Using Drupal UX team evolution as an example. Presented at FOSDEM 2015

1. Bootstrapping UX
design in your open
source project
@RoyScholten – FOSDEM 2015

2. Why bother?
● Still need convincing?
● Usable → Useful → Delightful

3. Quick Drupal retro
● A very big open source project
● Content management system
● Modular, fexible, extensible

4. Drupal 6
● 2008/2009
● 2 full blown lab tests
● Nobody made it through all the
tasks
● Panic!

5. Drupal 7
● 2008/2011
● UX in the spotlight
● Community UX team
● Hired designers for the bigger
vision

6. Drupal 8
● 2011 –…
● More specifc eforts
● Tackling harder problems
● Codifying patterns, guidelines

7. Lets bootstrap…
● Usability test
● Reviews
● Build a design culture
● Attracting designers

8. Usability test
● Gets you data instead of opinions
● Show the pain
● Helps prioritize eforts
● Sets a baseline. The next test will
show you whether things have
improved

9. Reviews
● Ask an interaction) designer to
review the user interface
● There are heuristics (Tognazzini,
Nielsen,…)
● What are the top support requests?

10. Design culture
● Project lead must champion the
cause
● Develop a vision, have principles
● Set priorities
● Allow for design process to happen

11. Build a design culture
● Adapt tools & processes
● Make developers better at design
● Show the work
● Attract designers

12. Tools & processes
● Tags in the bug tracker
● Screenshots!
● User centered design process

13. Developers getting
better at design
● Learnability, Efciency &
performance, Memorability, Safety,
Satisfaction

14. Show the work
● Show the process
● Have regular meetings
● Document standards, patterns
● drupal.org/ui-standards

15. Attract designers
● You don't need many!
● Clear point of entry on your site
● Start within your user base
● An open source design article on
Smashingmagazine.com might
work though!