This past weekend, a community of passionate WordPressers came together in the sunny, beautiful city of Los Angeles. We couldn’t have asked for better weather, vibes, and people in The City of Angels. Over 400 visitors from surrounding areas of LA came ready to absorb the rich knowledge of all things WordPress.
Photo Credit – Peter Minges
There are so many things to love about WordCamp. The one thing that makes these events uniquely awesome is it’s inclusion of different people of all backgrounds, skills, and interests. This made for a comfortable, safe environment to truly learn and explore the open-source world of WP. Huge shoutout to the speech-to-text reporters...
Your website needs to load fast, everyone knows that. However, no longer is this advice just for user experience. Page load speed now factors heavily into your search engine ranking. There are a number of cache plugins out there and tools to improve performance, but above all, I’ve found that
When it comes to facilitating a truly enjoyable and productive workplace, it takes more than just the promise of perks and ping pong. Employees want their workplaces to reflect what they value and expect out of the company they work for: trustworthiness, morality, and the opportunity to grow both in
Last week, our first hackathon of the year kicked off with more than a dozen teams and respective projects. After the 48-hour build period was up, those groups presented their cutting edge ideas to a packed audience of WP Engine employees. The presentations lasted an entire day, and only after all
What B2B Companies Need to Implement Blockchain Solutions
Blockchain can also improve user experiences, particularly in the retail space. Establishing trusted relationships on a blockchain enables frictionless peer-to-peer and peer-to-merchant transactions and data-driven customer loyalty programs, and it can help to ensure supply chain integrity. At a
A 60-Second Trailer of the 60-Day Report on Cybersecurity
Finally, Hathaway sees this as a unique opportunity for the United States to work with countries around the world, and with organizations on an extremely local level. “We cannot succeed if our government works in isolation,” she added. It requires “leading from the top” from
Blockchain Scalability: Even If Most Transactions Are in Layer II We Still Need a Layer I
There are clear and important advantages to keeping transactions on-chain. What layer I generally means is that the entire blockchain is modified periodically to reflect all transactions, with each one logged in finite blocks across every node in the network. Each transaction is ratified by a set
UX Research Cheat Sheet
The diagram lists potential UX research methods and activities that can be done as projects move through stages of design. Think of this as a menu of recommended options. Your process will vary and may include only a few things on this list during each cycle. The most-frequently used methods are
a look at wordcamp los angeles 2018 .
Creepiness–Convenience Tradeoff
When Facebook first introduced the ability to upload photos and create albums, we both remember friends who had mixed reactions. Some thought it was a great way to share their life and keep all of their friends and family up-to-date automatically without the need to explicitly email photos. Others
Split Buttons: Definition
Photoshop uses split buttons for the main toolbar, but does not clearly signify that the menu should be opened by clicking and holding anywhere on the visible target area. This design causes learnability problems for new Photoshop users, who often attempt to hone their mouse cursor over the tiny
OK-Cancel or Cancel-OK? The Trouble With Buttons
We get countless questions about small details in UI design that don't matter much to the overall user experience. One classic is the order of buttons in dialog boxes: OK / Cancel Cancel / OK Both are reasonable choices, and people can argue for hours about their preferences: Listing OK
A Checklist for Designing Mobile Input Fields
Whether you're designing web pages, web-based applications (e.g., SaaS), or native mobile apps, one of the basic building blocks is the humble text-input field: a box where the user can enter some text. Uses of this widget are plenty and not the topic of this article. We should point out that there
Top 10 Application-Design Mistakes of 2008
For mission-critical applications, you can often assume that most users have tried the app many times before. You can also often assume that new users will get some training before seeing the UI on their own. At the minimum, they'll usually have nearby colleagues who can give them a few pointers on
Helping Users Find Physical Locations
To assess the usability of location finders on the Web, we conducted usability studies of website locators for 10 major companies: Andersen, the American Automobile Association (AAA), Bank of America, BMW, Caterpillar, Charles Schwab & Co., The Dow Chemical Company, Toys R Us, Verizon, and
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Optimizing for Context in the Omnichannel User Experience
Users interact with organizations through many channels, including the web, email, mobile and tablet applications, kiosks, online chat, telephone, and by visiting physical locations. Regardless of the channel, people expect companies to provide a usable experience. For this reason, it's important
Touch Targets on Touchscreens
For instance, the Target app prioritized two main features for users who are in a physical store: searching for a product and scanning a product’s barcode to look for a coupon or other product details. These buttons are visibly placed at the top of the page and occupy an area of approximately 2cm
UX Mapping Methods Compared: A Cheat Sheet
Designing and developing a product often involves a large team of people with different backgrounds and experiences who must be on the same page about the project goals, the user needs and behaviors, and even the component processes involved. This common understanding is often built with
Parallel & Iterative Design + Competitive Testing = High Usability
Competitive testing is particularly important if you're using an Agile development methodology because you often won't have time for deeper explorations during individual sprints. You can do the competitive study before starting your development project because you're testing existing sites
The Magnifying-Glass Icon in Search Design: Pros and Cons
If your website uses a magnifying-glass icon instead of a search button on desktop, the recommendations here should help. At NN/g, we’re still using the search button on our website. We have the space, and we have no doubt that people can spot search on our site. We’ll also keep an eye on other
Hackers are Ready to Exploit Zero-Day Flaws; Companies are Slow to Act
Developers and vendors of vulnerable systems often try to take prompt action but fixes often don’t come out overnight. For example, a zero-day flaw that affected various Windows operating system versions was revealed last August, but it took Microsoft two weeks to release the official fix. The
How tweaks to IoT’s supply chain can close security gaps
When it comes to the Internet of Things, traditional cybersecurity approaches are difficult to integrate and can’t keep operational devices secure. Many embedded device approaches isolate systems, offering only partial protection, and only against known attack vectors. Could all of our IoT
Alexa, Where’s My Data?
An employee working from home in the proximity of a smart device may unknowingly record sensitive conversations. That data is then sitting on a server somewhere indefinitely. With more and more people working remotely and using these devices in their home offices, corporations must be aware of the
Start-ups and International Talent
Dan also said that “we’ll see an increasing number of important startups based outside of the Valley over the coming few years.” Again, I think this is a trend to watch out for. Not only in big countries like China, but in very small countries like my own. I’m certainly keen
a look at wordcamp los angeles 2018 .
4 High-Potential Sectors for AI and ML Startup Success
As the world edges closer and closer to an always-on internet-connected reality with the emergence of IoT technology, businesses everywhere are coming to grips with the fact that there are more marketing channels to manage than ever before. The only feasible solution is to turn the bulk of the work
Dancing in the Co-Economy: Are you Square Dancing or Foxtrotting?
Think of the co-economy as a new approach to business partnerships. Focus on more than the on one-off or occasional engagements, or even long-standing, fixed relationships with value-added resellers (VARs) or systems integrators. The co-economy involves working closely with a vast range of third
A Look at WordCamp Los Angeles 2018 . | Ensure High Contrast for Text Over Images
Ensure High Contrast for Text Over Images
Because images play such an important role, often designers end up placing text over an image to leverage the attention-grabbing aspect of the photo while providing text-based content to communicate actual information. However, these endeavors commonly backfire, usually when the contrast between
Usability Insights From Sun Microsystem's 1997 Web Design
The balance between looks and speed was resolved by a design that utilizes plain-and-fast HTML (prettied up with style sheets) to define the basic features of the page. Visual enhancements like the Sun logo and other graphic elements will fill in more slowly the first time a user visits but will
Best Practices for Homepage Links on websites
Our research indicates logos positioned in nonstandard locations damage usability. Users are 6 times more likely to successfully navigate to the homepage in one click when the logo is left-aligned than when it is centered. Simply moving the logo towards the right side of the page caused people to
