Developing Usable Experiences

First day of class (winter semester 2008)

January 5th, 2008 10:18 am —  234 views

west_hall.jpg

After a better (half day) at work1 I headed to campus for my first class of this semester. The class: “Evaluation of Systems and Services” and the focus: “the what, why, when, who, and how of usability evaluation.” This is me all bubbling with anticipation before class.

The professor seems friendly enough and has solid pedigree.2 Though I know this class has a pretty intense schedule and virtually all the assignments are group related, I’m feeling pretty optimistic about it. As a developer of applications, systems, and services that other people use, the core focus is immediately and specifically applicable to my current work and long term career goals.

Anyway, I won’t go into this class and what lies ahead now. I’m sure it will come up again over the next four months.

It was a sunny day and campus was looking good with everything covered in thick snow. On my way to West Hall where classes are held, I happened on this fat red squirrel hunkered down in a snow pile busily eating a piece of pizza. No need to hibernate if you’re a campus squirrel I guess. It let me get real close to take a picture. I swear the thing winked at me.

So that was my first day of class. I saw a fair number of familiar faces and quite a few new ones. This class promises to be interesting and useful. In case I haven’t shown it before, here is the motto of the school I’m attending.

Image: This is West Hall, the building currently housing the offices for the School of Information and home to a number of it’s classes. This picture and all those that appear in this post were taken yesterday.

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  1. I’m feeling better about things there…see, I knew my pissy feelings would pass. [↩]
  2. A Ph.D in CS for UC Berkeley and seven years at (XEROX) PARC in Palo Alto. [↩]

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3 Comments 

Comments

3 Responses to “First day of class (winter semester 2008)”

  1. Dawn on January 5th, 2008 12:36 pm

    funny, I had my camera on campus yesterday too..some of the same pictures taken!

  2. Laiane on January 7th, 2008 8:10 pm

    Very good shot of the squirrel. That thing was huge! I swear he’s wearing a “fat suit.”

  3. Spike on January 7th, 2008 10:10 pm

    Now that you mention it, he does look familiar. I think I saw him at the same store I got my “fat suit”.

    Oh well, winters and school can be bad that way.

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