sharepointforsocial-blog

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(via Microsoft taps Kinect to Create First 3D Scan of Sir Isaac Newton)

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An excellent summary of the major changes for designers in SharePoint 2013, by Randy Driskell.  Covers the major changes around managed navigation, design manager and device channels in a way that makes the basics clear before we launch forth into developing.

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The intranet is changing. Rapidly. Where is yours going?

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There’s a German word for it, of course: Sehnsucht, which translates as “addictive yearning.” This is, I think, what these sites evoke: the feeling of being addicted to longing for something; specifically being addicted to the feeling that something is missing or incomplete. The point is not the thing that is being longed for, but the feeling of longing for the thing. And that feeling is necessarily ambivalent, combining both positive and negative emotions.

Pinterest, Tumblr and the Trouble With ‘Curation’ - NYTimes.com (via thisistheverge)

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Adobe updater at its most existential…

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Top SharePoint guru, Joel Oleson, has a look at the new features of SharePoint 2013.

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Pervasive Social Networking – We’re expanding on SharePoint’s collaboration tools by adding rich new microblogging, newsfeed, community and other social features. Pervasive following of people, sites, documents and hashtags across SharePoint means you can see and act on the latest information in one place. In addition, last month we announced Microsoft is acquiring Yammer, the fastest growing enterprise social networking vendor, and that after the acquisition closes, we will expand the connections between Yammer and SharePoint and other Microsoft technologies.

The MS SharePoint Team Blog: http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/blog/Pages/BlogPost.aspx?pID=1012

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Microsoft’s Courier-like radial menu for OneNote Windows 8 (hands-on)

Microsoft launched its Customer Preview of Office 2013 yesterday, providing an early look at the desktop versions of its next-generation Office suite. The software maker also announced and released a Metro style OneNote app for Windows 8, complete with a new radial menu system. Taking elements from Microsoft’s Courier tablet, the new OneNote radial menu is the center piece for Microsoft’s touch-centric note taking app. The radial menu includes quick access to font options and colors, as well as feature to insert and edit elements such as tables.

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Microsoft explains the making of the Windows 8 touch keyboard

Microsoft has posted its latest entry on the Building Windows 8 blog exploring some of the ergonomic and functionally challenging aspects of typing on a touchscreen versus a more traditional keyboard. In order to offer its users the most comfortable and accurate on-screen keyboard, Microsoft did copious amounts of research ranging from ergonomics trials to adaptive key layouts.

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This blog post is one of my favourites - of course, Einstein and SharePoint are two paths that never crossed - but applying his most famous quotes to SharePoint creates an amazingly rich and accurate framework of discussions that all SharePoint experts should learn from. 

Here are some great examples:

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.” – Albert Einstein

“If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.” – Albert Einstein

“Information is not knowledge.” – Albert Einstein

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New Pinterest for SharePoint Infographics!

I collect infographics for SharePoint as if they are going out of fashion (which they aren't - in fact they are becoming increasingly prevalent!).

I am pulling them together as a Pinterest board - and they look so cool - so thought I'd share!

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A Morning of SharePoint...

...and I am reminded of one of my pet SharePoint hates - it's error messages.

When this error appeared this morning, the first reaction of the user I was working with was 'What did I do wrong?' . SharePoint's error messages are never descriptive, and never all that helpful. With nothing to help you identify what the error means, or how to solve it, users often find themselves trying the same action again - starting a pretty vicious circle which can only end in frustration.

Talking to one of our design team about this frustration of mine, she mentioned Jakob Nielson's heuristics for good basic UI design. As I read through the material she sent, it struck me that a heuristic analysis of the out-of-the-box SharePoint UI would make an awesome piece. 

Watch to for it on the Dachis Group blog later this week.

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Microsoft acquires multitouch company Perceptive Pixel

Steve Ballmer has just announced Microsoft's acquisition of Perceptive Pixel, a company focused on research, development, and production of multitouch interfaces. The company is perhaps best known for the 82-inch multitouch display that Microsoft demoed at MWC. Jeff Han, Perceptive Pixel founder and new Microsoft employee, says the display is the "world's largest true multitouch and stylus display," capable of supporting "hundreds of touch inputs simultaneously." 

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SharePoint and User Journeys

Join Dachis Group London for the second in their 'Making SharePoint More Social' series.

We will be exploring building user journeys for SharePoint.

SharePoint and User Journeys

One of the hardest pieces of communication in any SharePoint project is describing to end users, what SharePoint is there to do. Technologists happily talk about it as a content management system, a collaboration platform or a document and records management system, but none of these take an end user on a journey that they can understand, or engage with.

User journeys are an excellent tool which, when used well, can help conceptualise the interactions a user will undergo in their day to day work with the system, how it will change how they do their job and make things better.

During this session we will look at some of the tools you can use to build user journeys, what role they play in a project, look at some examples and design some of your own!

This session is aimed at practitioners from information, communications and IT who are working with, or are looking at SharePoint as a possible platform for collaboration, information management, document management or as a social intranet.

The event will take place on 24th May 2012 at 6pm, with drinks beforehand starting at 5.15pm and after until 7pm.

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A link to the first in a series of blog posts from Dachis Group London addressing some of the consistent issues we face when working with clients to achieve successful SharePoint adoption. When complete, the series will be made up of the content on the blog, some webinars, content from the session and some examples of the work that we do with our clients - very exciting!