says HBS professor John Deighton. What will? What if companies paid us to use our identity? A market approach to privacy problems. It's a startling idea: Instead of relying on regulators to protect our privacy against telemarketers, data miners, and… Continue reading HBS Working Knowledge: Marketing: Should You Sell Your Privacy?