Jaret Manuel
Posts by :
- Don’t make me think (great book)
- Communicating Design
- Designing Interfaces
- Exploring the elements of design
- Design for hackers
- Business model basics
- User research
- User Modeling
- Visual design basics
- Information Architecture
- Interaction Design
- Design testing
- Front End development with Html5 & css3
- Back end basics
Chicago & Code Academy Rocks
January 13th, 2012I’ve been here from Toronto since Sunday and this joint absolutely rocks and it’s cool to be Common in Chicago (Had to toss that in for big C). In 5 days Code Academy has taught me how to be an expert in all things Ruby and Rails (notice I didn’t say Ruby “on”)… Well, ok, the geek noids out there are probably saying whatever and ready to go ape shit on the keyboard, locking themselves into their code monkey cage and preparing to blast me out into the hack universe of “You don’t know jack shitville”. Although, I’d prefer they chill out, relax, work on getting laid for the first time, and hopefully know I am just yanking their nerd chains – they’d be right. I know squat after a week and I won’t be an expert when I am done. I am cool with that. It has been one week, and I am definitely not an expert – hell I am not even a beginner, but I have to say the Code Academy crew is awesome and the learning insofar has been fun.
I am fortunate and crazy enough to be doing both the Development and the Design class at Code Academy. Jeff Cohen teaches development and he is well – awesome, and the dude loves hockey (more on hockey in a minute). He is a very patient teacher who knows his stuff and he is able to break things down very easily and explain them in a fun manner and there is no dumb question in his world. Carolyn Chandler is a smart cookie who leads our design class and she is a design heavyweight who is well respected in that community.
In her class, we get to sketch, think lean methodology, and learn to think about design while listening to some awesome music from time to time on Pandora (Arivn (Pron: Irvin) Dang tees up some trippy beats). For example… that damn door in our class! I wanted to pull it the first few times and I found out I wasn’t alone, only to find out the design is messed. And the bathroom – well what gives with the paper towel being hidden (almost) under the mirror? One of my sketches portrays this irritant I have… anyhoo (yes, anyhoo you coding urban mutants) I need to take a break but here are some pics to chew on. I am going to chew on some pie (Pizza. ended up being a sub which was good) with my design mentor Jake Downs. Thanks Jake! Oh speaking of mentors – a big shout out to Don Bora of Eight Bit Studios . Don is my development mentor who took me to Burger Bar for lunch this afternoon. Thanks Don! If you like burgers you should run to this place. It is a hungry man’s dream right here in Chicago.
The Dyson Hand Dry under the Public Washroom long water and soap dispense. My drawing… really sucks…. but!
We all need a dispenser sensor man in our life!
My Design brain is kicking in… Maybe Don Norman would be proud! Or not…
Then wildly and unexpectedly I got invited to watch the Blackhawks last night and even more crazy was the fact I landed in the dressing room, out on the bench area (although the bench was removed in preparation for the upcoming basketball game. They move fast at the Madhouse) and I walked out on the ice. Let’s just say we all get to be lucky once and a while, and I have that good fortune here. The blackhawks have amazing and very loud fans with an amazing scoring jingle. Here are a couple pics.
This Dude walks by me with a hat on and lo and behold it was Kaner stopping to sign a jersey and he was off. The man looked busy so I had little desire to bother him.
It’s been a fun week in Chi town alright! My blogging will have to taper off as Code Academy ramps up!
Peace out,
Code Academy Notes: Day 2 & 3 Web Development & Design
January 12th, 2012These are my notes from Code Academy class. Keep in mind they are notes and I care little if there are errors (better yet you get to correct me). I am taking the Web Development & the Design class so there will be a mix and mash of both.
Jeff worked for Crate & Barrel for a few years. Didn’t get .net framework, and didn’t think he was smart enough for web apps. Found out about Ruby and then rails in 2005. Left a 20 year career and jumped into open sourced.
~/dev/mwf: ls
hello.html
open hello.html
Instructions
Puts
def
return
end
each
do
Data
Strings
numbers variables
arrays
hashes
puts “Chicago Landmarks”
puts “—”
puts
puts
def print_landmark(name, fee)
puts name + “: $” + fee
end
landmarks = ["Wrigley Field", "Millennium Park", "John Hancock Center"]
landmarks.each do |name| # the . (dot) is calling a method and do is a block |name|. The first will be Wrigley Field and then it will ask for “each” of the list and DO that one. Quite fun.
puts name
end
Hash is a list but a list of pairs of things and sometimes called Keys & values {}
Think of “=>” as goes to or points to
to access a hash {} that you set you would use the [] (array brackets). As in h["item"]
Nil means nothing but nothing is something. Nil is nil.
puts “Chicago Landmarks”
puts “—”
puts
puts
def print_landmark(name, fee)
puts name + “: $” + fee
end
# landmarks = ["Wrigley Field", "Millennium Park", "John Hancock Center"]
landmarks = { “Wrigley Field” => “40″, “Hancock Center” => “15″}
landmarks.each do |x, f|
print_landmark x, f
end
The very 1st Code Academy Design class….
MMM
Make it real, Make it right, Make it matter
Make something people can use, but “want” to use, and Make it Matter.
12 Years as user experience architect
Co-author of A Project Guide to UX Design.
Design Instructor (Depaul Masters, Human Computer Interaction)
Curriculum Developer, WaSP Interact
All around superstar!
Books:
Topics:
Design does not equal graphics
General Business Model Ideas
Immersive Research
Ideation/Concepts
Product Design
Design Testing
Front End Development
Failing shouldn’t be a mark against you (reference to Startups).
I got sick as a dog from starting hot yoga so I was like a space cadet for the class and felt like I was getting kicked in the head. Shame on you Core Power (actually, they are great..)
The first HTML/CSS optional class:
Shay Howe is a User Interface Engineer and he is teaching an optional HTML/CSS. This is a no brainer for those who can attend. How could you turn down that collate smile? Shay travels and attends groups like a rock star so we are especially appreciative of his time.
I could go deeper into this as I know a bit about the basics but…
HTML = Content . Meaning the words, the links, the images, tables… ie. Your content.
CSS = Presentation. How you style your content (html). Half the battle is getting this separation right (my words not Shay’s)
Elements are what makes the content do things like <a> which is an anchor tags.
<a> </a) (Open and closing tags
<a href=”http://www.shayhowe.com/”>Place Text here (For example:”Shay Howe”)</a>”
DOCTYPE html>
Control + Shift + < gives you opening and closing tags in Textmate. (Shay doesn’t disagree to this but doesn’t do it himself. Personal preference.)
Now to CSS… p (is the selector) or as Shay says “Now we are going to get in the Paint! (Basketball if you didn’t know!)
p { … } this is CSS. P in this case is the selector and in between the squiggly’s is the value or values (I think.. ).
External CSS is the best way to go, meaning you have HTML files for your content and separate CSS file(s) to style your HTML (content). You do this by adding the following link tag in your html file(s) in the tag. Why the head tag? One of the reasons it is at the top of the page so the CSS (and Javascript (Shay doesn’t touch on JS) files etc if you ever get into that) page(s) can load faster. Shay and others can probably give deeper answers but to me it just makes sense.
<head>
<link rel=”stylesheet” href=”file.css”>
<title>This is what you see at the top of your browser for the title</title>
</head>
We also got into Div classes and ID’s. You use classes to specify blocks of html that you want to style and it allows you to style many areas (classes) with one css style sheet and often simply changing a couple areas. ID’s are pretty much the same except they can only be used once per html page.
<div class=”color”>
Html content such as paragraphs or Ordered, Unordered or defined lists
- , etc
</div> <!– comment area. this closes the div –>
Then in the css file you would write:
.color {
color: blue;
font-weight: bold;
etc
etc
}
<div>
Html content such as paragraphs or Ordered, Unordered or defined lists
- , etc
</div> <!– comment area. this closes the div –>
red here and then wanting to change it blue two minutes later is a bad semantic practise)>
Html content such as paragraphs or Ordered, Unordered or defined lists
- , etc
</div> <!– comment area. this closes the div –>
#id {
color: red;
line-height: 1.5em;
}
So Class is . and ID is # in CSS.
The entrepreneurship optional Wednesday class is being led by aspiring entrepreneurs JinHwang & JeanBahnik and a big thanks goes out to them. I will cut it short this time around but a big thank you goes out all the support & help from the inaugural Code Academy class alumni. You know who you are and thank you. The support is quite impressive to say the least.
Code Academy Notes: Day 1
January 9th, 2012These are my notes from Code Academy class. Keep in mind they are notes and I care little if there are errors.
SMSassist sponsored the space in the JHC (show pic you took on iPhone).
Bought Jeff Cohen’s rails for .net devs book for a friend at my last job and now he is teaching me. Crazy. I didn’t know who Jeff was when I bought the book. Small world!
Learn as if you own the code
Blog lots about what you are doing at CA
Trust instincts and what you discover
What you go back & read will have a significant impact.
Vince Cabansag:
First thing he built was a blog. Blog is a great first app project. Student in inaugural class.
* I may miss a couple here as I didn’t know the logo’s.
Pathfinder
SPARK
Code Mountain
OCA ventures
Hydepark angels
accelerate labs
sand box industries
startup weekend (SUW is amazing. I worked on a SUW project called Stokfridge in Toronto).
new world ventures
chicago land
built in chicago
illinois tech association
techweek
tech.li
technori
devmynd
gtrot by Code Academy Alumni Br_ttany
enovafinancial
doejo
tribeca
8th ligth
lightbank
obtiva a Groupon Company
geekfest (tuesday at noon’s at Groupon). Free food. Can’t attend because I am in design class
refresh chicago
chicago ruby
chicago heroku user group
code and coffee (Franklin & Chicago Starbucks).
code retreat
gathersus
chicago js
windycityrails
Dave Hoover‘s Apprenticeship Patterns book : Emptying your cup (Dump your learning now. Programming wise. Don’t be afraid to ask questions).
Mentors are excited.
It is on you to contact you your mentor.. Find them and get them, reach, schedule. It is as important as the class.
37 Signals suite.
Backpack (organize & collect) & campfire (chat). Use Use & Use.
Idea: Everybody blogging should put the others students on their “Blog rolls” or blog a list of other blogs. It will help drive traffic.
Mondays: 6-8pm html5&css (this week Wednesday by Shay Howe). Wednesday: 1pm Entrepreneur session.
Learn to Program (awesome book) & Ruby on Rails 3 Tutorial. Jeff Cohen says it is awesome.
It’s ok to be out of your comfort zone. Jeff makes reference to the moon landing and what they went through. The Run way pic.May feel like a slow start but soon there will be takeoff.
Web Development:
-Computer Science (a little bit)
-Software eng
-Agile Methods
Computer Programming:
Input (instructions + data) > Processor > Output
Hard to explain how we are going to program, we are just going to dive in (~Jeff).
Tom Cullen> Used to be HF trader. Knew nothing. Built out a lot of website he developed. Redo exactly what we did in class but add it to your app/idea/project.
Advice: no substitution for hard work (Thomas Alva Edison Quote). Nobody has passion about your idea. Don’t worry about the NDA (I find this funny. NDA? Seriously?). Fight to pair with Ragu. Cut your illusions of getting a job right away (if that is your goal).
Mike Ebert: Zero programming. Little Html. Race Bikes in Europe. Looking at apprenticeships. Looking to be full time dev. Read 1st 2 chapters of Apprenticeship patterns immediately (free online). Get with people who are better then you (Shouldn’t be tough :) . The 4 hours with Jeff in class will be your best. He is the best at breaking things down in plain english. Throw away your code. Be goal oriented. Have your runway after Code Academy, map & search for your low to no pay job for a bit. Get together on the weekends.
Luis Vega: From Philippines. Knew about it 1 month prior and came. Was supposed to go home and looking for opportunities. He met everybody and anybody in the tech scene. He would go to Hash Rocket. Blog & share that you are constantly learning, and why it is totally worth it. Github is great but they won’t see your thought process so blog about it. Bug Neal and Mike to do a startup weekend (I did one in Toronto & it was an amazing learning experience).
Kevin (RudyonRails) I don’t know how to spell his last name. Programming bat boy. Audited classes he could get into. Worked in IT support, networks but got tired of it.
Try to tee up your mentors ASAP. Don’t put too much pressure to put on yourself. Exercise. @DHH said that when he came in and said don’t work over 40 hours & exercise.
Vince: Bit of C#, CSS, HTML. Real estate broker for 6.5 years. Left job to do Code Academy. Advice: Use your mentors.
In Class: Pair with different person everyday. Don’t let people do things for you. Learn how to build things. Share your ideas. Code into a program into a breakable toy (something that doesn’t matter).
Michael Verdi: Didn’t know what the terminal was. Completely foreign. Looking to continue practising and building. The Pair Programming King (Voted the person who was best to code with. His response: Non-threatening. The fact he is Vegan it makes sense (Non meat eaters are less aggressive supposedly according to a former teacher. Come up with an idea. Redo your daily classes from scratch and apply it into your practise app and your bigger app. John McCaffrey is the man. Funny dude.
Arvin (Pronounced Ervin or Irvin not Arvin): Partnered with someone in the Tues/Thurs class. Ditched ideas half way through and started something else. Him & Josh, paired and he learned a lot through him. Have confidence in yourself & don’t be afraid to stop your partner. There is no bad situation in pairing. Usually the person with less experience will be driving (typing).
Tom Brown (Not here): Had a vision of an app & he built it, and saw it through.
Jean (French) Not sure last name. Funny guy who will be doing the entrepreneurial seminars. 12 years of online marketing. Small Running app from Startup Weekend (You tell me when) Running registration app.
My thoughts: Damn am I ever glad to be living next door to the John Hancock Center for this class.
Some students are being paid by their employers. That would be cool!
Bernhard Kappe CEO of Pathfinder Software (Lean Startup MVP) will be speaking tomorrow at noon.
HTML Programming is a language despite what you may hear.
cd dev (This is just me copying Jeff’s terminal typing. To the geeks out that ready to ransack me saying this is not HTML, I suggest Chilling out).
cd mwf
~/dev/mwf
If you feel lost:
Open (command) so open . (it essentially brings up the Finder in Mac).
Neal recommends Unix for the beginning mage (freely available but this guy deserves beers!!!)
mate (means open textmate if you use it).
mate hello.html (that will open text mate and create the hello.html file so you can start marking it up with html).
Classroom étiquette: Respect the instructor.
Ragu:
Was sitting where we were 12 weeks ago. He didn’t know spotlight (didn’t know spotlight). No such thing as a dumb question. He knows where the class is coming from. Really bad with names but wants to improve.
Evening:
Have my meeting (Friday) booked with my mentor at Eight Simple Bits. Emailed my design mentor Jake Downs Started yoga at Core Power and hit the gym in the morning. Need to be fresh to handle both these courses and the various events. Pumped. Hitting the wrapper (Bed)!
Tom Rideout is right about Newfoundland Premier Dunderdale
October 13th, 2011|
Mr. Rideout’s commentary is bang on. Premier Dunderdale is starting out as a BlunderFail. For the first time, Newfoundland & Labrador’s elected premier is female – a long overdue feat in and of itself. One of right mind would assume Mrs. Dunderdale (incumbency in tow) understands struggle, equality, fairness, and the importance of a healthy democratic process – or dare we say debate.
Her supposed position of commencing the house of assembly in the spring of 2012 completely disrespects all aforementioned. It is unfortunate that many of today’s politicians, especially leaders of ruling governments, are confusing their seat for a throne of dictatorial and “higher then mighty rule”. Mrs. Dunderdale’s office is one I had the good fortune of visiting when I was a very young boy, one I was told on several occasions I would one day work from, and although I appreciated the belief people had in me and my future, politics wasn’t in it, and political scapegoating such as this unfortunate maneuvering will not draw me nearer anytime soon. Although I do not currently reside in Newfoundland, much of her remains in my heart and I will remain a Newfoundlander until I inhale my last breath. We are a people of great history, resilience, pride, hardship, and plenty of previous arguable inequality of our own, however the tides have changed with a robust economy that has weathered the economic storms of late, and we have exited out of the “have not” status regarding provincial transfer payments. Newfoundland & Labrador must remain ever mindful of these past hardships as we strive for continuous progression, and never forget our roots while taking nothing for granted, understanding nothing is firm – even on the “rock”. Newfoundland & Labrador’s days ahead look quite bright, yet this should not entail a government getting ahead of themselves, knowing many different people got us to where we are today, and all voices must be heard as sails are set for tomorrow. Mrs. Dunderdale would have most certainly earned my vote, however I am quite disappointed in her act to delay the house of assembly as I believe this erodes democracy, and that is something every Newfoundlander, Labradorian, and Canadian must vigorously defend. I do not want to place an unnecessary spotlight on the fact she is female because the gender equation should never have existed. Unfortunately it did exist and many, like myself see her premiership as a cause of celebration and an infusion of fresh air, a new beginning, an advancement… call it what you will, and I believe this delay is diminishing all of these notions and more. I would like to congratulate Premier Dunderdale on her recent election win, and I remain confident she will do a fine job representing the people that elected her and the party that was given a majority mandate for the 3rd time in a row. The opposition most certainly does not have to be agreed with, but it does have the right to be heard in timely fashion, and that all people are represented. This is responsible and the very essence of good governance, and is something premier Dunderdale should reconsider. Too many acts of “spring” can usher in a mighty fall regardless the cushion of seat or throne!
|
BuzzData & America’s Favorite Pastime
October 3rd, 2011I was recently asked to take a look at a dataset on BuzzData that outlined Major League Baseball salaries for all players spanning from 1988-2010. Before I get into the crux of it, BuzzData is an open source platform for people, companies, organizations to host, converse, post related articles, debate, create visualizations, download, fork, clone, upload and download data on any topic, idea, or event that you can possibly think of. Beers on tap, marijuana prices, forest fires, hurricanes, ecological & environmental concerns, NASA studies, United Nations research… you name it, Buzzdata awaits data from one and all. For coders and programmers, think of BuzzData as GitHub for data. For the non-Github & geeks of the world, think of it sort of as a much simpler sexier Facebook of sorts for spreadsheets (I dislike the fact I am using Facebook to describe BuzzData given I am not a fan of them) - sorry BuzzData please don’t hate me for that analogy but I have to get my point across. One Love.
I will profess that I am not much of a baseball expert. My heyday of watching baseball was during my punk teen years rallying behind Canada’s then beloved Toronto Blue Jay’s who managed for the first time to bring the World Series title north of the Bars & Stars for two years in a row in 92 & 93 – Back to Back baby! It was an impressive feat and I will never forget the dinger out in left field by Joe Carter that sealed the deal for the back to back title.
One of the original things I looked at from the dataset mentioned was the highest paid players for each year and to my surprise there was only one year where the team with the highest paid player won the world series, and that was the New York Yankee’s in 2009 with A Rod (Alex Rodriguez). I created a simple dataset to outline & confirm this fact because I was in disbelief.
The original dataset sparked a healthy debate and some interesting visualizations from people like Artful Geek and Gary Storey. From there I wanted to dig deeper and analyze some more numbers by creating a dataset with the team payrolls from 1988 -2010 (Keep in mind there was no World Series in 94 due to a strike).
Over the 22 year period the World Series was won 7 times by the team with highest payroll but only two teams achieved this. The Toronto Blue Jays had the highest paid teams in their back to back titles in 92 & 93, and the payroll king New York Yankee’s won with the highest paid team in 96, 98, 99, 2000 & 2009. If my math is correct the highest payroll during this period constitutes a 33% World Series title win rate. The average winning payroll ranking sits at around 7 but if you look above, no 7th ranked payroll team has won, however there have been three 8th placed teams, and just last year the 9th placed San Francisco Giants earned the crown. This graph sheds light on a newer trend as well. During the last decade, the highest payroll team has only won once or 10% (Yankees 2009) and the top 2 team won twice ( 20%: Red Sox 04 & 07). What gets really interesting is that the other 7 titles (70%) during the last decade have went to teams ranked 8th or higher in payroll (as high as 24th: 2003 Florida Marlins) with the ten year average sitting at 9.6. Based on this statistic alone, the 2011 payroll stats has the Detroit Tigers ranked 10th. Will they be your World Series champions for 2011? I have no idea but I would love to get more people engaged on BuzzData to join these datasets and discussion.
I looked at some of the most influential and followed “Baseball & MLB” twitter users and it would be great to get them and others dialed in:
Alyssa_Milano (Yeah that Alyssa Milano. She’s a smart cookie & loves baseball)
KashiwagiAkira (BuzzDataへようこそ)
Send these people and other baseball nuts a tweet and tell them about this awesome site.
I see @BuzzData for the serious, leisurely, and humorous alike. It is a repository to store, foster, and grow ideas from data, and I believe such a platform is necessary for us to advance democracy, our environment, ideals, and at the core – our future! Imagine more governments offering up data to the public in pursuit of better solutions, a business looking for help in solving complex problems, an organization looking at ways to improve the environment. It is happening and BuzzData is setting out to further unleash this open data frenzy.
The use case for sports will be interesting as well. I believe the networks and gaming companies that truly understand this will harness platforms like these to propel their businesses. Gamification and social engagement around data has huge potential.
Thoughts?
@JaretManuel | Jaret Manuel on BuzzData
James Dyson: The Art of Engineering Video
June 29th, 2011This is a fascinating video for all Designers, Engineers, Artists, and startup enthusiasts.
Simply one of the best talks I have watched in some time.
Enjoy! @JaretManuel
Solitude
June 12th, 2011There is great counsel in solitude. Seek it from time to time and revel in it’s sheer beauty and insight. To catch a sunrise greeting a new day and listening to nature is a calming experience. Many of us often run from being alone when in fact it is sometimes the very thing we need to recharge. Five, ten, or twenty minutes may be all you need.
Canada has an election but where are our leaders?
April 28th, 2011Don’t you feel the same ol’ same ol’ political wheel is turning?
This country requires fresh passionate thinking and leadership that doesn’t smack of power hungry phoniness. We need to be constitutionally bound from coast to coast to coast where there is equality for all, favouritism for none, and is led by a movement that is open to honest and transparent dialogue. The old way of political wrangling must die where a charismatic leader will arise, and with their party transform this country and set her sails on a wonderful journey into the future.
As the motorized vehicle transformed society so will the Internet and associated technologies. Why then are we not a world leader in broadband?
ABC’s of Social Media, SEO, and Pimping Out your Website
August 13th, 2010Get Active. Get Social. Get Business!
Ask me anything, Forms, and Surveys with Formspring
Blogging or life streaming made easy with Posterous or Tumblr.
Customer Feedback with Get Satisfaction.
Digg and contribute worthy information.
Everybody wants the Gist : contact aggregation.
Geo socialization is all the buzz with Foursquare.
Have you considered a Facebook Like Button for your website? You should.
Is your comment system up to par? Let’s Disqus.
Justin.tv is another easy to use live video streaming platform (see UStream Below).
Killer Analytic tool Konagent is your ticket if you are trying to cash in on Facebook.
LinkedIn: the business equivalent to Facebook.
Mo emails, mo problems, in my town or yo town, Flowtown turns those emails into social gold.
No need to play phone tag for a meeting – socialize your availability with Tungle.
Optimize your website with Google Analytics.
Plancast let’s your friends know your plans and upcoming events you plan to attend.
Quora: Ask Questions, Get Answers.
Reddit is another great social news aggregation service.
StumbleUpon is a social bookmarking service.
Twitter Start Tweeting. It is easy, and focus on quality not quantity.
UStream makes Live Video made easy.
Vimeo is Video creation & sharing made easy and an addition or alternative to YouTube (below).
WordPress is a very flexible blogging tool & content management system (CMS).
Xylophagous (Wood Eating) cannot be very Delicious: Another Social Bookmarking site (Cheesy I know but can you do better with X?)
Youtube Having a YouTube video channel for your business is a wise move.
Zoom, Snap, and socialize your Photo’s with Flickr.
Social Media Creative Resume
July 29th, 2010
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