Design By Tim

Recently, the NY Times had a short piece on how UPS eliminated left-hand turns for delivery trucks.

Last year, according to Heather Robinson, a U.P.S. spokeswoman, the software helped the company shave 28.5 million miles off its delivery routes, which has resulted in savings of roughly three million gallons of gas and has reduced CO2 emissions by 31,000 metric tons.

Implemented about 2 years ago it has had its series of hurdles. Costing $600M to adopt nationwide, the improved end-to-end flow, which will ultimately be used by more than 100,000 employees, begins when the customer generates a smart label using a Web application that transmits customer and package information to UPS and pre-processes it before the driver arrives for pickup. That information then passes to UPS’s Dispatch Planning System, which charts UPS truck pickup and delivery routes.

Beginning in 2007, when the new system will be fully deployed, increases in operational efficiency are expected to save UPS that $600 million each year, says project leader Cathy Callagee, operations portfolio manager at UPS.

The hardest part of the project, according to Callagee, has been integration with legacy AS/400 and mainframe systems. But the lessons she has learned from the project are of a less technical nature. Before digging into technology, the project’s planners focused exclusively on streamlining processes — and when the new package-flow apps were ready, the company rolled out the new system slowly, so feedback from the field could be leveraged to improve the software.

Callagee’s final advice has become the refrain for modern IT. “If we don’t have a business reason … we don’t do it for technology’s sake. Unless there is a true business-case ROI, don’t do it.” So what can Brown do for you?

Matt wrote a response to his recent post on frustration he has with the button layout of the GameCube controller when playing Super Mario World on the Wii.

Not too long ago I wrote a post on this blog titled WTF Nintendo?. In it I expressed my frustration toward the button layout on the GameCube controller when playing Super Mario World on the Wii. There were many similar postings on various forums, so I felt justified in my position. I knew that a single post on a no-name blog wasn’t going to do anything so I turned my blog post into a letter; Presented in a slightly more diplomatic fashion of course. I mailed it out the next day but really never expected a response.

Apparently, the great Nintendo must have head his pleas for redemption of a sorted issue. They tracked him down at his home with a phone call (gotta love the Internet). Please note he used snail mail to make them aware of this troubling feature abuse. Using the following points they explained the reasoning behind the layout of the controller etc…

• Not much QA is done on Virtual Console games, after all these games were well tested 15+ years ago. They just make sure the game runs and send it out.
• If you compare the button letters of a GameCube controller to a Super Nintendo controller you can see that they match up perfectly. It’s the GameCube button layout that’s messed up.
• Nintendo does not have a mechanism in place to “recall” a VC game.
• Nintendo designed the Classic Controller for the virtual console and thus it is the preferred method of input. (read “Cough up the cash, that’s what we made that classic controller for.”)
• Nintendo reps have no fore-knowledge of upcoming VC games (I had to ask about Pilotwings).

Even after sending him a free classic controller to enjoy the Nintendo freedom. It hasn’t swayed his opinion of the pricyness of hotness, yet has really sucked him in as a big N evanglist to the new classic controller.

This is a great segway into my complaint over Wii Strikers and online play. I love the game - it can easily be the best game since the console game out (in my mind it easily rivals Wii Sports, Tiger Woods, and Excite Truck). There have been many hours of tears, sore fingers and wrists and spilt drinks over jubilation.

However, thankfully they included that wrist strap on the controllers because I do not know how many times I have cursed the day when playing online that the connection drops. I (almost*) know it’s not my side of the connection, because I have run speed tests before and after playing when the connection will drop and there is no change in the speed. So either it’s Nintendo’s servers, or the other players - I find it odd that other players would be so routine to drop off.

What I find strange as well as when I first got the game - online play was crisp (albeit connection drops weren’t a problem then either). Now when I can log in - game play freezes and stutters. What’s with this? Granted I use the notorious *Comcast at home for the connection and with the recent debacle over traffic shaping it really wouldn’t surprise me if the Wii has been mistaken for something that they would shape.

So Nintendo - I know this lame - but I challenge you to find me and surprise me with some token of your affection seeing as how I must be your greatest evangelist (at least in Richmond Va - there I gave you a hint to find me). I need this fixed - because without confidence in online play with Strikers why should the future online games be any better. Wake up folks if the 360 and ps3 can have it - it has to be available for the Wii. The experience is what it’s all about and in my opinion the experience without online play severely limits the future of this as a legitimate big player in the console arena.

Some days I just amaze myself - other days everything else blows me away. Out of the ever amazing Adobe Labs, comes Kuler - a color choosing, creating, designing, modifying, mixing, matching web application that makes choosing a color scheme way too easy.

 kuler is the first web-hosted application from Adobe Labs designed both to stand alone and to complement Adobe® Creative Suite® software. Built using Adobe® Flash® and ActionScript 3.0, kuler is all about color: color for exploration, inspiration, experimentation and sharing.

Additionally, thanks to the joys of the Apollo framework, you can download Kuler as a desktop application. PLUS!… you can also grab an RSS feed of the most popular or highest rated schemes. Beware of my drool on the site!

I always find it quite difficult to build myself a site, so doing it this way—out in the open—works for me, it helps get me motivated. In the past I have called this process a live redesign but wouldn’t be so brave as to put myself through that again.

First, though, some kind of project overview so I have at least half a clue of where I am trying to get to:

What is it for? This is essentially a business blog and it’s long term goal is to generate business, pure and simple.

Why no design for the launch then? I am not actively seeking new clients at the moment, so any kind of design seems superfluous to my needs right now. It’s all about search engines and fellow geeks at this stage, and both can cope without a design for a while I am sure.

Who is my target audience? Well if you’re here then I guess you’re my target - really no direction here at the moment.

It’s a bit of a double edged sword really, my name is reasonably well known right where it needs to be but I have been known to get a bit vulgar and argumentative at times. I wouldn’t ever try and hide that from any potential client (I couldn’t anyway), that’s me like it or loathe it, but it isn’t necessarily all I am, nor all you get when you hire me to do a job (unless requested).

I have no ambitions to see this site featured on showcase sites, though it’s always nice (maybe I’ll give myself an award or something). No, if it’s possible I want the content to drive the site, not the design; we’ll have to wait and see. I might one day change my mind and which point I will plead like the beggar that I am for pointless votes to generate traffic.

That’s roughly it, for now…

I hate it - when I took my blog down originally it was plagued with the nasty stuff. Now that I put up some of the older posts I seemed to have grabbed all the comment spam with it - so I am terribly sorry to anyone who has to read this nasty stuff… I’ve got askimet running but it hasn’t learned my comments are spam yet… so please give me a break while I knock out all this crazy time wasting spam.