Watch Your Users' Every Move

Watch users navigate through your site, by recording their mouse clicks, with a simple line of JavaScript added to the code, to make it go.

RobotReplay allows you to view your users' activity on your site, and learn where they do and don't go. This could very well take the guesswork out of some usability issues that lead to stagnant marketing efforts. It's anonymous, so Big Brother remains out of the picture, at least for now, and it's relatively effortless... It's like usability research, but without putting in the time.

Check out this nail-biting example.

Dashing Desktop Designs

Are you tired of the same old desktop design, everytime you boot up? Maybe your computer's operating system (Mac only, I'm afraid... sorry, Microsoft users) didn't ship with the right image to make your world turn. Well, if that's the case, you can choose from a multitude of awe-inspiring (and not so awe-inspiring) designs at Desktoptopia. The concept is that one subscribes to a series of desktops, so that your desktop changes regularly. You might find something that tickles your fancy, and for designers, it's a wealth of cool effects to look at.

Flash Cheat Sheet... Coult it Be So?

If you're like me, you love to see fluid creativity in motion, but you may not be so adept at the programming side of things... enter, Sprout, "the quick and easy way to create sophisticated multi-media content". A user-friendly, pre-built WYSIWYG Flash programming claims to make Flash programming easy and breezy. Here's the Youtube video.

The Sprout web site proudly boasts a launch date of January 28, 2008... Well, we know that date is past. Akin to most software companies, I suppose they have run into unforseen delays before their product launch. I thought I'd try clicking on their "Get Started" page, but received a message saying that they're in the closed beta stage (code for: they're testing their software, and they have enough testers already, thank you very much).

From a programming-challenged designer's perspective, it looks like a promising solution, so I've signed up to be notified of their launch... I'll keep you posted!

FEB. 19 UPDATE... Get your Sprout here: www.sproutbuilder.com/friendsofsprout