details of a global brain

Notes from Prof. Dipl.-Des. Oliver Wrede

  • Watching the Republican Presidential Candidate Race

    Watching the Republican Presidential Candidate Race. The GOP party is now witnessing the result of their constant “dumbing down” of the public about politics and political reasoning. It makes it much harder for candidates to create momentum with rational arguments about political issues. It opened a chance for a candidate that is unfit for a…

  • Kids should learn programming!

    Blogger Nico Lumma recently published a rant on Handelsblatt about Germany (and probably other countries) are wasting time by not letting children learn to program in school. There have been initiatives like http://code.org/ to promote »coding« as a basic skill of the future: … or a recent German version »Jeder kann programmieren« … And maybe…

  • Fargo: Outliner for Bloggers!

    Finally! Fargo is an online tool for writing in outlines to a WordPress blog. Very good. Outlining has been underestimated as a writing tool – but there was barely any way to edit content without a desktop software – like OmniOutliner – this way. I was using Userland Software (Frontier with Manila – later Radio)…

  • SwiftKey Flow

    SwiftKey Flow is a way to use swiping for text input. It is supported by a selection of word predictions for quick completion:

  • Qeexo detects different touch methods on an Android phone

    Qeexo wants to bring new dimensions of touch to interactive surfaces, and make better use of the natural richness of our hands! Fingers have many “modes” – they do not just poke, as contemporary touchscreen interaction would suggest, but also flick, rub, knock, grasp, and many other actions.

  • SIGraDI 2012

    I will be giving a keynote presentation at SIGraDI 2012 conference in Fortaleza in the middle of November and I am looking forward to that. It has been quite a while I visited northern Brazil for a conference. I was presenting on the 1st Software Design Conference in Campina Grande, Paraiba, in 1996. The Internet…

  • Testing World Outliner

    This is just a test with the WordPress editing tool of Dave Winers OPML Editor and Word Outliner software. I owe Dave Winer a lot. He invented Frontier (which apparantly is running at the core of the OPML Editor). It got me into Blogging in 1996. I experimented a lot with it at the time…

  • New seminars for winter semester

    Two new seminars have been announced for the winter semester (details in German). These seminars are open to all students starting from 3rd semester. »Data Transformation« Lecturers: Prof. Dipl.-Des. Oliver Wrede A seminar for information design interactive media in the context of topics like »Data Journalism«, Generative Gestaltung, »Big Data«, Datenvisualisierung, »Information Mapping«, Informationsgrafik, Data…

  • OK. Reset!

    Well, as this blog obviously shows: I simply did not have the time to blog in the past (the Twitter account is more active). The past years have been of that sort. There is too much going on and I started to contemplate for a moment if I should revoke the old blogging habit from…

  • The ROI of User Experience

    In this animated video Dr. Susan Weinschenk demonstrates how user centered design results in significant return on investment (ROI). (PDF-Download)

  • Hot Topics in Information Design

    I have accepted to work for the Information Design Journal as Special Interest Editor. I want to think in the open about this: What is a “hot topic” anyway? In my view there are four criteria for any topic to be “hot”: the news value actuality amount of discussion in the community touching “high-level aspects”…

  • G-Speak

    (Via Dynamic Information Design Seminar Blog) Minority Report science adviser and inventor John Underkoffler demos g-speak — the real-life version of the film’s eye-popping, tai chi-meets-cyberspace computer interface. Is this how tomorrow’s computers will be controlled? G-Speak is a really interesting concept. Right now I do not feel it is where it should be to…

  • IA conference 2010

    I am at the IA Konferenz 2010 in Cologne (my hometown). Would have been a crime to miss this conference here. Met James Kalbach , Søren Muus, Jason Hobbs (I owe him a written commentary to his talk) and others… I need to write more but until I find the time to do that I suggest to look…

  • Björn Hartmann: Enlightened Trial and Error

    Björn Hartmann (Stanford HCI Group) talks about the different prototyping tools he and his collaborators have built to address two research questions: 1) How can tools enable designers to create prototypes of ubiquitous computing interfaces? 2) How can design tools support the larger process of learning from these prototypes? (Duration: 1 hour, 13 minutes; this…

  • When faces become hyperlinks

    The algorithms for facial recognition have improved a lot in recent years. Here is a company showing a working prototype of a mobile app that recognizes faces and attaches links to social network layers to them: The prototype was shown last year — but there was a live demo at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelone…

  • Create some music with Flash?

    There is a new release of the Hobnox Audiotool coming up! Until release you can play with iNudge:

  • 10/GUI & con10uum

    10/GUI (by Clayton Miller) is an novel approach to human-computer interaction. But it draws attention to the fine line designers will need to walk to effectively create physical human-computer interactions. The video demonstrates the potential advantages of navigating within a desktop interface with up to ten fingers, rather than via a single cursor: [More on…

  • Mouse 2.0?

    These research prototypes for future computer mice by Microsoft are very interesting approaches:

  • Next generation of devices: Tablets

    There have been many attempts to make a computer work from your pocket and without a keyboard. Apple is rumored to work on a tablet device. It has invented the Newton Message Pad over 15 years ago – which was a marvelous (but expensive) device at that time. Microsoft is working on a new prototype…

  • GPS + Compass + Motion sensors = Augmented Reality

    The new iPhone 3GS adds a compass to the set of sensors. Combined with the GPS, the motion detection sensor and some image change detection via the internal video camera, this enables a new breed of “augmented reality” applications. NearestWiki for example displays WikiPedia entries about buildings and places in the vicinity. NearestWiki is not…

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