Abby Covert is an information architect, writer and community organizer with two decades of experience helping people make sense of messes. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Abby talk about letting go of perfectionism in dealing with tech debt, the power of language and why words are hard, plus why diagramming is a high order skill.
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listenIn this solo episode of the podcast, Sophia talks about the coming artificial intelligence revolution and how it could work with OOUX. She discusses AI world models and how OOUX provides a framework for training AIs. Plus, all the fun AI/OOUX material coming down the pipeline, including Zoe, the OOUX bot (currently in development) and a meetup on May 16 3-5PM EST, "OOUX for AI and AI for OOUX."
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listenElena Haskins is a Certified OOUX Strategist and product designer that helps design software for SaaS startups that make users feel effortlessly at home. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Elena discuss how dog owners can teach clients about cardinality, why OOUX helps you ask the questions no one else is asking, and how system objects can be used for team therapy.
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listenDan Mall is a creative director, designer, founder, and entrepreneur. He currently runs Design System University: curriculum & community to support how you design at scale. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Dan ask the question, are design systems folks and OOUX folks the same folks?
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Elena gave her first official talk about OOUX at Thunderplains, a dev conference hosted by Techlahoma a few weeks ago. In this talk, she speaks about the benefits of OOUX to bridge the gap between design and development, and gives an intro to the ORCA process.
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watchIn this eighth installment of the ORCA Series, Sophia wraps up the Requirements round with Attribute Requirements. Tune in to hear Sophia give a primer on deeper level requirements gathering, plus what sorts of questions generally get asked during the Requirements round.
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listen"Complexity DOES NOT have to mean complicated...let's not use the excuse of complexity to build complicated products..." Gabriela Ospina gave a great talk at UXDX that is a PERFECT introduction to OOUX and the ORCA Process. If you've been curious about OOUX and want to hear about it from someone who has been using it on every project for many years, this is a perfect 20-minute primer!
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watchIn this solo episode of the podcast, Sophia gives a great bird's eye view of the ORCA process, outlining each step, how it can stand alone on its own, and what the main "tripping point" is for each part of the process. Plus, a teaser for the advanced training, March 1, 2024. Buckle up and grab something to take notes!
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listenKristin Ouellette Muskat is a Certified OOUX Strategist who is the Principal User Experience Designer at Coforma, and has worked in the government space for years. In this episode of podcast, Sophia and Kristin discuss why it's important to work at a sustainable pace, yak shaving in government work, how working in government differs from private companies, plus OOUXing the law.
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listenGreetings OOUXers! In this New Years episode of the podcast, we welcome Content Designer, Information Architect, and Certified OOUX Consultant, Karen Hewell. Sophia and Karen discuss the power of naming your feelings and thoughts, the difference between feelings and thoughts, mapping your polarizing traits can make you more confident, & how to get started OOUXing your life.
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listenIn this seventh installment of the ORCA Series, Sophia brings some holiday cheer while covering CTA Requirements. Revisiting the Santa Delivery App from ORCA Series #6, Relationship Requirements, she explores the four ways you can upgrade your basic user stories, plus how to use AI to help you fill in the gaps you might have missed.
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listenSophia delivers episode #6 in the ORCA Series: Relationship Requirements. Sophia expands on "My Cat Saving Fire Department," the power tool for analyzing object relationships. Using the example of Santa delivering presents, she illustrates how to apply this tool to understand relationships between objects, plus a rule of thumb for recognizing tree systems!
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listenIn this fifth installment of the ORCA Series, Sophia discusses Object Requirements, how to skip ORCA steps & loop back to them as needed, as well as ways to customize the ORCA sprint, plus the potential use of artificial intelligence in generating object guides.
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listenCertified OOUX Strategist, Sondra Eby, is featured on Winging It, a show by Oddbird about web design, development, & problem solving. In this episode, Sondra examines three examples of unintuitive web design, and teaches how to create websites and apps that are more intuitive using Object-Oriented User Experience (OOUX) design strategies.
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Do you want to make your website or web app more intuitive for the people who visit? As a UX designer at OddBird, Sondra Eby uses OOUX strategies to identify and avoid unintuitive objects. A warning, though, before you continue: once you start seeing unintuitive objects, you won’t be able to unsee them!
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Join us and our panel of four esteemed UX professionals in the government space as we discuss how they are leveraging the power of OOUX to solve big, hairy challenges. Organizer Sophia Prater will be moderating the discussion.
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watchIn this fourth installment of the ORCA Series, Sophia discusses the 15 attributes that you'll want to consider for every single object in your system. Think about this like a gut check or a question guide for each object.
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In this FREE guide, learn the 15 most common attribute types in UX as featured in episode 048 of The OOUX Podcast, (ORCA Series #4) - Top Attributes to Consider for Every Object.
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get itWhat makes a UXer high-value? In this solo episode of the podcast, Sophia outlines the nine traits that a "high-value" UX Designer should have.
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listenThe Nested-Object Matrix (the NOM) is one of the most powerful tools in the OOUX arsenal. During this event, we will give a short overview of the "classic" NOM (and show you where the idea came from)...and then we will go off the beaten path to show you how you can use this framework to map the relationships between just about anything.
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watchIn this third installment of the ORCA Series, Sophia discusses why objects aren’t more important than all the other parts of a system but are essential to understanding the system, plus she gives 8 tips for CTA discovery!
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listenI’ve got a question that I feel like no one is asking. Why is “legacy software” always considered a bad thing? Or perhaps the better question is: What if we could create good legacy software?
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readIn this talk, Mandi Geiselman will be reviewing a slice of the exploration work she did on this subject by looking at a few objects from Horizon Forbidden West (developed by Guerilla Games) through an object-oriented player experience lens.
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watchStone shares how OOUX saved developers 1000+ hours of discovery work, led a team to collaborate with the entire organization, and discovered 12 objects with over 100 relationships - all with just the Discovery phase, no less!
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readIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia & Richard discuss what it was like when object-oriented programming was invented, why "legacy" has one meaning in life & another in software, & why we've kind of been using the word "inheritance" wrong this whole time.
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listenKamil Van Buuren is a Digital Experience Design Team Leader at IKEA, With a focus on IKEA's co-worker & employee experiences. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia & Kamil discuss when to give your team a heavy versus a light dose of OOUX, using OOUX to quickly gain domain knowledge at a new job, plus how to more efficiently divide & conquer on a complicated project.
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listenThis MURAL template created by Certified OOUX Strategist, Maija Schmitt, will help you and/or your team come together around the first iteration of the ORCA process: Discovery. You'll gain incredible clarity by defining objects, relationships, calls-to-action, and attributes.
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get itEver wanted to talk with UX designers about database concerns, but didn't know how? Enter Object Oriented UX: A design methodology that gets designers and database developers speaking the same language and working together to create digital projects from day one.
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watchDuring this game-like happy hour, we'll be going through three rapid-fire noun foraging challenges! You'll get some awesome practice at pulling out the objects (the core concepts) from a mess of user and stakeholder needs and you'll learn some tricks on how to hone in on object quicker and more effectively.
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watchAllie Ofisher is a UX Consultant & Certified OOUX Strategist who focuses on information architecture, user research, & of course, OOUX. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia & Allie discuss running an ORCA Sprint for the Church of Latter Day Saints, how best to teach the process to stakeholders who might not have a design background, plus future plans for implementing future ORCA Sprints.
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listenLearn to recognize and leverage this ubiquitous hierarchy pattern that you've probably never heard of.
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readCaitlin Steele is the Experience Design Manager at Jira & Liam Greig is Head of Design at Confluence, both previously were at Trello. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia, Liam, & Caitlin discuss the aftermath of an OOUX Design Sprint at Trello, how maybe OOUX isn't for everyone, & strategies for bringing OOUX to a big organization.
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listenEwelina Nowakowska is a Certified OOUX Strategist and is the Director of UI/UX Design & Development at American Reading Company. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia & Ewelina discuss the ways in which OOUX is like mental yoga practice, how ORCA helps teams work faster, plus some exciting innovations that may be on the horizon from OOUX headquarters.
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listenIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia explains eight ways to level up your system modeling skills, plus diagramming The Church of Latter Day Saints!
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listenHow can systems thinking help OOUXers? Sheryl Cababa is the author of a new Rosenfeld book Closing the Loop: Systems Thinking for Designers. Join us for this event where we’ll go fireside chat style with a conversation between Upma and Sheryl. They will discuss systems thinking for designers and how systems thinking overlaps (or not) with object-oriented thinking.
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watchIn this episode of the podcast Sophia and Chase discuss using Object-Oriented UX to onboard at Chewy.com, creating new objects at Wealthfront, how OOUX fits in with other design methodologies, plus how you can get started with OOUX in your organization. We nerded out in this one. Enjoy!
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listenIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia talks to the VP of Design and Research at HelloFresh — Jake Zukowski. They discuss how a designer on his team started sneaking OOUX through the backdoor into their design meetings, they debate about the difference between a Product Manager and a UX Designer, and they talk about how PMs can bring OOUX to their teams.
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listenIn this session, see examples of how Karen and some of her more enterprising colleagues have used the basic structure of the "classic" nav flow and adapted it for concepts like user intent, voice & tone, page types and facets. Plus, explore how to better enable your content creators (many of which are *not* UX writers) with OOUX-informed documentation and processes.
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In this super candid conversation, Joe Natoli and Sophia sit down to talk UX process, sketching, creativity, agile, and how OOUX can fit into to all of the above, "meeting you where you are". We'll give you a look into the new course that Joe and Sophia are launching on April 1st, 2023 — a course that targets the fundamentals of OOUX and can get you rocking and rolling in about a weekend.
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listenSophia goes way back to her childhood, high school, college days, and early UX career to make sense of the current state of OOUX and ORCA. Sophia gets into the frustrations of designing in the dark, shares a few juicy life lessons, and reveals the early principles that make up the foundation of her career — and the movement she’s built.
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listenIn this interview style session, come and hear Upma Singh (EPAM Systems) and Imogen Levy (NHS England) speak about leading OOUX in their respective organizations, the trials and tribulations of embedding new ways of working and how it is helping to solve some epic problems in the health sector.
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Upma will walk you through the ORCA (Objects, Relationships, Calls-To-Actions and Attributes) method, an Object-Oriented UX (OOUX) methodology that helps teams design thorough information architectures, and point you toward more resources so you can start using it today.
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watchIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia kicks off the first in a 15-part series on her ORCA (Objects, Relationships, CTAs, and Attributes) process. This first installment will cover the process of Noun Foraging. Learn Sophia's 10 hot tips for getting started with noun foraging. Plus, how artificial intelligence can help you do the work, and how noun foraging might not be just for nouns. Enjoy!
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listenThe domain of Electronic Healthcare Records (EHR) is arguably one of the most complex on the planet. Dani Nordin, Product Design Architect, and Liza Richardson, Clinical Content Senior Manager, will showcase the ways they have used the OOUX process through a handful of high-visibility projects within the Clinicals Electronic Health Record (EHR).
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The UX Discovery process can often make or break a project. Mary explores how OOUX, with its focus on finding the nouns/objects in a system can save time, remove headaches, and get stakeholder buy-in early while letting designers lead projects.
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readSophia lays out her findings after successfully rolling out the ORCA Sprint envisioned in episode 033 from last season. She talks about manifesting the ORCA Sprint from concept to deliverable, what worked and what didn't work (and what can probably be skipped) while running the first ORCA Sprint, and why ending Day 2 of the ORCA Sprint with a nav flow is guaranteed to blow people's minds.
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listenIn this article Matthias Dittrich explains why your applications should be intuitive tools, not uber-guided funnels and how OOUX and direct manipulation can make your UI more natural and engaging.
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readCertified OOUX Strategist, Aleš Horvatek, recounts his experience taking The OOUX Masterclass Certification Course and lays out what to expect when taking the course as well as how he has incorporated OOUX and the ORCA process into his design practice.
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readIn this interview with Sophia Prater on the UX Pathways Podcast, Sophia talks about how she got into UX back in 2008 and gets up on her soapbox about how the UX industry is failing and how UXers are often set up to design in the dark. If you are interested in the OOUX Masterclass, make sure to stay until the end.
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listenIn this article, Sophia outlines why it's a bad idea to start UX projects with task flows and how OOUX can provide the framework you need to get started with any design project, no matter the complexity.
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readLearn how Delyanka and her team of OOUXers put on a 4-hour conference workshop on OOUX. If you are looking for inspo to run your own workshop, this article's got it.
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readIn this FREE guide, get the inside scoop on the creation story behind OOUX, learn the most critical activities in the object-oriented framework, and guide you to the best resources for learning the foundations of OOUX. You'll get the rocket fuel you need to go from 0 to 60 in just a few hours.
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get itWith the theme of "Sustainability in Design" at UX Sofia's 2022 conference, Sophia answers the question: "How can OOUX contribute to solving the climate crisis…or saving endangered species…or cleaning our oceans and air? Or…all of the above?" It all comes down to exposing the truth about the inner workings of the world by mapping connections and relationships.
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watchIn this article, Sophia answers a common question about the ORCA process. Should the Prioritization Round come before the detailed work of the Requirements Round? Why not do all the trimming first, and then focus the detailed work on what’s left over?
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readIn this interview, Marcelo from Headless Creator talks to OOUX Strategist Caroline Sober-James about OOUX and its benefits, the 15-steps of the ORCA process, and the parallels between OOUX and Content Modeling. NOTE: you’ll need to sign up for a free Headless Creator account to watch this interview.
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watchSophia was interviewed by Service Designer, Michael Schofield, and UX Designer, Tim Broadwater, for their podcast, Design Thinking Games, a podcast that “examines the player experience of board games, pen and paper roleplaying games, live action games, and video games.” In this episode, they discuss the game-like aspects of OOUX and the guys give their play-tested review of the OOUX card game.
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listenDuring this Happy Hour, we will learn about applying the ORCA process in sprints to gather domain knowledge and start scoping a project from the ground up. Allie will share tips for preparing one yourself — including what went well, what mistakes she made and wants you to avoid, and resources from Notion and Miro to help you conduct your own.
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In this happy hour, Certified OOUX Strategist, Maria Garcia, will discuss how she has approached object mapping a system that has tens if not hundreds of legitimately important objects that have complex relationships with one another.
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How an OOUX approach can help keep the IA lean and simple while scaling your application.
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readOOUX isn't just a process; it teaches you a new, more practical, comprehensive approach to product, design, and development work and improves your overall skills. Let's talk about integrating OOUX into your UI and feature work. In this happy hour, we will go beyond the object map and explore some practical tips and tricks by reviewing some real-world examples.
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Can the Object Map used to facilitate user research?
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readThis duplicate-able Notion template gives you a detailed outline for running an ORCA Sprint. The ORCA Sprint framework give you a formula for taking a team through a week of OOUX exercises aligning to the ORCA Process.
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get itA collection of beautifully prepared slides from Rik's presentation to Sony PlayStation on what OOUX is, where it fits in information architecture practice, and how to execute it.
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readFredy shares an in-depth article on defining business and product goals and more with JTBD (job to be done), OST (opportunity solution trees), and OOUX!
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readORCA is a 15-step meat-grinder of a process: put good research in one end and out the other, get clarity, structure, and everything you need to go into interaction design with confidence. It’s an iterative process that helps you synthesize research into naturally-intuitive UX. You need ORCA, the third diamond in your "double-diamond" design process.
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readIn his second article on creating an object-oriented CMS in Webflow, Luke Prater, CTO of Rewired UX, discusses three ways to future-proof your Webflow CMS.
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readWhat does leveling up look like when you’re drilling down? In other words, what does it mean to practice advanced UX without “manager” or “director” in your title? If you ask 10 experienced UXers you will probably get 10 different answers. But, for what it’s worth, here are my top five.
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readIn this solo episode of the podcast (and final episode of this season), Sophia talks about a new concept called "The ORCA Sprint." A week-long OOUX journey teams can take to tackle their projects head-on with the methodology of ORCA (tackling objects, relationships, calls-to-action, and attributes).
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listenLuke Prater, CTO of Rewired UX, writes his first Medium article about the OOUX-ing of OOUX.com (no pressure!).
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readKeith Rich and Anthony Gallo — a dynamic design/dev duo from Think Company who leverage OOUX in their work — recently started used Airtable as a content and data management solution. After a bit of experimenting, they quickly realized the benefits. Content consolidation, a well-documented API, and accessible project management round out the benefits.
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Certified OOUX Strategist, Dani Nordin, created a library of OOUX Components in FIGMA that you can copy for use in your own personal projects. The components include notations on Nested Objects with icons for Metadata and Core Content to represent the types of fields. She also included a handful of common CTAs complete with icons. Feel free to duplicate and adapt for your projects!
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get itCollaborating remotely? This Whimsical template, which includes Discovery, Requirements, and Prioritization rounds, is an upgrade from our popular MURAL ORCA Discovery template. You'll gain incredible clarity by defining objects, relationships, calls-to-action, and attributes. This template includes video tutorials covering each step of the process.
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get itIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia chats with Keith and Anthony about how they discovered OOUX, how they use it at Think Company, and what it means to "dev-ign."
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listenIn this month’s Happy Hour Sophia Prater (your host and chief evangelist for OOUX) will be introducing what noun foraging is, where it fits into the ORCA process, and some of the best places to go foraging. Next, Rik Williams, UX Architect and Certified OOUX Strategist, will introduce a software-based method to mine diverse content sources. Plus a fun design challenge!
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In this episode, Sophia and Samuel chat about Value Paths and how they hone in on the deeper value of our products. Listen as they lay this lens over a medical prescription app design challenge, the Headspace onboarding experience, and even OOUX.com's offerings.
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listenWhat do archaeology and information architecture have in common? More than you think. In this short article, Sophia outlines the similarities and makes a tongue-in-cheek case for why information architecture should probably be renamed "information archaeology."
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readIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Caroline discuss why designers should cultivate empathy toward developers, how to be "a designer devs swoon over," and how quickly Caroline's conversations with developers turn into "OOUX lovefests."
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listenDuring this happy hour (12pm EST!) we will learn about applying content ecosystem mapping, a specialized form of concept modeling, to drive clarity and alignment on large, complex digital strategy projects. We'll have a live, interactive demonstration of the technique based on some concepts in the OOUX universe, just for fun.
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watch
XR (Extended, Virtual, and Augmented Reality) is traditionally a field saturated with game designers, animators, 3D modelers, and developers. But what is the role of UX design in the coming XR revolution? In this article, Sophia explains why "UX for XR" author, Cornel Hillman, believes Object-Oriented UX is the "missing link" for UX in XR.
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readIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Scott discuss is-ness versus ought-ness, the rhetorical nature of creating a content ecosystem, plus how exactly one goes about making a content ecosystem map.
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listenCertified OOUX Strategist, Rik Williams, has outlined 19 benefits of OOUX for the user-centred and mental model-based information architecture of data-rich products, services and systems. If you need ammunition for selling OOUX at your company, this article is a fantastic mine of stakeholder-whispering postulation.
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readMarsha and her team work to help designers focus on their creation process, instead of spending time managing files and versions of files — and files within files. And files that don't play nice with other files. They are wrangling constantly increasing complexity — and they are leveraging Object-Oriented UX to do it. In this talk, Marsha will show us OOUX through her expert eyes.
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The challenges of working in UX are often "intimidating and overwhelming." Allie Ofisher shares how getting certified in OOUX transformed her process and gave her stronger confidence.
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readThe ORCA Discovery Template should be available on as many tools as possible. So here's one for Whimsical, courtesy of Certified OOUX Strategist, Marisa M. 🙌
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get itA super helpful set of ORCA Object Guide worksheets made by Certified OOUXer Marisa M. 🙌 Download them here, then print them out and use them! She even included a helpful Object Guide key to help you make the most of them.
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get itAs Mary looked back at the past year, it occurred to her that it was a year of big changes in the things that she did on a daily basis. Some changes were big and some were more granular, but it reminded her that, as a designer and as a person, she is capable of learning and change.
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readIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Lou discuss why portals should be banned, what precisely is the definition of "moment prison," and why we shouldn't get emotional about our professional metaphors.
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listenIn microsoft Teams, the TEAM object is pretty confusing and disorienting, expecially when first joining. OOUXer Jimmy Simov of SAP exposes in detail what's wrong and shows us how an OOUX approach can help.
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readSteve is a software engineer, a UXer, and a serial entrepreneur. His early company, Ordered List, was acquired by GitHub and after a long stint as a product designer at GitHub, we met when we were both consulting to NineLabs. He is the founder and lead designer at Box Out Designs, which is basically Canva for the sports industry.
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listenSophia was interviewed on the UI Breakfast Podcast. How can object-oriented UX help designers solve complex product problems? You’ll learn why object-oriented thinking is well-suited for design processes, how a shared vocabulary enables collaboration, practical mapping tips, and more.
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listenIn this talk given at the 2021 No Code Conference, produced by Webflow, you’ll learn the basics of OOUX and how it can help teams achieve a shared understanding of scope, strategically structure content, and shine light on hidden complexity — reducing rework in the process.
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watchThe ORCA Discovery Template should be available on as many tools as possible. So here's one for Figma, courtesy of Certified OOUX Strategist, Marcelo Brasileiro. 🙌
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get itThis article is part of a series of case studies that follow my journey of practicing and refining my Object-Oriented UX process. In many ways this project is where my career as a designer of the design process really began. It was a project of many firsts: my first responsive design, my first time working very closely with the development team, and my first real system design.
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readThis article is part of a series of case studies that follow my journey of practicing and refining OOUX. I hope you are ready to continue the CNN Elections saga after I returned to the newsroom — three years after leaving the team. In this case study, I talk about the struggles of pushing for collaboration and research, content-based navigation, Skeuomorphism 2.0, stage diagrams, and more.
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readAs you probably know, Brad Frost is the author of "Atomic Design," the creator of pattern lab, and a design systems advocate and educator. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Brad discuss how technology is like a river, why it's important for everyone on a project to have a shared language, and how design systems are like furniture parts.
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listenThe ORCA Discovery Template should be available on as many tools as possible, and especially tools that designers are naturally in and out of all day. One of the most-used tools for many is Miro. Using Miro's built-in kanban tool, Allie Ofisher has created a super useful template for object-mapping.
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get itAn object-oriented UX approach helps build scalable and consistent systems. Dittrich proposes an “object-oriented” approach that models the user experience around the content elements. A mindset that helps you to keep the UI scalable and consistent.
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readIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia, Sondra, and Miriam discuss the adaptability of the ORCA process for teams, the coming innovations of container queries in CSS, and how OOUX facilitates a fruitful, continuous conversation between designers and developers.
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listenCertified OOUX Strategist, Lauren Stone, uses OOUX and the ORCA process to help the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) to rebrand its image in order to adopt a more modern look and exhibit more credibility. The new brand strategy aims to attract younger, and more diverse members while establishing a more inclusive culture.
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readSamuel Hulick runs UserOnboard, where he researches, writes about, and implements successful user onboarding for companies around the world. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Samuel discuss how OOUX helped with a crisis of faith, how there's more than one way to learn to ride a bike, and why the right objects at the right time are the answer to good UX.
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listenIt’s why so many UX designers are frustrated in their job and why many projects fail. It’s also why we often can’t sell research: every decision-maker is confident in their own mental picture. In this article, Sophia shows you how to collaboratively expose misalignment in your team’s shared understanding by bringing them together around two questions. What are the objects? How do they relate?
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readLaurel Franciose originally created this template for her team at @Adobe, but it's now available to all! The OOUX ORCA Process canvas offers a way to follow the steps outlined for an Object-Oriented UX workshop. The ORCA process is a fantastic way to detangle complex design problems and create intuitive user experiences.
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get itThis talk will arm you with practical advice on how to take your OOUX knowledge to the next level: bringing your teammates’ perspectives and brainpower into the process.
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Cassie Eddy is a UX Designer and Researcher at Health Catalyst in Boston. She is also a Certified OOUX Strategist and active mentor in the OOUX Certification Program. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Cassie discuss learning to code, the information architecture of Crossfit, and how OOUX can help with combining passions in career and life.
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listenIn Part 2 of her series on better product design using OOUX, Nikki takes you through the nitty-gritty on how to hit the ground running using OOUX and the ORCA process in your work to create better products by defining a system of objects before jumping into task flows and interaction design.
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readContent models have to serve a variety of delivery channels, each more outlandish than the last. But why do many content models still look more like design systems rather than reflecting structured data? Mike takes us on a personal journey as he examines his own experiences and invites us to conceive content models that articulate meaning and group related content together for use on any channel.
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readHarrison Wheeler is a Senior Design Manager at Linkedin and is the host of his own user experience design podcast: Technically Speaking. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Harrison discuss how OOUX provides a chance to take a principled approach to design, why social media websites are like old enterprise software, and how inheritance can be used to build user trust.
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listenSophia goes solo once again to address a question someone in the OOUX Self-Paced Masterclass Program brought to her from a senior UXer who just didn't see the value of OOUX when information architecture already exists. It's one she's heard more than once from those familiar with IA. Is OOUX just a rebrand of IA that no one asked for and no one needs?
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listenIn this talk, Havana will walk us through why tapping the knowledge of your Customer Service team is so important and how to do it properly. You'll learn how to foster relationships with the folks who have more direct contact with the user than anyone — and get a heads-up to avoid some common pitfalls.
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Now that I am aware of junction objects, I use them ALL. THE. TIME. In this article, you'll learn about an OOUX-power tool that helps you solve some super-sticky data puzzles. This "design-technical" tool improves communication and collaboration with developers, while allowing us (UX designers) to create more dynamic experiences for our users.
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readIn this episode, your host Sophia Prater flies solo to show you how to sell more UX research using Object-Oriented UX—more specifically, the first two steps of the ORCA process. We will talk about how to make your stakeholders and biz folks aware of gaps in the team’s understanding and become more invested in important questions that need to be brought to users.
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listenIn this episode of the podcast, Andrea, and Kristen talk with Sophia about their work together at Duo Security, how they have started bringing OOUX to Duo for a double whammy of complexity wrangling, and how taking all of people's weird behaviors into account helps design better online security products.
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listenUnderstanding APIs is becoming more and more important for UX designers. Fortunately, OOUX can help with that. Join us and our guest of honor, Caroline Sober-James to learn how you can tap into the business complexity-wrangling power of object-oriented user experience (OOUX) to plan, design, build, and deliver better APIs.
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In this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Amanda talk about OOUXing your portfolio and making real connections at the UX Hustle Conference, How everything in your career has its season, and how Amanda leveraged her technical background as a civil engineer with her passion for design to build a new kind of web shop.
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listenIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Caroline discuss why Caroline calls OOUX a power tool for digital design, what it's like to have a user call your system "seamless," and the parallels between OOUX and API design.
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listenIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Imogen discuss how PDFs are bad for accessibility, why OOUX is not waterfall design, and exactly how many times you have to repeat yourself for your message to sink in.
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listenIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia and Jorge discuss why the tension between top-down and bottom-up is the greatest challenge to designers, how to recognize signs that you’re working on a “greedy” product, and why social media is like a meeting that lasts forever.
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listenIn just a single sheet of paper (front and back), this guide gives you step-by-step instructions on how to create an object map.
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get itCollaborating remotely? This MURAL template will help your team come together around the first iteration of the ORCA process: Discovery. You'll gain incredible clarity by defining objects, relationships, calls-to-action, and attributes. WARNING! This template provides some help text but is not completely self-explanatory. You'll want some OOUX basic training before diving in.
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get itIn this new book, Cornel writes about how an object-oriented approach to XR can help designers create more intuitive virtual experiences. During this Happy Hour, Cornel will take us through some UX for XR best practices. He'll also walk us through a case study that showcases how OOUX was leveraged to design a crypto art/NFT VR gallery.
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In this conversation, Sophia and Jorge discuss OOUX and how it differs from other methodologies.
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listenIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia, Michael, and Andy discuss why team clarity brings user clarity, how new UX writers should go about developing a company voice, and why communicating trade-offs is a killer skill.
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listenYou can add OOUX to your toolset to strengthen your UX process and dramatically improve your discovery phases. In this article, Certified OOUX Strategist, Mary Mahling Carns, takes you step by step through the full process.
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readIn this article, Michaela talks about how she used the ORCA process in making a little Mars weather app using NASA’s Insight Weather API.
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readIn this episode, Sophia, Ahren, and Bob discuss how taxonomies differ from folksonomies, how folksonomies differ from ontologies, and how common vocabularies keep design projects on track.
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listenImmersive technologies are entering the lives of more and more users in all shapes and forms. Yet designing for these new digital worlds requires a very different approach and toolset. These are the topics we will discuss with 2 leading UX experts in the design world: Sophia V. Prater and Cornel Hillman.
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watchIn this episode, Sophia and Jeremy discuss how responsive design made the truth about the Internet apparent, why the invisible is hard to prioritize, and what a bad design system means for our end users.
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listenIn this episode of the podcast, Sophia, Sarah, and Rachel discuss how to think like a library scientist, how being conventional can be a virtue, and why accessibility is good for everyone, not just the differently-abled.
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listenCommon misconception: OOUX is only good for large-scale redesigns or ground-up design work. In this quick and fun case study, Mary shows us how to OOUX a single page on Taco Bell's online ordering system.
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readIn this episode, Sophia and Ren discuss how to build a taxonomy around cosplay, how information architecture is more like information archaeology, and why it's important to understand the context of meta metadata.
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listenIf you are interested in Object-Oriented UX and are looking for ways to apply the methodologies, you're in luck! OOUX and Notion go hand-in-hand; exploring one will help you build mastery of the other. Diving into Notion is a way to apply OOUX in the wild and practice creating and manipulating systems.
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watchIn this episode, Sophia and Andrew discuss the meaning of embodied cognition, the pitfalls of being a physical creature in a digital environment, and why sometimes, creating inconsistency can help you be consistent.
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listenIn this article, Sarah Barrett talks about how mapping can improve digital experiences. She also tackled the 4 steps to make our digital experiences mappable.
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readIn this article, Sophia V Prater explains how you can use her object-oriented UX methodology to create intuitive digital products devoid of clutter. According to Sophia, broken objects are one of the biggest user experience fails.
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readThis article covers some of the challenges and approaches surrounding this focus, with particular attention to designing for the audience’s diverse levels of familiarity and expertise with the website’s underlying subject.
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readCornel Hillmann is a CG Artist, XR Designer, and Entrepreneur. He is the owner and creative director at Studio.CGArtist.com and Emerging Entertainment and has worked with brands including Panasonic, Jaguar, the Singapore International Film Festival, and other big names.
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listen"Advice Giver" Sophia Prater and "Advice Seeker" Joseph Duteil discuss OOUX and how the idea is rooted in practice starting with a project for CNN in 2012, and how it has evolved into a repeatable approach, helping UXers tackle any type of app, site or software.
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listenIn this article, Alicia and Andrea talk about Duo’s Object-Oriented UX (OOUX) Design Process. It also tackles the 3 steps on how OOUX works.
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readImogen Levy is head of Digital at Moorfield's Eye Hospital. When she started at this large NHS network of hospitals the digital "strategy" was basically to move all print material to PDFs. So, Imogen had significant educating and evangelizing to do. In this case study (and success-story-in-progress), imogen candidly shares how she is transforming content, structure, and minds with OOUX.
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Gabriela identifies strategic ways to implement OOUX in organisations in a way that’s transforming rather than exhausting.
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watchAll too often, we end up brushing complex business rules and information architecture aside in the name of “low fidelity.” In this talk, Sophia goes over four main sources of complexity and how Object-Oriented UX can help wrangle them. You’ll learn about the tough questions you should be asking early on—to make the rest of the project easier and more successful.
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watchBy following the OOUX process, NHS Moorfields has been able to truly focus on what is important to users. Led by Imogen, It is now investing in a large digital transformation project. This case study explains how OOUX has been a key catalyst for getting buy-in into this.
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watchWhat makes an OOUXer? What do OOUXers aspire to? This list of 15 values and principles can help you understand what it means to add OOUX to your professional skillset.
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get it"The course gave me so much more confidence in my skills as a UX designer." In this article, Lindsay shares her experience with the OOUX certification program, how it helped her improve as a UX designer, and how it improved her confidence in her own professional abilities.
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readEmmet Connolly (who brought OOUX training to Intercom back in 2016) write about how design systems need to be object-oriented, and how they are working toward that goal at Intercom.
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readIn this episode, we are revisiting the December 2019 episode with Ben Callahan. Ben is a design system expert and the founder and president of Sparkbox. At Sparkbox, Ben has created an amazing workplace that facilitates learning, exploring, asking questions, and pet projects.
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listenA Brooklyn Cat Cafe needed a mobile app to help cat adopters find great matches and increase the number of adoptions, plus consolidate the many tools they use into one app. Follow along with this fun and comprehensive case study as Lisa wields OOUX to unite hopeful kitties with their forever homes.
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readIf you want to take a deep dive into the OOUX process, Amy White will show us how to use the ORCA method to think through privacy and permissions across an entire application - before designing any screens.
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Caroline Sober-James has journeyed from database architect to UX designer to a fellow object-oriented UX evangelist. We look at how OOUX can help with client meetings as well as debate how OOUX applies to fantasy games, board games, and classic Nintendo.
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listenIn this episode, Sophia and Carrie discuss what exactly a content model is, why navigation is the most volatile layer of the content stack, and IA in UX education.
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listenStart here! Sophia talks through the top frustrations that she hears from UX designers and explains how OOUX can help. If you are enduring pixel-pushing sans strategy, an overwhelm of complexity, stakeholder buy-in, communicating with developers...OOUX is the answer!
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watchIs your portfolio the Boogeyman under your bed? Banish the Boogeyman with Amanda. She’ll walk us through some common portfolio pitfalls and show us how to combine self-discovery, Object-Oriented UX, and Webflow to take your portfolio from incomplete, hot mess, or cookie cutter to confident, clear, and uniquely you!
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In this episode, Sophia takes us on an audio walk-through of the "calls-to-action" methodology of her ORCA process. She will guide you through how to get started designing complex systems, how to make a CTA Matrix that's based on real-world objects, and why doing so will pay dividends.
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listenDan Mall is one of the leading experts in design systems. In this episode, learn how to start a design system project the right way, the pros and cons of “flexible cards” which can lead to what I call masked objects, and how OOUXers can create a ton of value on a design system team.
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listenLindsay gives a step-by-step walk-through of the ORCA OOUX design process, breaking down each round from discovery and requirements, to prioritization and prototyping, all while simultaneously designing an online coffee shop experience.
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readThis episode is an audio WORKSHOP that’s going to teach you the basics of OOUX and the ORCA process. If you listened to the first episode, you should have a zoomed-out, big picture Idea of what OOUX is all about. But in this episode, you’ll actually get to practice OOUX!
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listenThis is a great article about how OOUX can be used from a software development perspective. Eduard also has some interesting techniques for documenting Attribute Requirements.
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readOctober 20, 2015 was when Sophia's article on OOUX debuted on A List Apart. In this episode of the podcast, Sophia shows you how her philosophy and process have changed since then and how OOUX was forged in the crucible of CNN Election Night 2012.
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listenIn this presentation, you will: Learn the three basic needs that humans have in any place: orientation, consistency, and organization. See a lot of examples that illustrate these needs in various places. Learn about content superposition.
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This six-week course will take your portfolio from incomplete, hot mess, or cookie cutter, to confident, clear, and uniquely you! Learn to set yourself up for success so that you can continuously update your portfolio without having crisis moments down the road. Say buh-bye to overhauling your website every 3-6 months and hello to sustainable design! ENROLLMENT IS NOW OPEN!
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learn moreIn Dan's Lecture, he will give us a tour of his UX Magic framework, focusing on the foundation: UX Grammar. You'll learn how to create an Action-Object Matrix that illustrates the "conceptual grammar" of your system. Then, to reduce cognitive load (and screens!) you'll learn to compress that matrix, making it as dense as possible.
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You name the language, human babies learn nouns easier and faster than verbs. In this article, Sophia explores research conducted by Dedre Gentner and lays out how her finding are relevant and important in the world of UX.
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readNeed to convince a boss or a business stakeholder on the value of OOUX? This talk speaks directly to leadership about how OOUX can help save time and money.
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watchThe BBC has been basing their website design on domain models for over a decade. In OOUX, the design process focuses on objects, relationships, calls-to-action, and attributes. In this article, Sophia discusses how BBC Food is using OOUX to create a superb user experience on their website.
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read"OOUX and Design Systems, a match made in design heaven." Object-Oriented UX should be an organizing principle for your Design System. In this article, Sophia talks about how OOUX improves the process of creating a Design System.
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readAllison is a content designer, content strategist, editor of the IBM Design Medium Publication. After COVID-19 hit, Allison started thinking about how to apply what she learned in a recent OOUX workshop to COVID-19 safety messaging.
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readIn this quick interview before the Design Content Conference in 2019, Sophia Prater talks through the biggest danger of designing "actions-first", using an example from her Edtech days.
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watchOOUX has become a design power tool and it’s something you should know about if you’re interested in offering a better digital user experience for your customers. Learn how OOUX helps you build things your users can understand, simplifies and declutters your design, and fosters better projects and happier teams.
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readSophia outlines the four principles of intuitive design and goes deep on the subject of messy objects. Stay tuned 'til the end, when Sophia does a live demo introducing her iterative ORCA process (Objects, Relationships, Capabilities, and Attributes)!
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watchDesign systems are essential, but what Heidi shows in this article is that a design system alone, particularly if it’s primarily a component level design system, does not guarantee a simple, consistent experience. Heidi Adkisson shows us how to create a 'narrative' object model and dives deep into four main types of relationships.
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readIn this article, Mariana talks about the software she uses for UX/UI. This software is called Drooms which is a virtual data room that caters to a very niche audience: Lawyers.
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readExamine how EdX accomplishes a refreshingly natural browsing experience — curious users can navigate from subject, to course, to instructor, to school, and back again without ever needing to pick through the hierarchical main navigation. This is one of the primary principles of object-oriented user experience (OOUX): contextual navigation through object relationships.
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readIn this talk at the Design & Content Conference in Vancouver, Sophia explains how OOUX can help you avoid the UX fails that confuse and frustrate users. Stay tuned because in the last third of the talk, Sophia gives a sneak-peek into her OOUX process and how to use Webflow to build CMS prototypes.
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This book is spot-on, teaching readers about the importance of understanding the domain and how objects connect in the context of that domain. If you want to create products that are more future-proof and intuitive, this book is a must-read. It's (almost) 100% in-line with the principles of OOUX!
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buyIn the digital world, anything is possible. But if digital-space interfaces stray too far from our expectations, users will become unsure, confused, and unhappy. This article spells out why we should design with lizard brains in mind to create intuitive interfaces. (In OOUX, we have a new definition for a Broken Object. In this article, think of the Broken object as a mean Shapeshifter.)
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readEmmet Connolly is an advocate of the "full-stack design system", basically a design system that is rooted in a clear, shared conceptual model. "You shortcut a lot of extra thinking once you start with, “What does this object need to be?”' AGREED. In a hurry? Skip to min 9 to cut to the chase.
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listenThis is a full-length, 90-minute Object-Oriented UX talk delivered in Warsaw, Poland during the MCE conference. Strap in and enjoy!
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watchLook into how users understand and process their world, how thought, communication, understanding, and perception are all object-oriented, and how when digital design aligns with real-world objects, better UX is the result.
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readIn this talk for the QCon Developer Conference, Sophia discusses all the factors that cause complexity, the three key ways to wrangle it, and how to fix it with Object-Oriented UX. She talks about how to "cheat" on our IA, reduce moving parts, and stop arguing so much about features and functionality.
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watchInteraction design helps users get things done in digital spaces. For UX designers, it's where we choreograph all the users' doing; the verbs. But what are the things being "done to"? Learn how defining your nouns (objects) first will set you up for more intuitive interaction design.
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readA real world example of how object oriented UX was put in practice for the ITHAKA S+R redesign for project scoping and information design.
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watchSophia reflects on the value of pushing your content, getting it out there, and telling imposter syndrome to take a hike.
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readThe original OOUX manifesto. You'll learn why designing "objects first" is pivotal and how it helps you define the core structure of your system. The process has evolved over the years into Sophia's ORCA process, but this 2015 article is still a great place to start.
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readThis is a book that I wish I had written! My weathered copy of this book is packed with highlights, scribbles in the margins, and dogeared pages. It's not an easy read (some passages I had to read 3 times) but it's fascinating for anyone serious about information architecture and how laws of perception and understanding should drive our IA designs.
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buyFriends, a zombie apocalypse is upon us: an onslaught of new mobile devices, platforms, and screen sizes. Hordes of them descend on our cities every day. We're outmatched. There aren't enough designers and developers to battle every platform or editors and writers to populate every screen size. Defeating the zombies will require flexibility and stamina—in our content.
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watchMike did an excellent case study on how the BBC used Domain-Driven Design (a grandparent of OOUX) to revolutionize how the BBC creates, manages, publishes, and displays their massive trove of media. He reminds us that users "are not interested in a video, [they] are interested in what the video is about. [They] are interested in real things—real world things."
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readHave you heard the term "Object-Oriented?" Thought maybe it only applies to developers and techies? Think again. Paul makes the case that it's just about time we all started getting on board the Object-Oriented thought train as a way of viewing and deconstructing systems.
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readSoftware engineer, UXer, and researcher Dr. Jensen explains Gestalt psychology and why it's relevant to the design of intuitive software. She gives great arguments that remind us to avoid shapeshifters and masked objects!
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These are MIke Atherton's slides for his 2013 "half-day introduction to content modeling and the creation and management of structured, adaptive content" workshop. Delivered at IA Summit 2013.
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see slidesA classic piece on task-oriented navigation vs object-oriented navigation that deftly references more classic pieces of writing on the subject.
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readCare about content? As devices and channels multiply and users expect to share information quickly, we need content that can go more places, more seamlessly. "Content Everywhere" will help you start making content more future-ready, flexible, reusable, manageable, and meaningful wherever it needs to go.
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buyTom Dayton currently consults through his company, Presto Innovation. He counts silicon valley startups and being an 11-year NASA Ames Research Center veteran among his many impressive professional accomplishments. In this article he outlines our ubiquitous computer future, and guess what? It's object-oriented.
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readOOUX stands on the shoulders of giants! Lovinger was writing about content modeling back in 2012, pioneering the ideas of structured content.
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