SolidWorks 3DContentCentral (3DCC) Redesign

The SolidWorks 3DContent Central (3DCC) website -- a model exchange service that allows vendors to post models of their inventory for mechanical/industrial designers to download and use in their designs -- had been largely untouched for about 5 years and it was starting to really show. The original site's visuals were dated, and the features were scattered and unfocused after organic adjustments over the years.  A renewed interest in updating the site, along with a new business model was proposed in the spring of 2014, and finally in June of 2015, a new redesigned 3DCC was launched!

Yours truly lead the UX of the redesign. Although I was no longer with the company when the redesigned site finally launched, the UX design was largely completed by the time I left and it's great to see how far the product team was able to take it by the launch.

Here's a quick look at the Before

Original 3DCC Home Page
Hard to focus on what was important and where to start

Original 3DCC Find Content Page
A lot of entry points to finding content

There was a lot of work to be done, so the work was phased into 3 sections. The initial phase was to revamp the home page and general styling, revise the backend to support the new business model offering, and showcase why users and vendors should be part of the 3DCC community.

After I completed the wireframes of the main areas we could affect in the first phase, I worked with a visual designer to get the branding and color palette into place to support our new initiative.

Here's a look at the After

New 3DCC Home Page
Highlighting "Search" as the main way for designers find parts to use in their design
Sponsorship is clean and clear
Updated the overall look and feel to include the proper branding logos and color palette

As the page scrolls, the header and footer are fixed with Search persistently accessible

New 3DCC Find Content Page
Only the header and footer were adjusted in this phase to accommodate the timeline

New 3DCC Subscription Benefits Page
The navigation / site information architecture was completely reworked into the new header navigation

New 3DCC Business Model Page
Simple at a glance view of the different offerings

New 3DCC Publisher's Catalog Dashboard
High level view of your content publishing status by catalogs (publishers can have more than one)
The content manager (grid of content controls in bottom left) was not redesigned in this phase

New 3DCC Usage Report
The new feature and main selling point of the new business mode
Publishers will get a detailed view of who has downloaded their models (leads)
The report is searchable and sortable, allowing publishers to cross sell if the lead has downloaded other models
The amount of detail publishers see will depend on their subscription level

Overall the relaunch is fairly successful. We brought the website up to modern standards and provided a wealth of new functionality that publishers would (hopefully) find valuable and be willing to spend more money on a higher subscription level than before. 

Marvelous Margaret: How I Became a Potato Head

It is never easy to leave when you've really built a family of close friends at your work. And when they decided to make you into a potato head it is even harder to say goodbye!

Marvelous Margaret Potato Head
She demolishes poor workflow!

Why a potato head? You may be wondering...

Well, it started out with this little toy collection I started on my desk...

Miss Marvelous joins the Super Hero/Star Wars/Marvel Pop Taters, PacMan, Back to the Future, and Ghostbusters

And my colleagues thought, the only appropriate send off would be to make a super hero potato head of yours truly. Complete with frequently seen accessories like my fingerless gloves and my purple hair streak.

They started with a concept sketch, and then the team set to work.

Vinny drew an illustrator version of Miss Marvelous. She's carrying the DS "Compass" as a shield. After all, she's a super hero, she needs some kind of weaponry. Ben 3D modeled the shield and had it 3D printed.

The team purchased some potato parts and combined parts of Mr. and Mrs. Potato Heads to get the right elements in place. Mrs. Potato Head had blond hair and eyelashes, so Vinny painted them black. Additionally he painted the purple streak in too.

Alex custom made the box, including the feet cutout so Miss Marvelous didn't rock around inside.

And of course, have to pitch the fact that it is extremely tasty with cheese (it is a potato after all) and of course it has to be in French as well (the parent company - DS - is French)

Chinloo created the fingerless gloves by creating a fingerless glove! She took a normal sized magic glove, cut off the finger tips which is about the size of Miss Marvelous's hand, and then cut the tip off and a small side hole to fit the potato hand. She then used sparkly glue to keep it from fraying at the edges.

But wait, there's more!

Miss Marvelous is carrying a Batdz Maru backpack, complete with purple backpack straps made from purple electrical tape!

So of course, the only reasonable thing for me to do is dress as my potato head the next day. Complete with the purple shoes and red hoodie.

Badtz Maru is not amused... but then, he never is. =D

And there you have it - how I became a potato head. :)

What's New in SolidWorks Enterprise PDM 2015 - Copy Tree

Yours truly revamped the UI for an existing feature of SolidWorks Enterprise PDM - Copy Tree. In SolidWorks ePDM 2015, the UI was revamped, cleaned up, and given a brand new filter capability that allows users to locate the file they want in the fastest time possible. 

A more in depth post will appear at some point, for now, a repost of the original blog on SolidWorks by Mike Fearon follows below. 

http://blogs.solidworks.com/solidworksblog/2014/09/solidworks-2015-manager-showcase-whats-new-in-epdm.html

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The SOLIDWORKS annual release starts with feedback provided by you, our community, and finds its way to the people responsible for including your request in our annual release. For SOLIDWORKS 2015, we wanted to introduce you to some of the people responsible for the new features and let them describe their favorite tools included in the 2015 release. Today’s SOLIDWORKS Expert is Kurt Lundstedt, Product Manager, EPDM

Kurt on what’s new: Copy Tree has been available in SOLIDWORKS Enterprise PDM (EPDM) for many years, but in 2015 the user interface has been completely redesigned making it much easier to create new product structures.  As we all know, many companies reuse existing designs to make new ones.  These new designs often share many of the same sub-assemblies and components with the prior version as well as incorporating new designs.  That’s where Copy Tree comes in handy and in 2015 there are many new features that make it much easier to find and select the files to be reused or copied.  Some of the new features include:

• Selection filters based on file type and/or any text string in the file name or file property can make a large product structure easy to work with.
• Thumbnail previews for SOLIDWORKS files give the user an instant visual clue of the file they are looking at.
• Excluded folders so users don’t mistakenly make copies of standard library components
• Easy folder and file editing dialogs including searching for destination folders

The driving force behind this feature was customers telling us, both via direct interviews and submitted enhancement requests, that the interface was cumbersome to work with when working with large assembly structures. Another thing we discovered is that it was difficult for users to know what file they were looking at because most companies name their part and assembly files with a part number. Adding thumbnail previews provides users with quick visual feedback so they can make more accurate decisions.

Replacing the Wait Staff with an iPad

By chance I had a layover in MSP (Minnesota / St. Paul) and my gate was right next to a new concept restaurant with iPads at every single table, apparently the work of OTG Management (I have no relation to them - just happened by).

My initial thought was it's kind of cold. This restaurant is basically replacing the wait staff with iPads. We, as a society in this modern digital age, could use more human contact, not less. We're so attached to our devices, it's almost as if we are electronic devices ourselves.

I was going to sit and watch while I wait for my flight, but then the designer in me thought it might be better to go and check it out, find out how they've set it up and see what the interface is like. So I sat down looking at one of the beautiful food shots on rotation and got started with my electronic wait staff looking for the cheapest thing I can buy to justify sitting at a space and taking pictures as I go.

They rewired the iPad so you can't get to the standard controls. The Home button retrieves their special customized home screen and dock.

I tapped on "Your Flight" and it kindly asked me for info about my current flight in order to track its status for me. Gave me some info on the destination weather, etc as well. It wasn't "sticky" though, and as soon as I finished my order and was idle long enough for the slide show to kick in, it lost the flight info. It would have been nice for it to remember, or somehow have the user indicate when he/she is leaving the table (which would also help the wait staff know when to clear the table), before clearing the flight info. Since it cleared it for me, I don't know if it would have given me some kind of alarm when my boarding time was near. That would be a nice feature.

Then I proceeded to go browse the menu. Having great food photography is key in this case, since these photos are ultra high def on the iPad, and never looked this sharp in an actual printed menu.

The menu certainly looked appetizing, but the prices in this case were kind of high for my taste.

After you browse into a category the menu pop over gives you quick access to other categories, but strangely stays open after you make your selection. Maybe it's done on purpose to reduce the sticker shock since you can't see the prices when the menu is open.

After awhile I finally settled on some over-priced herbal tea since it's evening and it was more affordable than dessert. The system smartly does some cross selling as I proceed to check out.

You have to pay for your order before it gets submitted, which I understand. But gratuity is included in the payment, but I haven't interacted with any wait staff. How can I determine the level of service and how much tip to give? It's defaulted to 18% and there's no option to provide a custom value besides the 15, 18, and 20 that it gives you.

Then it steps you through paying using the card swipe stationed at each table. No cash accepted.

When the transaction is complete, it asks if you would like to receive an email of the receipt. No printed receipt seems to be available at the table. I was reluctant to provide my email since I don't know if it'll mean getting spam. They should put some kind of notice on the screen about that to reassure users, especially since you cannot opt out of getting the receipt via email. What if you don't have email?

A few minutes after all of this, my tea arrived. This was the first time I interacted with a wait staff (they have been walking around asking patrons if they needed any help in the mean time).

I was left wondering if it was worth 18% for the wait staff to bring me the tea and tell me to let it steep a few more minutes before enjoying it. Seems like a premium. The restaurants don't need as many people to work the tables, though yes, they had the up front cost of buying all those iPads. But over time it more than pays for all the staff they don't need to hire and schedule/coordinate work shifts.

The wait staff doesn't need to actually take anyone's orders. Instead of selling food and offering beverages they turn into iPad app explanation staff and they make at minimum 15% on each transaction. Not that I have anything against the wait staff earning more money, but this just doesn't seem quite right for some reason.

Well, it was an interesting experience if nothing else. Apparently this is popping up in major airports all over the country, including the Dunkin Donuts in BOS.

At the rate we're going, The Matrix will be here before we know it.

Bye humans. Better plug in.

LEGO Mindstorms NXT Icons

One of the major differences between working for a product company and a consulting company (at least for web consulting) is the time scale between design and when the design goes live.

I had done some simple icon design work in support of the LEGO Mindstorms NXT support package for MathWorks Simulink over a year ago.  The idea was to provide icons that help identify each Simulink block which can be sensors or hardware, depending on the system model's need.  After my departure I had no idea if the icons were ever launched.

I just found out it did go live with the March 2012 release and grabbed the screenshots off of the LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Support from Simulink product information page gallery.

There's also a page on MatLab Central: Simulink Support Package for LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT hardware. It has a screenshot of the library too.

I'm so glad to finally see the work in the product and out in the world. These icons were created as a stop gap measure since we were resource and schedule constrained. I wasn't sure if they would be placeholder icons until someone else gets to them, or if they will actually go out with the product. 

I'm glad it's the latter. It's always such a joy to see your work out in the world. Here's a clearer look at each of the icons designed. 

Post-It Art: Ms. Pacman

It started when I tried to accomplish something in a software 3 times in a row and failed. Out of frustration I went looking for a creative outlet.

Earlier on I had purchased some small square Post-It notes, so I thought maybe I can add to the wall that already has a giant thumbs up sign on it with some more Post-It art.

I did Ms. Pacman first.  I had a limited supply of colors and my initial idea of doing the Mario 1-Up Mushroom wasn't going to work since I had no black squares to work with.

One of my colleagues colored a white square in with a black sharpie to create the single black mole for Ms. Pacman.

After lunch and some meetings, I came up against another road block, so I went back to the wall and added the blue ghost and cherry with the little "white" dots.

White wasn't going to show up on the white wall so green was used instead. I also originally did the blue ghost when it's in "edible" mode, but it was a bit small and the resolution wasn't fine enough to reveal the squiggle of its mouth.

At the end of the day, I went back and replaced the blue ghost with a "normal" one that is bigger in dimension, so I could have the resolution I needed to give it a proper shape and also proper eyes.

With this version, I didn't need the mouth, which worked much better. Using the same technique as earlier, a colleague helped me color in a few white squares as black for the eyes.

Connecting the dots (literally) with the original thumbs up on the wall, that was done by my colleague many weeks before.

Finally, another colleague mentioned it might make sense for the ghost to be looking back at Ms. Pacman. I agreed and we went about moving the eyes so it looked to the upper left instead of the bottom right.  A master piece in 8-bit pixels, if I may say so myself. :)