The Artistic Outlaw

November 27th 2008 / learned, shared

We’re building web-sites wrong

I view a lot of web-sites everyday. I build a lot of web-sites every year and I can safely say we’re all doing it wrong, including me.

We are building web-sites with too much emphasis on visually pleasing ourselves, our clients and the potential surfer/user(s). We are ignoring content almost entirely.

There are an enormous pile of reasons (read: excuses) for this crazy workflow. We are all guilty of at least one or more at any given time. The copy/content is not available at the time of the design phase, no one knows what the content will be, you started strong got bored and just towed the line to get it off your calendar resulting in boring content placement and design, etc… and so on.

We should be solving the problem that is the presentation of content, not the placement of content within the presentation.

Wireframes, let alone design comprehensive dummies should not begin without a full content document. And I’m not talking about a vague notion of content and where it might go. I’m talking about a document that outlines final copy and contextual images and their importance.

I’m talking about examples of typical blog/news posts. I’m talking about a document that says we want this form, with this functionality, and this is what will happen if the form is filled in wrong, and here’s what happens when it is good to go, and here’s what happens after the submission, etc… and so on.

We need to see the problem in it’s entirety prior to trying to solve it. We cannot do our jobs to the best of our ability when we don’t know the problem we are solving.

Let’s stop spending so much time trying to please clients & users visually in the beginning and start figuring out how to please clients & users long term and with lasting solutions that are at once visually stunning and attentive to the needs and flow of the content.

Web-sites are content.

November 16th 2008 / learned, shared

the e-commerce situation

I’m fed up.

I’m tired of wanting or more often needing to buy something online and being forced to jump through a series of tiny hoops of the “on-fire” variety only to be told that I made a mistake somewhere along the way, yet said mistake is a guarded secret and up to me to guess where it was made and repair it before I can move forward and finish my purchase. I’m likely already pissed off from the process and fit to leave.

Perhaps I have less patience for this ridiculous circus than your average consumer, because I’m a web developer and know it’s possible to make a form simple and easy to use. A form that can tell me, the user, exactly what I did wrong and even give advice on how to fix it. A form that looks nice and functions better.

I have yet to experience an online shopping system that made me feel good about my purchase, let alone left me smiling and wanting to buy more. Even Amazon falls short, sure they get close, but they certainly have issues and they are clearly not sharing their knowledge or experience with other online retailers.

There has got to be a better way, a better process, a better checkout experience.

I’m not going to just gripe about it. I’m going to solve this problem.

May 15th 2008 / shared, taught

Procrastination Zero

I was tele-communicating with a co-worker today, and we got on the topic of “Inbox Zero” and being on top of things, or trying to be.

I’m not a fan of “Inbox Zero” or “E-mail Bankruptcy” or “Getting Things Done“. I feel they all add an extra unnecessary step/series of steps to the end goal of accomplishing things. Maybe, I’m too old school, or too efficient at multi-tasking but the idea of writing a list of things to do before actually doing those things causes my brain to start doing increasingly dangerous stunts without a stunt coordinator.

I want to introduce you to a new name for a concept I’ve been using forever, I call it.

Procrastination Zero.

It’s the simplest plan of all time, it has a single rule and it works. I’ve been utilizing it for seven years now—albeit without a fancy name.

The Rule: When something needs to be done, do it.

“Well Jim.” You say, “That sounds too easy to be true, I can’t just do things as they come up. I’m a busy person!!”

I know. Me too. Always. Yet, for some inexplicable reason doing things when they come up always keeps me ahead of the curve. Crazy-talk I know!

How does this work?

As I said earlier. You just do things as they come up. Simple. You don’t write things down, you don’t put things off until tomorrow. You just do them. Right away.

But I don’t have all the info/stuff I need to finish the task!

Which means you don’t have a task then. Isn’t that odd? Basically if someone tells you about something they need done, but they can’t get you all the info/stuff to do it until Wednesday, then you have not been assigned/given a task at all. And it can wait until Wednesday when the task is actually available to do, but do it as soon as it’s ready to go.

Wait! I don’t have time to do things as they come up, I’m swamped.

Right… Two things are happening here. One; You’re a liar and probably a dirty procrastinator as well (only slightly kidding). Two; You’re honest, but also have a problem saying no. Which is why you’ve accepted more tasks than you can actually accomplish (I still do this with personal projects, sorry Brad and Greg).

To solve this problem, simply stop lying and procrastinating. Or in the second more probable use case, start saying no. Firmly but, politely. It’s real easy, the work still needs to get done, it’ll just be more graciously distributed, easing your mind and work load quite a lot.

But I have 1000 e-mails from the last month in my Inbox.

Really? You sure? Try using a junk filter. If in the very uncommon case that you are buried in legitimate e-mails, try answering them as they come in. You’re not required to write a novel or even a novella for e-mail communications. The point is to be fast, if your correspondents need to wait a week or longer to hear back from you they’d have been better off using traditional mail.

The average e-mail can be answered in less than 30 seconds, and 3 sentences. Anything that takes more thought or a longer response should have the following reply sent; “Hi Name, Let’s schedule a phone call to discuss this. When is good for you?”

Phone calls can cover a lot of info in a short period, plus a real voice and tone go a long way to squashing time-wasting miscommunications. Is the other party too busy for a phone call? Link them to this article, they need it.

So that’s it. Start today!

Procrastination Zero! Guess what you’re done!

May 13th 2008 / shared, taught

5 ways to be a better client

Everybody writes about how to be better at their job, how to make more money and be more productive. Nobody ever writes about client responsibilities and how to be a better client.

1.) Pay on time. Always.

This is not optional. If you don’t have enough money to cover the full budget of the project, don’t get me started on the project. I’m a freelancer, which means I live off what I make. I can’t wait 30 days to get paid for work completed and there is no reason I should have to. Paying on time is respectful and should be a top priority.

2.) Make my requests as important as your own.

If you ask me to complete something by a certain date, you need to cooperate to help me make that happen. If I ask for a specific asset, get it to me yesterday.

I know you’re busy, so am I. Busy working on your request and about a million others. If you can’t fulfill my request today, then let me know. A one-line email is enough. And always be understanding of my new found inability to fill your original request.

Additionally, don’t disappear for six months, then show up one day and ask me why development has stopped and the project isn’t completed. This actually happened once.

3.) Know what you want, before you ask for it.

Seriously, don’t hire me to make something that’s description is “I’ll know when I see it”. I don’t have time for that, and neither do you. You don’t need a one-hundred page project brief, but you do need to know what styles and ideas you like/dislike and what the overall project is going to entail in general.

4.) Remember, you hired me.

I’m a professional, and I have an expertise that you sought out. Don’t try to do my job for me. It’s disrespectful and a huge time waster for both of us. This is pretty much common sense, but happens a lot.

5.) Be loyal.

If I do a good job, use me again. If I keep doing a good job, keep using me. If you feel I’m too expensive lets talk about it, don’t hire someone else then say I’m too expensive, ’cause for a loyal client I’ll always drop or discount my price, it’s a perk of being loyal. Try it out, you’ll like it.

May 13th 2008 / learned, shared

www != the wild west

Sadness prevails within me.

I’m tired of hearing: “Hey man, you should have known _blank_ would happen, it is the ‘web’ after all.”

Initially, I thought maybe this topic didn’t belong on TAO, but the more I think about it, this is exactly where it belongs. It concerns the internet and that is exactly the place our industry calls home, so ultimately it’s about our home.

When I visit a friend’s home I treat them with respect and kindness. I just do it. It’s not an option to do otherwise. It’s not my home, and therefore It’s a privilege to be there, not my right. Treating them with anything other than pure undiluted respect is blasphemy.

Likewise, when I invite someone to my home I expect the treatment returned in kind.

This idea translates directly to the web. There is no acceptable reason for pretending to be someone other than yourself in every aspect of your life. The Internet is an extension of your “real” life, not another/different life.

The Internet is not a free-for-all playground where you can assume any persona you like, saying and doing whatever you want. Yes, I know it’s possible and yes, I know people do it all the time. That, my friends is exactly why I wrote this.

As a human being it hurts to know that other human beings treat each other in such terrible ways online and off, but it happens. Constantly.

That doesn’t make it alright. Which brings us back to the web, where it is also not OK.

I believe, treating others with kindness, is a non-optional social convention and there is no acceptable excuse to do otherwise. None.

—me via twitter

So next time you log into an anonymous web account to lay down some hurt on an unsuspecting n00b, remember you’re just perpetuating the myth that anything goes online.

Which is my cue to pull on my boots and grab my shovel.

May 10th 2008 / shared

The Problem with Content Management

Content Management Systems are all the rage. They let you build a dynamic web-site with little to no web development knowledge, which is awesome! Right? Well yeah, sometimes, but I think these ease of use systems are fundamentally broken. I have an opinion on content management systems in general, that I’d like to share. I’d also like to provide an idea that might help make a content management system better.

Every CMS I’ve ever used—which is everyone of them—makes assumptions about how you will use the system. Some even go so far as to force you to use certain language, structure or presentation for building a web-site with their system. I don’t like to be told what to do, or how to do it. And that is exactly what these systems are doing.

To me, this is the major drawback to using a pre-built CMS; having to adapt to someone else’s idea of work flow or web-site construction.

How can we solve this problem?

Simple, stop making assumptions about how an end user will use the system.

For instance, just because I like to use HTML to write templates doesn’t mean another person might not prefer XSLT or some sort of PHP hybrid.

A CMS shouldn’t be trying to guess at how I want to structure content, or how I want to present that content. A CMS should just give me a place to store and manage my content with a few tools to help me build out the front end like a flexible loop and easy access to data variables for use in templates.

In a perfect CMS, we wouldn’t have anything in the database except the raw content and it’s meta data. No templates, no settings or configuration.

Templates should always be flat file based and stored on the server, never in the database.

Settings and configuration files have zero business being stored in a database, it only causes problems. They should be stored as flat files on the server, better if they are secured in some way. A MySQL query to grab configuration settings that boil down to a simple string or a yes/no scenario is unnecessary overhead.

I’m sure there is a flaw or two in my opinion, but that is the beauty of opinions, they don’t have to be right.

May 1st 2008 / shared

Consider it Broughten

May 1st, for many is a day that is synonymous with refreshing or rebooting or just scrapping and starting over with your web-site. I’ve participated several times in the past. In 2006, the now defunct CSS Reboot is what put leihu.com on the map. In other words I think it’s a good exercise, even if at the very least it pulls you out of the doldrums of a stale design or designer block.

This year, I chose to redesign The Artistic Outlaw, and it happened to correspond in a timely manner with May 1st. Thus, my participation with the Standards Reboot.

If you are reading this in your feed reader, click through and check out the new TAO.

If you are seeing this for the first time, I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

I really wanted to try and break free of my current personal trend with earth tones and muted colors. I think I burst out of that box quite flamboyantly. It feels nice to know that I can design outside my comfort zone and produce something I really, really like love to look at.

I’ve got a couple of new posts coming up, but I’m not going to promise super increased activity here. I tend to only blog when I have something real to say. And It will stay that way for now.

However, I hope when I do publish an article it’ll mean more to you, because it’s thought out and meaningful.

Thanks for visiting I really appreciate any and all patronage.

June 21st 2007 / learned, shared, taught

Respect

I’ve been working in the web development industry for five years now. For five years I’ve been able to sustain a specific lifestyle, working solo. Working in an industry I both love and admire. I’ve seen designers, programmers, ideas, businesses and so on, come and go, come again then leave once more. I’ve heard just about every conceivable pitch for projects from one page brochures to one-hundred page social networks. I’ve been offered partnerships, equity, free hosting and heard promises of more work to come. Basically I’ve heard it all.

There is one thing I do above all else that keeps my business running and my mind clear. Keeps me riding the karmic bicycle in the right direction if you will.

That thing. That one, simple thing is; Respect.

There’s more, go get it

May 11th 2007 / shared

Fonts found, for you.

Something I really dig about being a designer is fonts. I love finding cool, new, fresh and interesting fonts. Some I can use and some I’ll just stare at and horde.

Upon further introspection my uncontrolled, rabid collecting of fonts may have something to do with my inability to use more than a handful of them in a majority of my projects, but the safety of knowing I have them on hand if the world ever ends and a viable way to use specific fonts becomes readily available.

There’s more, go get it

April 19th 2007 / shared

I Answer Questions

Back in March I received an e-mail from Smashing Magazine asking for my participation in an upcoming article where they ask five questions to a whole bunch of web designers.

At first I was reluctant, thought it was maybe spam or even a mistake—I don’t consider myself an industry leading designer. After a few e-mail volleys with Smashing Magazine’s own Editor-In-Chief Vitaly Friedman, and assurance that it was not a mistake, I was willing to give it a go.

I answered the five questions and sent the e-mail and had not heard anything back.

Today, David pointed out to me, via IM, that the article was up.

So without further hyping of something that I was only a very small part of, please enjoy the article; 35 Designers x 5 Questions over at Smashing Magazine.

And my sincere thanks goes out to the team at Smashing Magazine for seeing something in my work that I myself have yet to realize, it’s appreciated.