Tag: canux

CanUX 2008 Attendees on Twitter

canux Even though we spent more time doing than tweeting at CanUX, Twitter was still there in the background. Those of you who couldn’t make it to the event could at least follow along remotely, and some of us at the event used it for informal discussions. You can find nearly all the related tweets at Twitter Search. There’s some value there, but I think following the people who attended is even more valuable, because you can learn from them over time. With that in mind, here’s a partial list of CanUX 2008 attendees on Twitter.

nForm

Presenters

Attendees (in no particular order)

If I’ve missed you, let me know and I’ll update the post!

UPDATE: Here’s my list of links and resources for CanUX 2008.

Sketches from CanUX 2008

I had a blast at CanUX 2008 this week! It was my first real introduction to Canada’s User Experience community, and a great opportunity to meet some interesting people. I learned a lot, and have tons to read and think about! You can read about the sessions at Techvibes: Day 1, Day 2, Day 3. You can find all of my photos here.

We ended up doing quite a bit of sketching and drawing at the conference, which was something I didn’t expect. It was fun though, and something I think I will practice. Here are a few sketches from the sessions (I originally wrote these in my Moleskine and re-did them using my tablet):

This one comes from the creativity session on day 2, led by The Banff Centre. It’s a representation of David Snowden’s Domains of Knowing.

This one comes from Jerome Ryckborst’s session on Designing with Developers. It illustrates the different types of people that your team likely has. Ideas are created on the left, and refined or implemented on the right.

This one was shown in Brandon Schauer’s session on Sketchboards. It shows the two basic types of sketching. Exploratory sketching results in lots of rough and varied ideas. Refinement sketching results in fewer, better ideas.

The visual alphabet was something Dave Gray shared with us. Early on in his career, he started searching for the ABC’s or 123’s of drawing, and this is what he found. Can any drawing be made just from these simple characters? Probably!

Thanks to Gene, Yvonne, Jess, and the rest of the nForm team for putting on a fantastic event!

Thoughts from CanUX 2008 Day 2 in Banff

I skipped breakfast this morning but still found the day extremely packed! Fortunately it seemed to go by quickly, which means I wasn’t bored or overwhelmed. You can read more about today’s sessions in my post at Techvibes. Once again I am enjoying the size of CanUX 2008, as I’ve had a chance to chat with many of the people in attendance.

CanUX 2008Sally Borden Building

In the first session today, Luke Wroblewski used a metaphor I really like:

“No one raindrop believes they are to blame for the flood.”

It’s simple, effective, and applies to so many things! In terms of software development, I immediately thought about requirements. It might seem like asking for a feature enhancement is just a raindrop, but eventually you’re going to have a flood.

Another concept that stuck out for me came during the creativity session. We broke into three groups, and mine focused on improv. Our first activity was called the sun and the moon. We started as a big group in a giant circle. Everyone then had to pick out two people from the circle and keep their choices to themselves; the moon would be your protector, and the sun would be “too hot to handle”. Then we were to pretend we were at a party, walking around meeting people, but always keeping your moon in between you and your sun. What we found was that being so focused on moving around and staying away from your sun meant that you couldn’t actually get beyond a simple hello with anyone.

You have to decide whether or not it’s worth getting a little burned if it means you can have that meaningful conversation.

The entire session was full of activities that generated similar thoughts.

Tomorrow is the last day of the conference, and I’m looking forward to it. The last session is on Microsoft Surface, so that should be interesting. As is often the case, I’m both enjoying my break from a regular schedule and feeling a little behind on my normal day-to-day tasks. I’m glad to be learning some new things though, and I definitely have a lot to think about when I get back. You can see my photos here.

Notes for 11/16/2008

canux Arrived safe and sound today in Banff for CanUX 2008 (you can read more about the first day at Techvibes). The highway was perfect until Red Deer, and was covered in snow and windy the rest of the way to Banff. The roads inside Banff itself are quite icy, so I’m glad the main townsite is only a 15 minute walk from The Banff Centre where the conference is taking place. Hopefully I’ll get some time to head down there.

I’m having a great time so far! Two of the best things have been the food and the wireless. I wasn’t sure what to expect from hotel-provided food, but it is actually very good. I can definitely handle another two days of this. The other positive is the wireless – the entire grounds are covered in wireless Internet, and it seems pretty fast. Upload isn’t terribly quick, but that’s okay.

Another plus was getting to meet some more Edmonton Twitterers in person: @designcookhouse, @trevvg, @jessmcmullin, and a few others. Oh and @mwarf from Lethbridge too!

Here are my weekly notes:

You can find my photos from CanUX here (I’ll keep adding to it). Also – follow along on Twitter!