[thelist] Dinah begs your gracious attention re: her book

Dinah Sanders metagrrrl at yahoo.com
Tue Mar 27 18:25:21 CST 2001


Hello Evoltfolk,

Some of you may remember me from the old monkeyjunkies days and might
even remember my thesis, to which some fine monkeys contributed,
"Documentation of the Design Process in Online Environments".

Well, those fine folks at New Riders Press have asked me to update it
and turn it into a book. Since I don't want to go through all that work
to give the world something it doesn't really need, I thought it might
be good to get focused by asking a few questions. If you have time to
send me your thoughts on this topic, I'd be most grateful.

NOTE: DO NOT SEND YOUR REPLY TO THE LIST
SEND IT TO ME at book1 @ metagrrrl.com
I'll keep all y'all posted as the project proceeds and I make new
resources available (New Riders insists on companion websites for their
books, so if all goes well, you'll have a new resource coming your
way).

Thanks to all of you for keeping the questioning, answering and sharing
ideas alive!

cheers,
Dinah Sanders 
(a.k.a. MetaGrrrl)

p.s. Yes, it is true. I really did have CoffeeCoffeeBuzzBuzzBuzz ice
cream late one night and it was not, in fact, a good bedtime snack.

++++++++++++++ The Questions ++++++++++++++

I'm working on a book which will probably be called "Documentation And
Design On The Web" and I'd like just a teensy bit of help from you.


Those of you who've read my thesis MetaGrrrl Proposal on Documentation
of the Design Process in Online Environments
(http://www.metagrrrl.com/design/proposal.htm) know some of how I'll be
approaching the topic, but I believe it is important to extend the
scope. I intend to reflect the changes of the 3 years since the thesis
was written and to present a broader range of solutions to the
challenge of creating reproducible design quality. I should mention
that I am using the word design in a very broad sense here,
encompassing not only creation of visual appearance but also of user
experience, information architecture and the underlying code.


To my knowledge, very little has been written about how we can document
our work on the web in order to understand the decisions we made in its
creation. My goal is to introduce the Why and How of design
documentation and to present a roundtable of solutions to draw from. To
this end, I would love to hear the answers to a few questions.


Your response to any or (bless you) all of these 10 questions will be
very helpful and deeply appreciated. Please send them to book1 @
metagrrrl.com (and NOT TO THIS LIST, thanks)

1. Would you be interested in a book about documentation of the design
process in online environments and/or do you see the need for such a
book?


2. Have you ever read any books/articles/websites on the topic?
(Pointers to any commendable or offensive examples would be spiffy)


3. If you answered yes to question 1, what would you expect/want to
find in such a book? (Follow-on questions: What would make it useful to
read once? What would make it a useful resource on an ongoing basis?


4. What about an accompanying website? What would you expect/want to
find there?


5. In either the book or the website, what would be essential
introductory information on this topic?


6. In either the book or the website, what would be valuable/exciting
advanced content on this topic?


7. Do you currently document your web (or interaction or user
experience or print or programming) design work? If no, why not? If
yes, how and/or using what tools?


8. Are you interested in participating in this project as a critical
reader, visual designer and/or as part of the "roundtable" of
solutions?


9. Is there someone else I should really talk to too about this?
(Please do feel free to forward this email, of course)


10. Is there anything else you'd care to add?


Please accept my deepest thanks for your attention. 





=====
Dinah Sanders,
MetaGrrrl
http://www.metagrrrl.com

------------------------
Ignore this other junk:


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Get email at your own domain with Yahoo! Mail. 
http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/?.refer=text




More information about the thelist mailing list