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11
Dec

off-topic : Tee-shirt design

by Tal Zubalsky on 4:37 pm 12 Comments

This is a bit off-topic, but I just submitted my t shirt design to threadless, and I’ll be glad if you check it out.
If by any chance you’re a registered threadless user – VOTE (and help get it printed)

Here’s my design : “The Texas Gardener”
The Texas Gardener

Thanks!
Tal.

Categories: Graphical Design — Tags: , —
09
Dec

Keeping it simple: Structure and logic (3/5)

by Tal Zubalsky on 1:59 pm 2 Comments

From the start of Octabox’s development we always knew we want to create a platform that answers information management needs in a simple way, and we made some mistakes trying to figure out how to make it work. The biggest mistake of all was not putting ourselves in our users shoes – not learning their specific needs.

We did what anyone else would do – look at the competition, learn from their successes and mistakes, and come up with differentiating features for our platform.
While what we came up with looked somewhat simple, it was in fact problematic – it had too many layers of data and the relationship and hierarchy between those layers wasn’t clear and intuitive for the user to understand.

For a quite a long time we struggled with how we’re going to nail this one: how can we answer the different / diverse / complex needs of our potential audience, without limiting their options for organizing data. Is there a simple solution?

We created several user-stories, from a wide range of freelancer and small business types and tried to analyze similar patterns in their “information-habits” – What tools they use and how they categorize and organize their information.

The conclusion was, well, simple: there is no common-ground.

The only thing in common for our users was the tools they use and not how they use them to manage information. Almost everyone needs a task list, but one user will use it as a simple shopping-for-the-office checklist and the other will use a set of task lists as a project management tool.

Similarly, there are multiple approaches to categorizing information – one user may be a freelancer working with one big client about many projects (project-based approach) while the other works with many clients one project each (client-based approach).

The answer that we found answers those custom needs and lets the users use the same tools but in different ways. As the diagram explains – the hierarchy of data is custom-created by the user. He can create contexts based on his way of managing his work and information, and then nest the relevant tools and data inside those contexts.

Here is how the two different types of users I talked about earlier would use Octabox:


Projects Based

Clients Based


Those two approaches can also be mixed to create an ideal flow for a particular user.

We feel the user-based (personal) versus tool-based (functional) approach is much more appropriate for freelancers and small business. Those kind of users need to flexibility in managing their data, and mix-and-match several approaches to create their ideal workflow.

Categories: Business, Information Management — Tags: , , —
04
Dec

Using your Octabox account to work with non-users

by Eran Galperin on 5:10 pm 0 Comments

One of the problems of information management solutions such as Octabox is handling collaboration with people who are not necessarily users. For example, you use Octabox to manage one of your projects and would like to collaborate with your clients on it yet they are not Octabox users. How can you (and we) make it as easy as possible for them to participate?

Approaches to information sharing

Other applications have tried various approaches - basecamp allows you to register additional users (depending on your subscription plan), so you can add your colleagues and clients without forcing them to go through the registration process. This approach delegates the process to an active user, based on the assumption he has the most incentive to do so.

Google applications such as Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Reader all share the same user credentials - meaning that if you already have an account on one of those, you can access all the others just the same. This approach works well for Google, whose some of its apps have a massive user-base.

Sharing information in Octabox

Getting back to Octabox, we too have our own take on the subject. Data in Octabox is mostly grouped by pages of different types (such as a task list, a contact group, a whiteboard and more), and those in turn are grouped by contexts (read more on the Features page on our site). Contexts are personal and are relevant only to the user who created them, but pages can be shared with other people.

Sharing to other Octabox users is easy - they receive the shared page into their Dispatch (a container for outside information streaming into an Octabox account), and after assigning it to one of their contexts, they use it as like any other page they have (while sharing the information between all the users shared to the page). But what about non-Octabox users? how can they participate in the activity on one of those pages?

Our approach is to allow non-Octabox users their own interface with which they can access pages shared to them. They receive a URL address which uniquely identifies the page they were shared on, and they can interact with it right away. Basically, they become limited users without registering or signing in, and they receive a slimmed down version of Octabox that is focused only on whats relevant to them (the shared page in question).

Non-Octabox users can be invited to collaborate on pages simply by inserting their Email address in the sharing interaction (or selecting them from the contact list). If the sharing user requires greater information security, he can provide a page-specific password which will be used by all non-Octabox users.

Everybody wins

So what’s our incentive to allow use of Octabox’s services for free by any non-Octabox user? there are a few actually:

  1. Increase the value of the platform for our users. The more value it has for them, the higher their inclination to become subscribed users. A happy customer is a returning customer :)
  2. Expose potential-users to the platform. We believe in our product and that if we just let people experience it they might decide it is useful for them.
  3. Allow solitary users who are not a part of a user group (for example: freelancers!) to experience the collaboration aspect of Octabox, which so far we believe is its strongest suite.

We see it as a win-win situation - we hope this feature helps reduce the barriers of collaboration through Octabox, increasing its value and possibly attracting additional users. It is still under development but will be released into production soon, so all you beta testers are in for a treat :)

(By the way, if you wish to join our private - and soon public - beta test, head over here to register).

Categories: Features — Tags: , , , —
30
Nov

Keeping it simple : Design and UI (2/5)

by Tal Zubalsky on 9:52 pm 4 Comments

This is the 2nd of 5 short posts about Octabox’s approach to simplicity.

One of our main guidelines during development is that the user’s information comes first. Nothing should stand in the user’s way to his information: not banners or alerts, not screen-blockers or any other graphical distractions.

We apply this principle by designing the UI to be as focused, simple and clear as we possibly can.

Octabox Dashboard
(click the image to view full size)

The main work-area is centered and white – hovering above the darker background, making it feel closer to the user. The navigation is placed on the top and the sides, not taking the eye’s focus from the main area – but still – remaining noticeable, quickly and easily accessible.

We try very hard to stay true to our principles while dealing with issues like:

  • Different screen resolutions (yes, some still have those 17″ CRT monitors running with 1024×768 …)
  • Fluid UI (yes, some work with that history bar docked to the left)
  • Cross-browser support (unfortunately, some still use Internet Explorer 6)

We don’t think minimalistic design takes the place of an aesthetic, modern design and the feedback we got so far on the UI has been confirming our believes.

We use less detail, graphic elements and visual load on the user’s eye to make the user feel the application revolves around him and his info, making it easier on the user to consume his relevant data easily and in a focused, productive way.

In my next post in this series, I will cover our simple approach to structure and logic.

Categories: Graphical Design, Web Development — Tags: , , —
30
Nov

Keeping it simple (1/5)

by Tal Zubalsky on 9:52 pm 0 Comments

No one wants complications. It’s as simple as that.

I’m Tal, one of Octabox’s creators, and Octabox’s designer and user experience specialist. I have learned animation and design and have been working in the field for 5 years specializing in web, UI and interaction design, as well as animation and post production for television and music videos.

In the following short posts I will elaborate a bit about our approach to simplicity in the various aspects of the development process:

  • Simple design and UI
  • Simple approach to structure and logic (Very soon)
  • Simple interactions and usability (soon)
  • Simple approach to sharing (soon)

We live by these principles day in and day out, trying our best to incorporate them into our products. We always keep them on the back of our minds in every step we take because we feel simplicity and focus are the key to a successful, useful service, to you – our users.

Categories: Graphical Design, Web Development — Tags: —
24
Nov

Yep, we’re in (private) Beta!

by Eran Galperin on 4:11 pm 0 Comments

So without much fanfare, Octabox web platform has launched into the world on October 10th. This phase is a closed one as we want to make sure the quality is way up there before we unleash the platform on the general public.

User feedback has been excellent thus far - people have taken a liking to the UI and overall feel. There are definitely some things to improve and more functionality to be added before it is ready for a public unveiling - but we are very excited and feel to be on the right direction.

Hand in hand with the platform launch, we have relaunched our marketing site with a new look (we wrote a post on the logo selection process a couple of months ago). The site contents are still somewhat raw, but if google analytics statistics are to be trusted the improvement over the previous site is major.

From now on we’ll be updating our blog on a regular basis, discussing upcoming features and sharing personal experiences from the startup process. We hope to hear from you as well!

Categories: Business —
03
Sep

Octabox has a new logo and a launch date

by Eran Galperin on 1:04 am 4 Comments

It has been a long time since our last post here, and we’ve been busy as all hell (I especially moved on to writing mostly on my own personal blog). But we have been making steady progress towards a release (still self-funded by the way).

We have recently contracted a logo project at crowdSPRING, a community design site in which multiple designers submit concepts to design projects. Our project was a huge success (we hold the current record with 504 different submissions to our project), and we enjoyed the process immensely. You can check out our new logo at the site.

We also marked a release date for a our public version (yeah, finally!) - it’s September 30th. While nothing is guaranteed in life escpecially in web development, we are definitely on course to make this milestone.

With the new logo we will be redesigning our website soon, and also put up fresh and more relevant content on our service. We’ll keep you posted.

Categories: Graphical Design, Start up —
17
May

techfounder is online

by Eran Galperin on 12:25 am 0 Comments

I’ve finally wrapped up my personal blog and it went online today. There I intend to write much more technical articles about some hard-core web-development spiced up with some opinions on the web and personal interests.

You are welcomed to visit - techfounder.

Categories: Uncategorized —
26
Apr

Is Vista Salvageable?

by Eran Galperin on 4:54 am 2 Comments

I just finished reading a post that popped up in my feed about another Vista user ‘upgrading’ back to Windows XP. This is nothing new, I have read such depressing stories before (and people are getting more creative). I got my first taste of Vista just about a month ago, and I can confirm its suckiness is at an all time high.

It’s been over a year since Vista launched, and it doesn’t seem to be getting better. Windows 98 and XP had their launch problems and users were slow to migrate, but it was never bad when the it was such a consensus that upgrading to Vista is actually a major downgrade. It’s hard for me to see a good way for Microsoft to resolve this. Besides fixing all the compatibility issues (which is a MAJOR undertaking), do they have any intention of reworking the UI? What if this version of Windows never replaces XP as the main Windows product?

Bill Gates has basically admitted “Yep, it sucked ass” in this video. For how long does will this farce continue?

I feel this is the time for a major OS developer to come forth. Loyalty to Microsoft is at an all time low, with users hanging on to their old (and sometimes key-expired) version of Windows XP. A serious player could make a major splash and maybe even make a dent with a good product (And sorry Linux people, mainstream users are not ready for command-line goodness). Maybe if someone took some Linux build (Ubuntu anyone?) and made a commercial ready product out of it? One can only hope.

Categories: General —
16
Apr

Lets Schedule A Meeting And Talk About It

by Eran Galperin on 1:50 am 1 Comment

To survive in the startup game you need partners and investors. You’ll come across many people who say they can help but somehow you (I?) always feel like they’re lacking in urgency.
They’ll always say “Lets schedule a meeting and talk about it”, and that meeting will always be a several weeks from now. And then it will require another meeting, and another meeting, and it will test your patience. You are thinking to yourself, “Man, this is a hot deal. Why are we moving so slow?”

Personally, I hate this stalling tactic. I understand people are busy, but so am I. If I can make time to meet you NOW, so can you.

I liked this strip from the classic comic TheVC. Why don’t you say no now?

Categories: Business, Start up —
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