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Elements of Design for Content Management Systems

design, design for Drupal

This presentation was given to students at Boston University's Center for Digital Imaging Arts as part of a course called Usability, Information Architecture and Layout for the Web.

Factors to Budget For When Planning a Drupal Implementation

site planning, web strategy, presentations, Drupal

This presentation, done for the Drupal Business Summit in 2012, covers factors that must be considered when planning Drupal implementations of medium to high complexity.

User Research for the Web and Applications

presentations, user research, UX Design

In this Skillshare workshop, I discuss basic techniques and deliverables to help teams understand their site's users, organize content and visualize task flows. The full workshop includes a video demonstration of a post-up workshop done for the Congregational Library, as well as exercises that help students understand their current design challenges.

Bringing Strategic UX to Drupal Projects (Design for Drupal Boston, 2012)

design for Drupal, Drupal, User Experience Design

This presentation, given at Boston's Design for Drupal Camp in 2012, talks about how to bring strategic UX to the planning and development of Drupal projects. In particular, it discusses two key methods to make UX more efficient and accurate: user interviews, and post-up workshops for working through complex navigation issues with clients.

Creating Fireworks Templates for Drupal: D4D Boston, 2012

design for Drupal, Layout and Visual Design

This presentation, given at Boston's Design for Drupal Camp in July 2012, outlines a rationale and framework for rapidly creating and iterating Fireworks layouts for Drupal implementations. The benefits to Fireworks as a layout tool for the web are many, including better/easier handling of vectors and round corners, text styles and shared layers that allow for rapid iteration across multiple layouts, and the ability to include multiple pages in a single document. The slides attached provide the basic framework; however, the presentation included a live demonstration of creating a template from scratch, as well as an extensive Q&A section. 

Bringing Strategic UX to Drupal Projects

UX, design for Drupal

This discussion, first given as a webcast for O'Reilly, discusses the process of user experience design for the Drupal CMS, and some specific techniques and tools which can help make the process easier. You will learn: 

  • Why Drupal teams need UX designers, and how to sell strategic UX to your team.
  • How to identify core user groups and recruit participants for user interviews to flesh out your understanding of the site's target audience.
  • Why prototyping directly in Drupal isn't a great idea in the beginning phases of a project—and when going straight to Drupal is a good idea.
  • Specific techniques that can be used in your next project to step up the user experience.

What Makes Design "Sustainable?"

sustainable design

In this session, presented to Stonehill College's student design group, I discussed issues around sustainable design, including:

  • waste reduction
  • designing for sustainability
  • building sustainability into your business model

Drupal Site Planning: Let User Experience Guide Workflow

design for Drupal, UX

Too many websites start with a list of functionality, and get straight into building out wireframes and prototypes without a solid sense of who their users are and what experience they’re looking to have with your site. The result? A website that isn’t effective at reaching the audience that you need to reach, or extra work re-doing things during development once you realize that users don’t actually need it, or need something different. This presentation outlines a simple, practical approach to user experience that you can use to start a site plan on the right foot.

Basic points covered include:

  • Ways to talk clients through the user experience that they want to create through their site; 
  • Using audience research to identify key content "landing areas," and defining the key components of those pages; 
  • Using simple wireframes and prototypes to flesh out the user experience of these key "landing areas" and refine architecture and user experience prior to design and development; 
  • Taking all of this work and using it to help define blocks, views, taxonomy, etc. that you need to use throughout the site development process.

Session presented at Design for Drupal Camp Boston, June 2010.

Design and Your Brand

design, branding, entrepreneurship

Given for the Downtown Women's Club in 2009, this presentation goes over some key design principles that entrepreneurs should be aware of when branding their business. Topics include:

  • What a brand is (and isn't);
  • What your materials say about your organization;
  • How much to budget for the basics: logo, website, business cards, etc.
  • How to find the right designer or team for your project, and how to work with them effectively;
  • Some simple DIY tips for the occasional project you have to handle on your own.

O'Reilly Webcast: Talking to Clients about Drupal

design for Drupal

In this presentation, done for Planning and Managing Drupal Projects, I walk listeners through the typical lifecycle of a Drupal project. I also talk about:

  • How to help clients understand Drupal without resorting to DrupalSpeak (and confusing the heck out of them)
  • How to get the information you need to put together a strong proposal
  • Strategies for walking clients through the Drupal design and implementation process
  • Some common red flags to look out for when talking to prospects.