Lots of Good Resources

Here is the much overdue update with the latest resources I found worthy of being bookmarked. Before I get to them, here is a nice proverb:

A peacock who sits on his tail is just another turkey. 

My favorite one from the bunch is The 50 Things Every Creative Should Know. Has really good points and graphics. Take away: "Success is not a finite resource".

  

The Noun Project - this makes me start drawing each of these objects, one a day...one day.

The UI Guide to Buttons has some useful Photoshop tips and the associated psd file.

Kickstarter project, lots of good ideas waiting to be funded. 

How to Teach Someone Graphic Design - title says it all. 

Premium Pixels - has free psd files and online tutorials.

Teach Yourself Graphic Design - Online courses  

Matching Requirements with User Experience

Starting June 26, 2011 I am a Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) and a member of the Scrum Alliance.

Essential and Desirable Skills for a UX Designer - excellent article from the folks at UXMatters. Have it handy whenever you update your resume or portfolio.

How to Draw Cute Kawaii - Loved this, hope you will too. I was surprised there aren't so many good resources on Kawaii on web.

Ending with another quotation

I’ve been amazed at how often those outside the discipline of design assume that what designers do is decoration. Good design is problem solving.--Jeffery Veen

Basics

Here is a great quote from Alan Cooper's About Face :

Design is  not a visual facelift to an implementation model. Design properly deployed identifies user needs and defines a detailed plan for the behavior and appearance of products. It provides a true product definition, based on user's goals, needs of business and constraints of technology.

Latest Findings

* A quotation from Jacob Nielsen: Read the whole interview with Jacob Nielsen at UTest.

*  The UI Style Guide from Microsoft.

* Why you can't do research simply by asking users what they want http://bit.ly/8HZDXo

You can’t just retrofit a strong user experience on top of a confused architecture. The peanut butter theory of design is false. (It claims that if you smear a thick enough layer on top, you can hide the taste of what’s below.)

UX into Agile Development

UX Matters article, 'Integrating UX into Agile Development" . It also has good links at the end.
http://www.uxmatters.com/mt/archives/2011/04/integrating-ux-into-agile-development.php

UX and Agile

Look for the fourth link in 'Talks and Papers'.  In "Adopting User Centered Design within An Agile Process: A Conversation' the author has a great drawing that illustrates how sometimes we forget the real user's needs and instead have this perfect user in mind.
http://www.syntagm.co.uk/design/articles.htm

UI Design and More

Control library : very good explanations and use cases:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa511482.aspx

50 free UI design wireframing kits

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/02/05/50-free-ui-and-web-design-wireframing-kits-resources-and-source-files/

I already downloaded and used the first one on the list for Photoshop. Look for the Starter kit on the lower right: http://quommunication.com/

IEC62366 at a glance

http://www.userfocus.co.uk/articles/ISO62366.html

UX Matters article by  Pabini Gabriel-Petit : Design is a process
http://www.uxmatters.com/mt/archives/2010/07/design-is-a-process-not-a-methodology.php

Visual guide to Swing components (Java look and feel)
http://download.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/ui/features/components.html

User Interface Design Pattern

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/06/15/40-helpful-resources-on-user-interface-design-patterns/

Videos for Designers
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/08/14/25-useful-videos-and-presentations-for-designers/

Tables

An excellent article on table design at jankoatwarpspeed.com.

Icons, Gestalt, UI Guidelines

Gestalt Principles - they never get old. A good summary with examples here:
http://sixrevisions.com/web_design/gestalt-principles-applied-in-design/

50 free icons sets from SixRevisions
http://sixrevisions.com/resources/50-amazing-free-icon-sets/

... I like these ones (Japan)
http://p.yusukekamiyamane.com/

"A Moster List of UI Guidelines"
http://www.theuxbookmark.com/2010/08/interaction-design/a-monster-list-of-ui-guidelines-style-guides/

More on guidelines:
http://ui.stackexchange.com/questions/750/what-guidelines-exist-for-designing-uis

25 Useful Presentations for Designers
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/08/14/25-useful-videos-and-presentations-for-designers/

Perception and Cognition

Jeff Johnson: Psych 101: The Psychological Basis for UI Design Rules

View more presentations from Steve Williams.

UX Matters Newsletter Articles By Jeff Johnson
Updating our Understanding of Perception and Cognition
Part I
Part II

How to Draw Trees

I have discovered Austion Kleon's blog a while ago and today I stumbled into it again. It was a sign I need to bookmark it... I am happy he got his book published. The share today is on How to Draw Trees. There is definitely more to explore on his site.