Sidewalk Graffiti Provides Navigational Assistance For Subway Commuters

"A considerate cartographer wielding a stencil and a can of spray paint has left a helpful navigational compass at the top of the stairs outside the NRW train at Prince Street for commuters exiting the station. As even native New Yorkers cant attest, everyone has exited a subway station and needed a moment to reorient themselves; a directional compass will make it that much easier. The unknown compass crusader stenciled the sidewalk at the uptown 6 train station on Spring Street as well. "

http://nyctheblog.blogspot.com/2010/06/sidewalk-graffiti-provides-navigational.html

I love simple, unobtrusive signage. It can be used in physical space and virtual space. Brainstorming on this example from NYC that painted a compare rose at the exit of subway stations you could use the same technique too

* point to bathrooms near parking

* point to information booths

* point to insert-your-favoriate-coffee-franchise-here

What would you point too?

Helping out Instapaper

The Instapaper iPhone app is wonderful for reading web pages later. Some web site's content does not show up very well because the Instapaper parser can't determine which HTML elements contain the content and what is ephemera. To help it, web sites can add CSS classes that point directly at content and non-content. Add the "instapaper_body" class to the parent content element and "instapaper_ignore" to non-content within the content element. See Preview: Community text-parser configuration for more detail.

I can't swipe horizontally to read email

Yesterday I walked into the Burlington Mall's Apple Store and tried out the iPad for the first time. (I have decided to buy the new iPhone 4 rather than an iPad and so the impulse to have one has waned.) It was much smaller than I expected but this does make it more book-bag friendly. I was very impressed with its speed especially compared to my iPhone 3G. I really wanted it to have a cover. The screen just screams at you "Please take care of me! I am going to be scratched." I don't want a sleeve: Where would I put it when it is not in use? I want a cover that works something like a triptych that folds flat into the back of the iPad or can be folded for use as a stand.

I have been thinking about interface design for the iPhone and iPad for a while now. I have been working through ideas with the design of an issue tracking application as this is a tool I will use every day. (I am a software developer, after all.) I am greatly inspired by Mag+ design. It is such a deep source of ideas. The Mag+ magazine is virtually laid out in a very strong 2d space: The horizontal is used to hold the articles side by side and the vertical is used to hold the article's content. This is a very easy visual model to internalize and it can be used for lots of different kinds of content with strong peer relationships and long content. I had assumed that Apple had this idea too. You see it in their photograph applications, but I was wrong. When reviewing the iPad's email application I was shocked that I could not swipe to view the next or the previous email. This was such a natural gesture that I assumed I did something wrong. As far as I can tell, I did not. Afterwards I realized that I can't swipe horizontally with the iPhone either.