#65 And a wow...
A little bit of this and a little bit of that.
I am currently reading the book Two Heads, a graphic novel about neuroscience and how brains work. I got it for my son earlier this year, since he really likes comics and science. In the middle of a book is a section about the scientific process. We think user research for a website or app is tricky, try figuring out which parts of the brain are responsible for different activities or cause certain types of mental disorders.
In my role as designer, I try to strike the balance between intuition and data. Sometimes you have just go for what feels right, and sometimes admit that you have no clue which options is better one. Data can also often be misleading - maybe you don’t have enough to be statistically relevant or the process was flawed or it’s the good old “correlation != causation”. No clear answer here, just something to continuously keep in mind and balance well, although I do think that experience should improve the sensitivity and accuracy of intuition over time.
Other non-fiction graphic novels that my son (13) and I liked:
Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art (all UX designers should read this)
Cartoon Introduction to Economics: Microeconomics and Macroeconomics
Back to business, various things are in progress with Saving Satoshi. I helped with QA and testing, we figured out a better direction for scripting challenges, and I found a good direction for chapter 4 visuals. Chapter 3 is about a 51% attack and the images focus on people. In Chapter 4, the learner constructs their own wallet/address, which is a purely digital solitary activity. But there is also some unique bitcoin magic happening and I think we can visually lean into that.
Also had some good progress on Bitcoin Core App planning. At least from the design side, I have a good idea on how we can break things down into 7 mini-projects to systematically construct the new experience feature by feature. Here’s a visual map of the whole application with new screens (new to V2) highlighted & color-coded.
More discussions to be had this week. But can’t wait to get hands-on again with this design. First step will likely be the navigation restructuring.
Wallet Scrutiny will soft-launch this week, maybe even today. I am doing some really minor launch QA support, but Leo and Ed are in the spotlight now to deliver this update. It’s a soft-launch, so there can be some time for live testing and feedback. Something always comes up.
Also made some progress on the UI Kit. Main thing right now is to refresh all the screens on the website, which are super outdated. Plan is to revise one user flow per day. I am tracking the progress here. Revision includes ensuring screens are clean, consistent with the guide, and well-documented. I am also looking for opportunities to improve components, especially with the new Variables feature Figma announced this week.
Speaking of Figma. The new features all look great. I would just be more excited if I could expect to ever use them. Free accounts get some basics, but much of the good stuff is paid and/or enterprise only. And paid accounts are just not possible with our type of open-source collaboration. How could I use dev mode, variable modes, or branching for free open-source community projects when anyone who wants to use them has to pay $45 and can’t even properly collaborate then because of the team/org focus? Figma’s product is amazing, their account system is not. I am getting a hunch that long-term we really need Penpot in order to have really good open-source design workflows, which also have a conference this week.
Alright, it’s Monday, let’s get back to things. Have a good one.
👻