Articles by Joyce

At the heart of every designer or developer’s office is their browser. The internet provides a plethora of online applications and add-ons. This suite is dedicated to making sure that your browser becomes the ultimate productivity suite.

Browser: Firefox

Because of the useful options already provided by Firefox, its popularity is growing. There are numerous free downloadable extensions and add-ons available on the web for Firefox. Here are just a few add-ons that keep my productivity levels high:

PDF Download – Lets you convert any (unsecured) Web page into a high-quality PDF that’s great for archiving, printing and sharing.

Firebug – Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page.

Read It Later – Save pages of interest to read when you have the time.

Word Processing: Google Docs

I use Google Docs for word processing. Sure, it doesn’t offer every feature that MS Word does, but it contains almost every necessary feature, function and utility to make it the best online word processor. You can export files in all the necessary formats — .doc, .txt, .rtf, .odt, .pdf and more! — and the online storage is easy to organize, safe and secure, and conveniently tied to your Gmail account.

Online Storage: Dropbox OR YouSendIt

For small files, it’s easiest to just .zip them and email them. For big stuff, you’ve either got to go with one of the many free upload websites (YouSendIt) or get your own upload space (Dropbox). Both allow you to send files up to 2GB. Even the most frugal of online workers can find ample space to store work-in-progress designs, documents and other important files. This also reduces the risks and costs with secure managed file transfer that seem like hours when trying to send via FTP.

Presentations: Prezi

Powerpoint and Keynote are great tools. But with Prezi is a browser-based application. Instead of putting every mindless detail on a separate slide, Prezi allows users to lay out your presentations on a single plane and move through them at their speed, in their own order, and if required, change the presentation on the fly.

Calendar and Scheduling: Google Calendar

This one’s nice and simple, with features that will keep you remembering dates and appointments. Simply set your schedule in the simple interface, decide whether or not you want SMS reminders, and leave it for the week. Check out some features we highlighted using our Google Calendar.

These tools are all part of my office suite. Once you implement all or even just a few of these tools, I hope you will see a dramatically increase in your productivity and make your work easier than ever. Would love to hear what applications or platforms keep you productive.

Map Illustration Software

Anyone who has ever had to produce a location map knows how much time can be used up on the simplest things! MapDiva sounds like it will give Adobe Illustrator, the current software of choice, some competition! Touted as simple to use and priced low, with the emphasis on map creation, Ortelius not only allows designers to use their own geographic information, but includes fully editable, royalty-free vector outline maps of regions, countries, continents, and the world, to get you off to a quick start.

Thanks to the program’s 20 tools, designers have open options of choice of colors, fills, strokes, and adornments that allow them to assemble unlimited style and symbol combinations. Ortelius also includes WYSIWYG drawing and editing; layers and layer groups; and automatic junctions and style transitions.

Read all about it, and try out a free trial of the Ortelius Standard Edition for the MAC.

Getty Stockphoto for Web & Mobile

While one tends to think of Getty Images as a provider of expensive, high-end imagery, the firm has broadened its range in recent years with the acquisition of iStockphoto. But Getty has targeted another set of image buyers who are developing web and mobile content, and often need hundreds of images at smaller file sizes with the Getty Web & Mobile Images products.

The release of the new Web & Mobile image products featuring very small file sizes designed specifically for online and mobile use. As an extension of the firm’s $49 web-resolution offering, the new product features very small sizes – 170 pixels and 280 pixels. The huge selection of high-quality imagery and illustrations are appropriately priced – starting around $5 – and in ready-to-use formats that are ideal for use in mobile, website, email marketing, banner ads, widgets and other web application environments.

A hacker attack this morning, shut down Twitter, and Facebook, and Live Journal. Twitter said in its status blog that it was “defending against a denial-of-service attack.”

OK, but how was I going to let people know what I’m having for lunch? Or that the sun is finally out?

The outage began at about 9 a.m. EDT, and still had lingering access problems midday, though both Twitter and Facebook seemed to be functioning at least intermittently, giving social media addicts a collective sigh of relief.

A public-relations manager in Manhattan, said she felt completely lost.”I had to GOOGLE SEARCH Twitter to find out what was going on, when normally my Twitter feed gives me all the breaking news I need.” OH, lighten up!

Some are keeping their sense of humor.

We are hording tinned foods and begun sacrificing our pets in case this truly is the beginning of the end. We can hear looting in the streets. We can smell cars burning. We can sense peoples microblogging frustration. We are crying to ourselves. TechChuff

It’s all fun and games till WoW goes down too, and we have to fend off the hoard of zombie-men stumbling into the streets in search of cheetos and brains. Roy

What about the children?? antje wilsh

Nine months after …. a lot of babies will born! daniel

Smashingmagazine.com is one of my favorite sites to check.  As a mom whose kids didn’t like to grocery shop with me because of my opinions of the use of type fonts or color on packaging, I found this article inspiring!

No one understands the statement “design is everywhere” better than designers.

For instance, when it’s time to grocery shop, do you treat the experience as a journey through Design Mecca – with sources of inspiration lining the shelves from wall to wall? When you’re waiting on the unbearably slow line at the post office, do you make note of the ugly signage covering the walls and kill the time by redesigning it better in your head?

The next time you go out, why not make a conscious effort to spend the time observing all the graphic design you see around you: from pothole covers to food receipts and anything that catches your eye?

Read the full article by Stephanie Orma, and take the ‘How Good Is My DesignDar?’ test online here.