I keep going back and forth on whether or not I think this book is a parody of the Harry Potter series. On the one hand, it really obviously is – magic school in Britain, Chosen One, mysterious villain, rival from Old Money.1 But it’s doing so much more than just poking fun at these things that have become tropes; it has its own story to tell, and a system of magic that honestly makes more sense than anything Rowling ever accomplished.2
But a good part of my enjoyment of the book is also in the contrast with Harry Potter. What if Harry and Draco had been roommates? (And yes, it’s magic, so we do get to say “they can’t just strangle each other, the school has magically-enforced rules about that.”) What was Draco thinking when Harry was doing the “I have to keep an eye on him at all times” thing in their whichever-th year?3
The opening couple chapters are a delight to read. It’s the start of the school year, which makes for a very clear narrative beginning point… except it’s the start of Simon’s final school year, and he’s been a Protagonist all along, so we’re coming in very much in medias res. The amount of “as you know, Bob” is kept very low, which makes it a fun puzzle of “what all Insane Bullshit has he survived so far?”, and I’ve always enjoyed a game of “what’s the setting.”
Suffice it to say, I heartily recommend this – I’ve been trying to reduce the number of books in my to-read pile, but the moment I finished the book I immediately ordered the sequel, so here we are. If you at all like Harry Potter, and want something without the… tainted association of Rowling, please do read this delightful book.
For reference, the titular character, and all the adventures that he went through prior to “Carry On,” made their original appearance in a novel centered around someone’s enjoyment of We Can’t Call It Harry Potter Because Rowling Has Lawyers For That, so it’s no surprise that there’s a lot of clear similarities. ↩
There’s rules! Actual rules, explicitly stated, about how spells are created! And they aren’t “yeah there’s an insane AI somewhere running things, it thinks making us make those noises are funny and rewards us with making stuff happen.” It’s all I ever wanted. ↩
For reference, here’s how I summarized that to my friend, while I was reading: “Harry is over there like ‘he’s gotta be up to something!’ Draco, meanwhile, is like ‘please, I am a fifteen year old boy, I need five minutes of Alone Time to deal with a… personal matter.’” ↩
I remain a complete sucker for good worldbuilding, and this is a very fun world that Hale has built. Gilded Age America, but with magic around, things went a bit differently – not least of which being that a magical war cracked the continent in half, leaving California an ocean away. In the meantime, magic has been severely regulated, and oh, don’t forget the automatons everywhere. It’s an interesting place.
And that’s without touching on the protagonists, who have an astonishing amount of backstory for such a short book.
It’s a short read – took me less than an hour, once I’d gotten invested – and I heartily recommend it. Give it a read.
I haven’t actually read very much Kipling, so reading a collection of stories inspired by — or, possibly, “in reaction to” — his work has me feeling like I’m almost certainly missing some context.
In reading, though, I didn’t find these stories at all lacking. They’re well able to stand on their own, and I’ve picked up enough from cultural osmosis to at least feel the shape of some of the references.
It’s also interesting to see the various storytelling methods and traditions being referenced here. Sometimes it’s a story you’re reading, and other times, you’re being told a story, spoken to directly. In a few of the stories in the book, it switches back and forth between these two approaches, telling two stories at once, one nesting inside the other. Reminiscent of Cloud Atlas, in a way.
The thing that most surprised me, as I read this, was how wrong my expectations were. “Based on Kipling’s Just So Stories” had me expecting everything to be in following the Platonic Ideal of a children’s book, very little conflict, everything easily resolved. Instead, in many of these stories, I found myself enraged and saddened at the injustice of it all. Many of them don’t have a happy ending; many of them don’t have much by way of happiness at all. In that, they feel more real than what I was expecting would’ve, although I so much hate to say it.
But my hatred for saying that is a response to media where that sadness feels like it’s there for sadness’ sake. Looking at you, DC film universe — the whole “grim and gritty” thing is just depressing, and the world is depressing enough already.
But in Not So Stories, for the most part, the unhappiness isn’t there just to be unhappy. It’s there to highlight that things aren’t fair, that the world doesn’t always go right — and to make you mad at that. To make you want to change it.
It is, in retrospect, an enjoyable reading experience, though at times I didn’t feel that way. Go read the book, and get mad at injustice.
I realized, somewhere around a third of the way into this book, that I don’t actually like anyone in it. The protagonist is an astonishingly boring man, for someone living through this upsetting a series of events, and the other main character is a rather good example of what’s wrong with acting like a proper Victorian.
All that said, I did enjoy the book. It was the kind of mystery that I enjoy, less about figuring out who did the thing than it as about what, precisely, they did. That mystery is what carried me through – I had theories, thoughts about what might have been going on with that second main character, and I had a great deal of fun trying to figure out which of them were right, which were wrong, and why. (And, it turns out, I was wrong on all counts – the end was stranger than I expected, and all the more creepy as a result.)
All told, I quite enjoyed this book, and I can recommend it to anyone who likes a creepy mystery. (Bonus points if you like Victorian literature — you’ll probably catch more of the references than I did.) If that’s you, give it a read.
Every time I go to file a bug report Feedback with Apple, I have to remember how to gather a sysdiagnose; on macOS, the whole diagnostic process is automatic in the Feedback app, and if you have Feedback installed on iOS, it is there too. I, however, make things difficult on myself, and use Feedback on macOS to submit my iOS bugs.
A sysdiagnose, for those wondering, is a big bundle of diagnostic information that Apple (or the developer of an iOS app) can use to figure out what exactly went wrong when something didn’t work right on your device.
Since Apple’s documentation on how to gather a sysdiagnose leaves out a few key steps (FB8739343, if anyone at Apple is paying attention to this), I figured I’d write up the process for myself for future reference.
Without further ado, here’s how to gather a sysdiagnose on an iPhone X-class device. (Read: ‘no home button’)
Press the volume up, volume down, and lock buttons all at once, and hold them for ~1 second. You’ll feel a little haptic buzz; your phone might also take a screenshot.
Wait. Apple recommends about 10 minutes for iOS to gather everything.
Open Settings and go to Privacy > Analytics & Improvements > Analytics Data
Scroll through the list until you see a file whose name starts with “sysdiagnose_” and then the current date. (Protip: this list is super long, so once you’ve started scrolling, you can tap and drag on the little scroll blob on the right side of the screen to zoom through hit much faster.)
Tap on the file, hit share, and AirDrop it to your Mac. (Or save it to iCloud, but I heartily do not recommend trying to email or send it via iMessage – it’s probably like a quarter of a gigabyte.)
Hopefully this helps you, and as someone who has to try to figure out why software isn’t working right, thank you for taking the time to get all the diagnostic information – it’s very helpful.
If you’re a fan of Warehouse 13, you’ll enjoy this book, I suspect. While it’s not as visibly rooted in actual historical fact as Warehouse 13 always was,1 it’s got that same “Indiana Jones, but about saving the world instead of just finding cool stuff for the museum” vibe.
That’s, really, most of the tl;dr of the book, although I’ve left out the magic. It’s a somewhat loosely-defined magic system, which normally I’d be annoyed by, being the “I want to understand the laws of magic” person that I am, but in this case it fits the cinematic feel of the series. The only really solid rule is that magic doesn’t come from people, but is a natural thing — ley lines! — that they channel through a focus of some sort. There’s also a lot of dangerous ancient artifacts around, which is where we get the Warehouse 13 aspect.
Zoe makes for a reasonable protagonist in Ancient Magic and Cursed Magic, but I think Hayley, the protagonist of Hidden Magic, is the one who really makes this collection. Zoe is the seasoned veteran, someone who was raised with magic and made a career out… well, being a badass. Hayley, meanwhile, is a junior museum curator, and spends the first quarter of her story in the perfectly reasonable belief that magic isn’t real. Discovering it with her is a lot more fun, and that “what is happening” mindset makes her a lot more relatable to the reader. Frankly, I’d argue that Hidden Magic should’ve been the first book in the collection, but Ancient Magic dovetails into it so well with the little crossover that it’s hard to be mad.
End result, I quite liked this little collection. It was a pretty quick read, and a fun one; give it a go.2
Well, right up until it wasn’t, but you’ve gotta let the show have its core concept, after all. ↩
Normally, this would be a Bookshop link, but I’m unable to find the collection — or any of the component novellas — on Bookshop, so here’s an Amazon link instead. Strangely, despite being published under the same title, the thing I’m linking to is a 6-novella set, while the one I read only contains the first 3. I, frankly, have no idea where I got this ebook. ↩
People say not to judge a book by its cover, but looking at the cover of this book having just read it, I think it does a remarkably good job of explaining the book. The title really covers a lot of it, and the porthole hints at the little bit of steampunk that drifted in around the edges of the ‘werewolf’ bit.
In short, the book is utterly ridiculous. It’s not quite as “empty fluff”-y as you might think, and has some interesting things going on with some of the backstory, but it’s still entirely ridiculous.
But you know what? It’s 2020. The world sucks. Let people enjoy things! Read a ridiculous werewolf-regency-romance novel!
You can judge this book by its cover, but think about what context you’re using to judge it. Does “ridiculous and fluffy” mean bad? Or is it that it’s feminine-coded, and our sociocultural background has spent our entire lives teaching us that we should frown upon that sort of thing?
I was going to start with “it’s been a while since the last anthology I read and reviewed,” but, as it turns out, it hasn’t. I wonder if it’s the variety of stories that makes an anthology feel further away in my memory? No single story has as long to get lodged in my memory, or something. Hmm.
Still, I do like the anthologies – they’re fun in the same way that a 22-minute-long TV show is, a great way to fill a bit of time without getting yourself too invested in something.
Knaves is, admittedly, less fun than some of the other ones, because the focus is on villains. So, by the nature of their stories, it’s a bit of a gloomy topic.
Which isn’t to say the stories aren’t interesting, because they absolutely are. “All Mine” is heartbreaking, as is “Hunger in the Bones”; “The Bloodletter’s Prayer” is a fascinating piece of dark fantasy; “Cat Secret Weapon #1” is a delightful spin on the Bond archetype; “The Hand of Virtue” is sweet and a touch melancholy; and “Old Sol Rises Up” is… well, honestly, mostly confusing. But I suspect that was the intent, so I won’t fault it.
And, of course, there’s an introduction – every anthology has to have one. What caught my eye and, frankly, got me to actually read the introduction was who wrote it – Howard Tayler, the man behind Schlock Mercenary, another delightful piece of media that I’m happy to recommend. Read the intro – it’s weird, and silly, and fun.
Craig Laurance Gidney This book is… melancholy. I read it in bits and pieces over the course of a couple of months, which it’s well suited for, as a collection of short stories. Some of them were creepy, and some were sad. One or two were happy, and hopeful. But overall, the feeling I have is melancholy. Part of that is the way the last story ends, which is certainly coloring my opinion, as I set the book down and immediately started writing this, but I think the whole thing feels that way, as well. Melancholy certainly isn’t the best of moods to be in, but sometimes it’s what you need. And, considering that I’m posting this as we’re making our way into autumn, it’s entirely appropriate. Get yourself a seat looking over trees preparing to shed their leaves, a mug of tea, and read this book.
Alex Acks
I was genuinely surprised that I don’t have another review to reference here — I would swear that I wrote one about the book where these characters were first introduced, Murder on the Titania, but apparently not.1
So, the introduction: in the Sherlock Holmes style, very vaguely. Zombies, and steampunk, and all the other internet buzzwords abound, but it works surprisingly well together. The primary arc of the first story can be summed up with the image of a Native American man and a Latina woman rolling their eyes as an elderly white man tries to convince himself he’s the hero because he’s slightly less of an imperialist than the bad guy.
And if that hasn’t sold you on the concept, I’m not sure what will. It’s a fun little read, check it out.
I do love a good anthology. It’s all the fun of starting a new book, several times over, and with much less of a time commitment each time.
This did have some of the downside, though – about halfway through, I found myself getting rather bored of the concept of pirates. It’s a bit too coherent a theme, I feel; the book had a lot of the variance that makes anthologies fun, but keeping everything tied to ‘pirates’ limited it a bit more than is really healthy for an anthology.
After that midway nadir, though, it recovered nicely, going off into some interesting science fiction bits, and ending on a delightfully weird fantasy (or, possibly, extremely-distant-future?) piece.
So hey, have some fun with a variety of pirate stories.
Erin M. Hartshorn
“This feels like an indie novel,” I told one of my friends as I was reading it. “The content is really interesting, but the title says ‘there wasn’t an editor.’” Looking at the cover now, I’m doubling down on that statement. It looks, honestly, ridiculous. But it was also one of the most fun books I’ve read recently.
It also feels like it’s setting up for a series, both in the subtitle and in the amount of world-building it contains, which I’m pretty okay with. That world building was quite interesting, and I’d like to see what Pepper does next. It’s a fascinating blend of little and big stakes — competing for promotion from ‘assistant manager’ to ‘manager’ at work, a bit of relationship drama, and, oh, a serial killer.
Which leads me to the other thing I said to someone about this book as I was just starting to read it. “It feels like the plot is going to be a Scooby Doo episode, just a real estate developer using ghost stories to drop property values… except they’re murdering people so that they’re Actual Ghosts.”
And hey, if that doesn’t sound like a fun book to you, then… you’re reading the wrong blog for book reviews. Give it a read.
Following my recent post on form design, I thought it might be interesting to take a look at what is, in the US, one of the most universal forms: the ballot.
This sits at the intersection of my interests in design and civic engagement. It’s also a much more controversial topic than I’d normally touch with a ten-foot pole, but here I am.
(‘Pole/poll’ pun? Absolutely intended.)
And first, an admission: that image up top, of people at a polling station? That’s an utterly alien concept to me. I’ve never been to a polling station; I live in Oregon, a state that finished moving to universal vote-by-mail when I was in elementary school.
Now, vote-by-mail is a very controversial topic these days, but as someone who grew up with it, I thought it would be interesting to do a case study of how it works in Oregon.
Vote by Mail: A Case Study
Overall, the user experience of voting in an election in Oregon is, to my eye, already a ways ahead of most of the rest of the country. There’s still room for improvement, though.
So, what is Oregon doing right, and what are we doing wrong?
In doing the research for this article, I found out that “register when you get your driver’s license” went from “… if you fill out this extra piece of paper while you’re at the DMV” to being an automatic process, thanks to the amusingly-titled “Motor-Voter Law.”
Ease of Information
While I can’t say we don’t have our share of crappy political ads, the state has a standard way of providing information on everyone running: the voting pamphlet, sent to every household prior to the election. (They are also available online.)
(Image credit: Statesman Journal)
These pamphlets, nice as they are, aren’t perfect. The actual process for putting information in them is a touch convoluted, and surprisingly unregulated. While each entry mentions where the information comes from, and plagiarism or misquoting are banned, there is nothing enshrined in law (or policy) to prevent misleading entries.
Let’s take a look at the information architecture of the section on a single ballot measure.
At the top, the easily-memorable measure number takes precedence, followed by the shortest-form summary, the title.
Each measure has a very clear summary section, as well as the “Result of ‘Yes’ Vote” and “Result of ‘No’ Vote” area, which state, very explicitly, what each bubble on the accompanying ballot will do.
The estimate of financial impact is prepared by an eminently qualified committee; the text of the measure is resolute in itself.
But then things break down, with “Arguments in Favor” and “Arguments in Opposition.” This is an official state document; everything about this measure, so far, has been as factual and rigorous as one could hope. These arguments, though, are unregulated beyond “no plagiarism, no misquoting people.” If you want to write a 350 words of “why you should vote against this,” pay the fee to have it entered in, and file it as an “Argument in Favor” there’s nothing to stop you.
And that’s a problem. This is an official state document; it’s got the seal on the cover, and a lot of very solid information in it, giving it credence. Unverified information in the Arguments gains legitimacy by association.
For comparison, let’s take a look at a different state.
California’s voter pamphlets are laid out very differently. The first thing that caught my eye – and made assembling this comparison in a visually-pleasing way rather difficult – was that the ballot measure doesn’t have a table of contents.
I’ll give California this, though: they’ve lined up “Proposition” with “20” much better than Oregon did “Ballot Title” and “96.” The all-caps feels a bit “Newspaper Headline”, though, and what is going on with the kerning in “Prepared by the Attorney General”?
To save you a great deal of scrolling, I’ve pulled together the section headings from the 2020 Voter’s Pamphlet, Proposition 20, and summarizing somewhat:
Official Title and Summary
Summary of Legislative Analyst’s Estimate of Net State and Local Government Fiscal Impact
Analysis by the Legislative Analyst
Overview
(Specific Proposal Title)
Background
Proposal
Fiscal Effects
Argument in Favor of Proposition
Rebuttal to Argument in Favor of Proposition
Argument Against Proposition
Rebuttal to Argument Against Proposition
Distinctly more words to it, but notice some key differences:
There’s an actual analysis of the legislation, expanding beyond the fiscal impact to the actual outcomes of the bill. This is provided by the Legislative Analyst’s Office, who are explicitly nonpartisan.
Arguments in favor and against are paired with rebuttals, allowing for more of a dialog between sides.
Note, however, that there’s still no legal requirement for an “argument in favor” to actually be in favor. There is a strong precedent for judicial intervention, which is something of an improvement, at least. And the typography makes a statement, too.
On the left, the Analysis by the Legislative Analyst. It’s rich text – there’s use of bold to highlight key points, and various levels of headings to organize it. On the right, the Arguments, sans formatting. They’re also in a smaller font size, and have their own unique style of heading. In short, the Arguments look different, providing a subtle reminder that this section is not the product of the nonpartisan election officers.
And now, back to the other aspects of the election. But first, a reminder to find other sources of information on the candidates and ballot measures. As a good starting point, I recommend Vote411, from the League of Women Voters, and Ballotpedia.
Ease of Voting
A few weeks before the election, the Oregon Department of State mails out ballots to all registered voters. The package includes the ballot, a return envelope, and a second ‘privacy’ envelope that you can use if you’re worried somebody might be able to see the contents of your ballot through the outer envelope.
One of the inspirations for this post was the American Institute for Graphic Arts’ “Design for Democracy” program. They did a larger-scale version of my research on form design, investigating and determining best practices for ballot design.
Let’s take a look at a (reasonably) representative sample of an Oregon ballot. This comes from the 2020 primaries, courtesy of Lincoln County:
It’s actually pretty good. The visual design follows most of the guidelines, although the “Write-in” lines and text need a bit more space. The main issue I see is the instructions – they’re fairly clearly written, but they are written. Pairing them with a visual explanation – the cartoons, in AIGA’s example – makes them even easier to follow.
The UX of Elections
Elections in the US, being controlled at the state level, rather than federally designed, are something of an ongoing A/B test. We can see different electoral systems in use across the country, and use opinion polls after the fact to judge how well-represented people feel by the results.
Were I polled right now, I’d feel fairly happy with how my state handles things.
So, what are the key action items for, say, another state, looking to implement some of Oregon’s best practices?
Reduce the friction of voting. Make it easy to register, easy to get your ballot, easy to fill out your ballot, and easy to turn it in.
That’s it, that’s the list, the whole idea. Make it easier to vote, by whatever means possible. I’m an advocate for doing so by enabling universal mail-in-voting, thanks to some of the inherent benefits:
No standing in line, or going into cramped polling places – an excellent benefit during a pandemic!
Voting on your own time, rather than needing to take half a day off to wait in line. (‘On your own time’ within reasonable limits – there’s still a deadline to get it turned in on time.)
But, of course, I’m not done. I have some recommendations for Oregon, as well:
Validate the voting pamphlet materials. Don’t just trust what people submit, make sure it’s actually espousing the viewpoint it claims. Do some fact checking, while you’re at it.
Visually distinguish public submissions. Use some gestalt principles – things that are close together, and look similar, look like they’re part of a group. Move the public submissions a little further away, and make them look different, to remind people that they aren’t from the same source as the rest of the material.
Demonstrate how to fill out the ballot. The instructions are fairly well-written, but “comfortable reading English” should not be a requirement to vote.
Image credit: Elliott Stallion, Unsplash.
Postscript: while I’m advocating for improving voting, I am absolutely not advocating digital voting. No.No, no, no.
For form design, cognitive load theory can be boiled down to the idea that people only have so much space in their brain, so don’t overfill it. The exact amount varies depending on context: is the information auditory or visual?1 What stage of processing are you going through? (Gwizdka 3)
Techniques for Reducing Cognitive Load
Produce less cognitive load. Intrinsic cognitive load is necessary to what the user is trying to do; extrinsic is work because the design surrounding the goal is bad (Hollender et al. 1279; Feinberg & Murphy 345).
Use multiple modalities. Mixing visual with auditory, for example, allows users to distribute the cognitive load across multiple cognitive subsystems (Oviatt 4).
Do the work for them. Pre-filling known fields (i.e., a user’s name and address when they’re already signed in) moves the cognitive load from the user to the computer, saving the user the effort (Gupta et al. 45; Winckler et al. 195).
Cognitive Load in Human-Computer Interaction
Under heavy cognitive load, users work slower, and may commit more errors (Rukzio et al. 3). From a young age, humans are goal-oriented; slowing them down as they work towards these goals, unless explicitly a design goal, can only cause frustration (Klossek et al.). Reducing cognitive load leads to happier users.
Applying Cognitive Load Theory to Form Design
Cognitive load theory gives us several key takeaways:
Indicate which fields are required. Provide a clear indicator of what is required so your users don’t have to guess (Bargas-Avila, Javier A., et al., 20 Guidelines 5).2
Pre-fill data when possible. Use available sources—an existing account, or on-device sensors—to save the user the effort. However, if that data might not be accurate, don’t guess; leave the field blank to prompt the user to enter the correct data (Rukzio et al. 3-4).
Don’t interrupt the user by validating data. Real-time validation is fine, as long as it doesn’t force the user to switch from ‘completion mode’ to ‘revision mode’ (Bargas-Avila, Javier A., et al., Useable error messages 5).3
There has not been any research into the combined effects of marking required fields and pre-filling fields; however, we can extend the conclusions in the first two points, above, as such: a required field, even if pre-filled, remains required, and should be marked as such.
Bibliography
Baddeley, Alan D., and Graham Hitch. “Working memory.” Psychology of learning and motivation. Vol. 8. Academic press, 1974. 47-89. Bargas-Avila, Javier A., et al. “Simple but crucial user interfaces in the World Wide Web: introducing 20 guidelines for usable web form design, user interfaces.” (2010). Bargas-Avila, Javier A., et al. “Usable error message presentation in the World Wide Web: Do not show errors right away.” Interacting with Computers 19.3 (2007): 330-341. Budiu, Raluca. Marking Required Fields in Forms. 16 June 2019, www.nngroup.com/articles/required-fields/. Feinberg, Susan, and Margaret Murphy. “Applying cognitive load theory to the design of web-based instruction.” 18th Annual Conference on Computer Documentation. ipcc sigdoc 2000. Technology and Teamwork. Proceedings. IEEE Professional Communication Society International Professional Communication Conference an. IEEE, 2000. Gupta, Abhishek, et al. “Simplifying and improving mobile based data collection.” Proceedings of the Sixth International Conference on Information and Communications Technologies and Development: Notes-Volume 2. 2013. Gwizdka, Jacek. “Distribution of cognitive load in web search.” Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 61.11 (2010): 2167-2187. Harper, Simon, Eleni Michailidou, and Robert Stevens. “Toward a definition of visual complexity as an implicit measure of cognitive load.” ACM Transactions on Applied Perception (TAP) 6.2 (2009): 1-18. Hollender, Nina, et al. “Integrating cognitive load theory and concepts of human–computer interaction.” Computers in human behavior 26.6 (2010): 1278-1288. Klossek, U. M. H., J. Russell, and Anthony Dickinson. “The control of instrumental action following outcome devaluation in young children aged between 1 and 4 years.” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 137.1 (2008): 39. Oviatt, Sharon. “Human-centered design meets cognitive load theory: designing interfaces that help people think.” Proceedings of the 14th ACM international conference on Multimedia. 2006. Pauwels, Stefan L., et al. “Error prevention in online forms: Use color instead of asterisks to mark required-fields.” Interacting with Computers 21.4 (2009): 257-262. Rukzio, Enrico, et al. “Visualization of uncertainty in context aware mobile applications.” Proceedings of the 8th conference on Human-computer interaction with mobile devices and services. 2006. Stockman, Tony, and Oussama Metatla. “The influence of screen-readers on web cognition.” Proceeding of Accessible design in the digital world conference (ADDW 2008), York, UK. 2008. Tullis, Thomas S., and Ana Pons. “Designating required vs. optional input fields.” CHI’97 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (1997): 259-260. Winckler, Marco, et al. “An approach and tool support for assisting users to fill-in web forms with personal information.” Proceedings of the 29th ACM international conference on Design of communication. 2011.
The foremost theory splits it into three: the phonological loop (sound), the episodic buffer, and the visuospatial scratchpad, all controlled by a central executive (Baddeley & Hitch; the episodic buffer was added by Baddeley in a later revision than that cited here). ↩
There is some dispute over what makes the best indicator; the general consensus in industry is to use asterisks to mark required fields (Budiu). Studies have shown, however, that using a background color in the field to highlight required fields performs better (Pauwels et al.), which in turn is outperformed by physically separating the required fields from the optional ones (Tullis & Pons). All, however, agree that it is preferable to mark the required fields, rather than the optional. ↩
Non-interruptive real-time validation, say by adding error messages beneath invalid fields, works well for sighted users. Be aware, however, that screen reader software struggles with dynamically-updating pages (Stockman & Metatla); avert this accessibility problem by providing both real-time and on-demand validation, presenting errors in a modal fashion when the user attempts to submit the form with invalid data. ↩
Joseph Lallo
Oh, this book got me. I’ve got a Diana Wynne Jones feeling about it — it took a while to grip me, and then suddenly I caught myself thinking “well, how long will it really take me to finish reading this?” and staying up way later than I should’ve to see where it was going. It’s absolutely a slow start, and (given that I had no memory of buying the book/what it was about) I had no idea where it was going.1
And, as always, what really got me was the worldbuilding. It’s distinctly uncooperative at the start — the character who has the most interesting secrets, who knows the most about what’s going on, starts of being super cagey about it all. So even though Alan, the protagonist, is just as inquisitive as you’d want a protagonist to be, there’s no exposition-dump at any point. What you learn happens in a slow trickle, bits and pieces coming up as the story needs them. It’s a dangerous way to do it — done badly, it feels like the author is making it up as they go along — but, in this case, it worked well. I’m interested to see where the series goes: the main plot wraps up in a surprisingly neat bow at the end, but there’s a couple threads by the wayside that very clearly show this was meant to be a series.
So, hey, I liked the book. Check it out.
And, really, that’s the most fun part of this whole “read all the books I have on my Kindle that I don’t remember buying” project — everything’s a surprise! Everything on here was chosen by someone who’s got a reasonable idea of what I like (by which I mean ‘Past Grey’), but they didn’t tell me anything about any of them, I can just see the title and author. ↩
