One of and perhaps the hardest aspect of re-designing a product with a new visual treatment is selling the design both internally and externally. As a former manager told me, “design is pretty easy; it’s influence that’s the hard part.” This has to do with a savvy awareness of the internal political and power structure, […]

As the spec writing process starts to gather steam, routine check-ins and reviews need to occur to ensure accuracy, and more importantly, capture any missed issues or conflicts/confusions with other members of cross-disciplinary team, particuarly QA or Development. The reviews are not a time to go through word by word every single line or what’s […]

UI specs should capture the following pieces of data: consistent terminology, pixel-level measurements, annotated screenshots (see prior post on how to create accurate images for specs), behavioral descriptions beyond the obvious or “for free” stuff, with cross-references where appropriate and useful between depedent specs. Tables and spreadsheets do NOT make for good spec content or […]