Clik here to view.
Developing enterprise products with Lean UX and JavaScript
From our experience, there are typically two strategies that can drive success at a professional services firm like Myplanet: a) focusing your efforts so you can become really excellent at just a few...
View ArticleLaunching With Zero Update Hooks
The SmartCentres project was built using an "installation profile" development strategy.For those who are not familiar with it, the brief summary mentions a cleaner, leaner codebase resulting in a more...
View ArticleFellows Begin Implementation
As we mentioned previously, our Fellowship program has evolved significantly since its launch in 2011. This year we have 5 teams of Fellows working through self-directed projects to design and develop...
View ArticleWetKit steals the show at DrupalCamp Ottawa
The camp definitely had a government-related spin, given that Ottawa is Canada's capital. This was all hearts-stars-and-horseshoes as far as I was concerned, as I personally have a passion for open...
View ArticleThe agency model is broken: Why we sell teams, not projects
In the typical model for project work at a digital agency, a contract would lay out the scope of work (often in considerable depth), the cost per deliverable, and the expected delivery date.It's not...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Engaging Remote Workers
We value in-person collaboration whenever possible, and we encourage our teams to spend the majority of their time in our office. However, we have many remote team members in Vancouver, New Brunswick,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Product Innovators: Craig Follett, Uniiverse
Our first Product Innovator is Craig Follett, co-founder of Uniiverse. Uniiverse is an online community marketplace for people to create and discover services and activities near them. Users can share...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Fellowship Product Preview
At the beginning of the term back in January, Fellows formed teams and chose a particular problem they wished to tackle. They conducted user research and design studios and learned about concepts like...
View ArticleHow Top Companies Are Embracing Humanity
Attentiveness. Resiliency. Situational awareness. Mental agility. Emotional intelligence. None of these attributes just "happen"; rather, they must be intentionally cultivated.Recently, I got an inside...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Yammer Roundup #3
If You’re Busy, You’re Doing Something Wrong: The Surprisingly Relaxed Lives of Elite AchieversShared by: Patrick ConnollyThis article suggests that those of us who are chronically stressed and up...
View ArticleHow We Work, Part 1: Making The Case for Bricolage
IntroductionAgile purists, human-centered advocates, lean UXers. Manifestos, credos, value-laden proclamations. In UX design and development circles, there’s certainly no shortage of opinion when it...
View ArticleClik here to view.
5 Cardinal Sins of Web Usability
In fact, research shows that the average visitor only spends 1 minute 49 seconds on a website before abandoning it if the site doesn’t readily offer up what he or she needs. And after visitors abandon...
View ArticleHow We Work, Part 2: Examining Structure & Roles
For example, certain team members have experimented with limiting themselves to predefined Scrum responsibilities, while others have worn more hats than can fit on one determined head (aside: you can...
View ArticleA Brief History of JavaScript
Now regarded as the language’s “Genesis”, The Good Parts revolutionized the way developers used “the world’s most misunderstood” language by de-mistyfing its core principles and laying out its best...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Migrating to Drupal 7: Book Review
Whether you're importing data from an external data set, converting a site from another CMS to Drupal, or migrating a site between Drupal versions, there's a module for that!Migrating to Drupal 7A few...
View ArticleMyplanet at TEDxWaterloo
After nine months and countless hours of planning, we hosted two parallel TEDx events around a single, shared theme - chasingHOME. With this theme, we asked the questions: "Is home a concept or a...
View ArticleTroubleshooting Workbench
Intro to WorkbenchIf you already know what this module is and does, skip to the pot of gold.Before explaining the problems we've encountered while implementing Workbench, I'd like to describe the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Product Innovators: How To Acquire Your First Customers
Kitchener-Waterloo is an interesting town. Buoyed initially by the success of RIM, KW is now the de-facto startup capital of Canada, boasting many of the most promising new ventures in the country.Case...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Myplanet's Exciting Move to Downtown Toronto
With an expansionist fervour that would make even the British Empire blush, we've annexed one office after another as our team has grown. Today we have five offices in our building, occupying nearly...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Product Innovators: Hussain Saleem, Rocket Man
Using open data to provide up-to-the-second information about when the next bus or streetcar is arriving, Rocket Man creator Hussain Saleem is one of Toronto's most widely appreciated product...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Product Innovators: Tapping Into Startup Communities
Last week we introduced Vidyard, a successful video marketing and analytics company that got its start with the support of VeloCity Garage at the University of Waterloo. VeloCity Garage is a part of a...
View ArticleUX Lessons From The USSR: The Trouble With Manifestos
Erik has spent some time writing about the Myplanet process in our "How We Work" series, examining the ways in which our process has evolved to support clients, staff and quality of work. He believes...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Product Innovators: Lead Generation & Iterative Product Development
As CEO of video analytics platform Vidyard, Michael has helped his startup grow into a lucrative & well-respected business. In previous videos, he has provided us with great insight about early...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Product Innovators: The Importance of Lean UX Design
In Part Four of our video series with Michael, he explains how a lean approach to user experience design can impact the success of a digital product or platform.Responding to customer feedback by...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Myplanet wins Momentum Company of the Year
The York Technology Alliance is a network of more than 200 tech organizations that provides support, resources & collaborative opportunities for its members. Each year the YTA hosts the Technology...
View ArticleHow To Successfully Facilitate Groups
As a designer, I frequently find myself leading sessions to retrieve insights from clients and internal teams. In this somewhat unfamiliar role, I have often struggled with the processes and techniques...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Hacking a Standing Desk
In the past several years there have appeared a number of articles published claiming that working while standing is better for one's health than sitting. I spend quite a bit of my spare time...
View ArticleClik here to view.
'Interviewing Users' By Steve Portigal
I've been following Steve Portigal's work for many years and have used many of his approaches and methods in my own design research. So, when I heard that Steve was writing a book on the art and craft...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Photoshop IA: The Structure Behind The Design
This pattern led me to realize something. As many distinct and different ways as there are to actually design a website, a user interface or even a newsletter, I've always found the byproduct of such...
View ArticleSo, you wanna OOP with JavaScript!
.pane-node-body h2 {margin-bottom: 0.5em;padding-bottom: 0.5em;border-bottom: 1px solid #707070;} .pane-node-body h3 {display: inline-block; padding: 0 40px 0.5em; border-bottom: 1px dotted #707070;}...
View ArticleUnderstanding Common Open Source Licenses
Open source is a philosophy that encourages the free distribution of a software's source code. It allows for collaboration amongst developers, who can then offer the finished product to the community...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Skeuomorphism vs. Flat Design
Like a great online marketer who understands that the offline world must be considered when defining a sales strategy, so must a great designer consider familiar offline concepts to assist users in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Translating Panel Content Titles Using Tokens
*/ The titles of content items within a panel page are not translatable. There is an issue in the queue for panels, but it has been open for two years now, and it is unlikely to be resolved any time...
View ArticleClik here to view.
DrupalCamp Toronto 2013
Organized by DUG-TO, DrupalCamp is an annual event that brings together Drupal-loving developers, designers and business folk to share news and lessons. For the third year in a row, Myplanet was proud...
View ArticleMyplanet Meets DocPad: A Next Generation Web Framework
Almost a year ago today Patrick (our DevOps Imagineer) shared an enlightening article around how Development Seed (a once very prominent Drupal based company) was now building what they called...
View ArticleThe Danger of Sunk Costs in Product Development
In order to be sucsessful with product development, we typically have to overcome a wide array of challenges and obstacles. Believing in your work and doubling down when things get tough are...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Programmers Must Consider Accessibility
Somewhere in this image, in a randomly selected position, is a single pixel that has a JavaScript attached to it. Click on that pixel, and a message will appear. Happy hunting! This text is displayed...
View ArticlePractical Advice for the Agile Manifesto
Berteig Consulting offers Agile training, consulting, and coaching services (including Scrum, Extreme Programming, Kanban & OpenAgile). They're great friends of ours and they've been instrumental...
View ArticlePractical Advice for The Scrum Framework in 30 Seconds
Scrum is the most popular of the Agile frameworks. It is also one of the hardest to implement well. Many organizations have used Scrum only to find out that the Scrum framework is simple, yet the...
View ArticleIntroducing Drupal's Clean Markup Module
Conceptualized and coded by myself and Matt Parker, the Clean Markup module aims to clean up, enhance and facilitate the customization of markup for Drupal core and several popular contrib modules such...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Why We Hire For Fit First, Skills Second
Imagine you have two teams of five individuals. The first is a dream team with each team member scoring a complete 10 out of 10 competency points. The second is an average-skilled team with members...
View ArticleMyplanet Digital Makes B Corp 'Best for the Workers' List.
B Lab have released their ‘B Corp Best for the Workers List’ as part of the 2013 ‘B Corp Best for the World’ series. We're very honoured to be recognized with the B Corp 'Best for Workers' award....
View ArticlePractical Advice for The OpenAgile Framework
OpenAgile is one of the newest Agile frameworks, much younger than Scrum. And it is one of the Agile methods that is most applicable to many industries and environments outside of IT. It has been used...
View ArticleDocPad September Recap
A few months back, we announced that Myplanet was embracing DocPad, a next generation web framework. We were lucky enough to have the founder of DocPad, Benjamin Lupton, join us at Myplanet for the...
View ArticleMyplanet's World of Webcraft Program
Beginning in January 2014, we’re proudly piloting a new education initiative called World of Webcraft. While our Fellowship program welcomes college and university students, World of Webcraft aims to...
View ArticleClik here to view.
DesignThinkers 2013 Recap: Part 1 of 4
Systems + Stories and Making Every Interaction CountWritten by Amit JakhuAs this was my first deisgn conference, I was pleasantly surprised to be exposed to a broad range of topics. Initially I thought...
View ArticleClik here to view.
DesignThinkers 2013 Recap: Part 2 of 4
Bruce Nussbaum on Creative IntelligenceFor this year's DesignThinkers, I was particularly looking forward to Bruce Nussbaum's breakout session, Creativity = Strategy, where he shares key insights from...
View ArticleDesignThinkers 2013 Recap: Part 3 of 4
James Griffin on Designing Across Multiple PlatformsThis year I had the privilege of attending Design Thinkers 2013 as part of the Myplanet crew. Over this two-day event, I participated in lectures,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
DesignThinkers 2013 Recap: Part 4 of 4
Ricardo Crespo asks, "Why Are You?"As a first time attendee at a design related conference my experience at Design Thinkers was both informative and inspirational. Over the span of two days, four of us...
View ArticleBook Review: Drupal 7 Media by Liran Tal
Thank you Liran for an awesome book! I’ve written down a comprehensive list of Pros and Cons below that I hope will help both prospective buyers as well as the publisher.Pros:There are ample...
View Article