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	<title>Alex Metcalf &#187; Usability ideas</title>
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	<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com</link>
	<description>Web expert and technology explainer in British Columbia, Canada</description>
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		<title>Ten Usability Issues in One Dialog Box</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/08/ten-usability-issues-in-one-dialog-box/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/08/ten-usability-issues-in-one-dialog-box/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 10 Aug 2010 08:14:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>admin</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=621</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Quite a feat, to get ten things wrong.

At least the software will never again tell me my &#8216;blacklist is corrupted&#8217; and slow my machine to a crawl.
]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Things you thought you&#8217;d have seen by now</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/05/things-you-thought-youd-have-seen-by-now/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/05/things-you-thought-youd-have-seen-by-now/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 25 May 2010 18:49:06 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>alex</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=565</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[When I close a web browser tab (or window) by mistake, why can&#8217;t I undo that?
]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Google&#8217;s search improvements need improving</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/05/googles-search-improvements-need-improving/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/05/googles-search-improvements-need-improving/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 05 May 2010 22:33:55 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>alex</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[google]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[search]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[usability]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=439</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Today, Google announced they are rolling out an improved search results page.
However, they seem to have battered it with an ugly stick and made the page very &#8216;heavy&#8217; (click for larger version):

So again, a few hours&#8217; work, and I&#8217;ve created an improved version. Most of my time was spent:

Removing unnecessary details, such as grey dividing [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/05/googles-search-improvements-need-improving/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Tweaking TweetDeck&#8217;s User Interface</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/04/tweaking-tweetdecks-user-interface/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/04/tweaking-tweetdecks-user-interface/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 26 Apr 2010 03:57:59 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>alex</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[interface]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[tweetdeck]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[twitter]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ui]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[user]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=409</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I&#8217;ve been using TweetDeck for my tentative tiptoeing into Twitter.
Of course, as always, I immediately felt compelled to revamp the user interface, with my clean-up gun set to &#8216;Maximum&#8217;.
Here&#8217;s the before-and-after (click to enlarge):

The key changes:

Cleaner display of tweets. Use a cleaner, anti-aliased font, replace the text-heavy date stamp with a current time offset, remove [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Refreshing the BBC sport website</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/04/refreshing-the-bbc-sport-website/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/04/refreshing-the-bbc-sport-website/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 07 Apr 2010 22:30:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>alex</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bbc]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[usability]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=284</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[So I&#8217;m watching the live football text on the BBC website, and it strikes me that the page design is rather heavy-handed. Solid slabs of colour everywhere, excessive wordage, and a general lack of focus on the content.

I sighed, and resigned myself to spending three hours refreshing it.
My version, with which I&#8217;m rather happy:

(Manchester United [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/04/refreshing-the-bbc-sport-website/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Clearer Movie Rentals in iTunes</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/clearer-movie-rentals-in-itunes/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/clearer-movie-rentals-in-itunes/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 24 Mar 2010 16:38:35 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>alex</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[itunes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[movie]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[rentals]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[usability]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[user experience]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=257</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[iTunes movie rental screens – see the before-and-after graphic below – would benefit from some simple user experience improvements:

You do not need to rent directly from a search screen such as &#8216;New to Rent&#8217;. I would anticipate most people click through to the movie first, then choose rent, to reassure themselves on making the correct [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Better Safari browsing: more vertical space (part 3)</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/better-safari-browsing-more-vertical-space-part-3/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/better-safari-browsing-more-vertical-space-part-3/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 23 Mar 2010 06:13:16 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>alex</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[apple]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[browser]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[safari]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[usability]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=230</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[We (still) need a better browsing experience, and I&#8217;m on a mission to promote it. For part 3, I&#8217;ve created a comparison picture to again show easy gains in vertical space.
Browsers, such as Apple&#8217;s Safari, need to make better use of vertical space. Less focus on functionality and more on page content.
Here&#8217;s my mockup. (Click [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/better-safari-browsing-more-vertical-space-part-3/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Recipe for making iPad&#8217;s iBooks easier to read</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/recipe-for-making-ipads-ibooks-easier-to-read/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/recipe-for-making-ipads-ibooks-easier-to-read/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 12 Mar 2010 18:47:27 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>alex</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[apple]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[iBooks]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ipad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[usability]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=214</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Recipe background
My great-great-great-great-grandfather once sat me on his knee and said, &#8220;You know what kid? People read books for the words.&#8221; He then wrote that insight down as a magic recipe.
Today, I&#8217;d like to share that recipe with you for improving Apple&#8217;s new iBooks.
Ingredients

One (1) Apple picture of a two-page iBook spread on an iPad, [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/recipe-for-making-ipads-ibooks-easier-to-read/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Improving the iTunes store &#8211; search results</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/improving-the-itunes-store-search-results/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/improving-the-itunes-store-search-results/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:31:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>alex</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[apple]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[itunes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[store]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[usability]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[user experience]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=198</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Following from my last post about the iTunes store, I appear to be on a roll here. Here&#8217;s how you can give the iTunes store&#8217;s search results a makeover.
Here&#8217;s the current store search results page (click to embiggen) for &#8216;TomTom&#8217;, where inexplicably the app search results aren&#8217;t at the top – even when you search [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/improving-the-itunes-store-search-results/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Improving the iTunes store &#8211; TV shows</title>
		<link>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/improving-the-itunes-store-tv-shows/</link>
		<comments>http://www.alexmetcalf.com/2010/03/improving-the-itunes-store-tv-shows/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 06 Mar 2010 06:17:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>alex</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Usability ideas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[apple]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[itunes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[store]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[usability]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[user experience]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.alexmetcalf.com/?p=186</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[An iTunes thread on Ars Technica inspired me to give the iTunes store a user experience spring clean – specifically, browsing TV shows.
Here&#8217;s the US store&#8217;s current presentation of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Season 1 (click to embiggen):

It&#8217;s crowded. Information is duplicated, such as the main season picture, the show title and season number, and many [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
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