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BarCampRDU was a resounding success. The turnout exceeded our expectations and it didn’t take long to fill up the schedule with sessions. I made some good connections and learned a lot both in sessions I attended and led.

Fred Stutzman showed his knack for leadership and orgainzaton by initiating and driving the conference. He deserves much of the credit, but the conference wouldn’t have been possible without the other organizers, sponsors, and volunteers. I’m looking forward to the next one!

Below are some notes I jotted down in some of the sessions I attended.

Refactoring your WetWare by Andy Hunt

- Discussed the Dreyfus model
- Novice and Experts don’t work in the same way. Novices need rules, experts use intuition
- Certification programs and SWEEBOK don’t work
- Learning by synthesis rather than analysis is much more powerful
- Does design matter? Short answer is yes, that’s how toilet brush makers can charge $6 for their highly designed product.
- R-mode vs L-mode processing
- L-mode thinking tends to dominate
- Draw house example - L-mode takes over and shows a standard house
- How to engage R-mode?
- The more senses you use to work on a problem, the more of your brain will being to work on it.
- For a given design: write it down, draw a picture, describe it verbally, engage in open discussion
- Lozanov Séance
- R-mode to L-mode flow
- “You want to write drunk and revise sober”
- Start off with an R-mode approach to learning (multi-sensory) and then move to L-mode
- Rock climbing experience
- Techniques:
Image streaming
Free-form journaling

Working on a keyboard is a L-mode activity
When you run into a problem, step away from the keyboard

A Whack on the Head
Try to see a problem from a completely different viewpoint
Recommends: Mental Whacks

The magic of an “oracle”

Everyone has good ideas. Few people keep track of them. Even fewer act on them. And even fewer act on them successfully.

If you don’t keep track of great ideas, you’ll stop noticing you have them

Capture good ideas

Keeps Carries Fisher Spacepen and small notepad at all times

Capture isn’t enough, you need to process them
Thinks a personal wiki is the best thing for this

Check out: Pragmatic Learning

Context switching: If you constantly interrupt the task you are working on with will drop your effective IQ by 10 points

Get a second monitor: get productivity improvement by 20-30%
He has two 23 inch monitors for 46 inches of space + 6 virtual desktops organized by function (editing, communication, etc.)

Desktop metaphor is really the Crowded airline seat metaphor

Mailing list available on the topic, email Andy

Sex & Death of Advertising by Martin Smith

- Recommends: Attention Economy
- Infomercials have become extremely costly. As more people do something, the most costly it becomes
- Magnetic Poetry
- Word of mouth is the most powerful advertising, but also the most difficult to get

Social Networking by Fred Stutzman

User Experience by Rick Cecil

- You are not your users
- Best practices
Information Scent
Enough! Not too much, but not too little. General (more) Specific (less)
- As you get more specific, ask if the use really want this? Do they care?
Hick’s Law
Eliminate Errors - (like Google spell checking)
Always allow undo

Set Defaults
Fitts Law - time to acquire a target is a function of the distance to the size of the target (i.e., if you have a button that is important, make it big — and vice versa)
Obviousness
If it needs a sign, it is badly designed