Nov 17 2025

Slava Shestopalov - Everything I Know About UX Research I First Learned From Lt. Columbo

If you don’t know Lieutenant Columbo, I envy you. I wish I could erase my memory and watch this TV masterpiece for the first time again. Columbo, a Los Angeles homicide detective, has become a cult

Ethics , User Research , ux , Design

May 05 2009

Frank Puscher - Optimizing Conversion Rates: Less Effort, More Customers

Most online store designers who want to optimize their conversion rates only concentrate on the “inner” part of the shopping process, the sales funnel. They focus on product pages, the shopping cart

ux , Usability , E-Commerce , Conversion

Aug 24 2012

Jason Gross - The Designer Will Make It Pretty

I am sure that my day job as a designer has a lot of similarities to that of the entire Smashing community. I create wireframes, mockups and concepts. I craft HTML and CSS using methods that I hope

Creativity , Inspiration , Design

Sep 21 2009

Luke Wroblewski - Enhancing User Interaction With First Person User Interface

But sometimes, it makes sense to think of the real world as an interface. To design user interactions that make use of how people actually see the world -to take advantage of first person user inter

ux , Interfaces , Usability , ui

Feb 25 2010

Janko Jovanovic - User Interfaces In Business Web Application Design

Business web application design is too often neglected. I see a lot of applications that don’t meet the needs of either businesses or users and thus contribute to a loss of profit and poor user expe

ux , Web Design , ui

Aug 17 2011

Laura Klein - Breaking The Rules: A UX Case Study

I read a lot of design articles about best practices for improving the flow of sign-up forms. Most of these articles offer great advice, such as minimizing the number of steps, asking for as little

ux , Usability , Case Studies

May 05 2011

Anthony T - Innovative Techniques To Simplify Sign-Ups And Log-Ins

There are many ways to design sign-up and log-in forms. Most designers are familiar with the conventional ways. But understanding and applying a few innovative techniques could make your forms simpl

CAPTCHA , Forms , Security , ux , Usability , Design

Oct 18 2011

Jeff Gothelf - How To Build An Agile UX Team: The Culture

This is the first in a three-part series on how to build and grow successful user experience teams in agile environments. It covers challenges related to organization, hiring and integration that pl

UX Design , Productivity , Software , Process

Nov 08 2012

Christian Holst - Adaptive Vs. Responsive Layouts And Optimal Form Field Labels

Editor’s note: Welcome to a new column in the UX Design section on Smashing Magazine! Each month we’ll pick a handful of popular questions asked by our readers around good practices in designing sma

ux , Usability , ui

Nov 17 2025

Victor Yocco - The Value Of Concept Testing As Part Of Product Design

UX design teams are passionate about our approach to solving problems and providing users with experiences that lead to their desired outcomes. Without some type of user input guiding our process, w

Product Design , testing , User Experience