Duncan Stephen

Article — 23 December 2019 — 1,503 words

Pedestrian ways

Accessibility — Architecture — Human-centred approaches — Society

Town planners in the mid-20th century faced a big problem. The advent of the motor car brought increased congestion and safety risks. Planners wrongly thought that separating pedestrians and vehicles on different levels was the solution. If you know where to look, you can still see remnants of this thinking.

Article — 14 December 2019 — 1,475 words

5×5k — A tale of five Parkruns

Personal

I’ve been running on-and-off for about six years. But it was only a year ago that I took part in my first Parkrun. Since then, I have done five different Parkruns in four different locations. My aim was always to run a sub-25 minute 5k. But it somehow always eluded me — until the fifth one.

Article — 8 December 2019 — 178 words

I’ll be speaking at UX Scotland 2020

Service design — User experience — User research

Work: Learn Foundations

The session will outline the comprehensive programme of user research the University of Edinburgh’s User Experience Service conducted on behalf of the Learn Foundations project. It will show how, as the project went along, we adopted a service design approach in order to better meet the needs of both students and staff.

Article — 28 November 2019 — 520 words

The false paradox — accessibility and aesthetics

Accessibility — User experience

Accessibility and aesthetics are not in conflict, despite the claims of some.

Article — 12 November 2019 — 430 words

Get out of your comfort zone and talk with people

Business — User experience — User research

To do good stuff, you have to get out of your comfort zone. 10 years ago, just before I got my first job after graduating, I was a scared person. I still am.

Article — 28 October 2019 — 240 words

Crawick Multiverse

Travel

At the weekend, we visited Crawick Multiverse, a land art installation in Dumfries and Galloway designed by Charles Jencks.

Article — 15 October 2019 — 815 words

User experience lessons from a university dumping Blackboard

User experience — User research

One university got so frustrated with Blackboard they finally ditched it. But this experience highlights a big problem with almost all enterprise software.

Article — 28 September 2019 — 385 words

I’m getting rid of 18 years’ worth of plastic CD wrappers

Music — Personal

I’m not entirely sure why I started collecting them. Probably a mixture of liking some of them, and thinking that keeping them would make my CD collection more valuable.

Article — 22 September 2019 — 376 words

Alex and I had a great time riding a chopper over Edinburgh

Personal

We had another incredibly kind wedding present from some of our friends — a helicopter tour of Edinburgh!

Article — 16 September 2019 — 1,544 words

We cracked the Crystal Maze in Manchester

Personal — Travel

My expectations were already high. But they were surpassed. Let me emphasise this: The Crystal Maze Experience was way better than I expected. Which was already very good.

Article — 9 September 2019 — 296 words

What to do if a user talks about faster horses

User experience — User research

It turns out Henry Ford never said that quote about faster horses. That’s not to say we shouldn’t pay attention to the sentiment of the quote, however.

Article — 7 September 2019 — 52 words

Understanding what students really need from a virtual learning environment

Service design — User experience — User research

Work: Learn Foundations

Slides from my Edinburgh UX meetup talk on Monday 2 September 2019, about the user research we have been conducting around the needs of students and staff working with course materials digitally at the University of Edinburgh. See the more detailed blog posts about this project over at the Website and Communications team blog.