Blog of Subvert Marketing Inc.

How to fix your Diamond BVU195 USB external video display adapter after updating to Mac OS X 10.7.3

2012-02-08T21:08:49Z

I use the Diamond BVU195 USB external video display adapter to run three monitors from my MacBook Pro. When I say three monitors, I'm referring to the MacBook Pro as one, a 27" Dell U2711 as two and a 23" Dell U2311 as three. My set-up is as below.

After updating to the latest version of Mac OS X, 10.7.3, my U2311 no longer worked. This is the monitor that's plugged into the MacBook Pro with the Diamond BVU195 USB external video display adapter. The U2711 is connected via a Display Port to Mini Display Port cable, so it was fine.

I've gotten really used to my three monitor set-up, so this was a pain in the butt. My productivity was one third less! I can't afford that sort of extreme drop in productivity. Also, where was I supposed to put my iTunes window?

The solution I found was to first unplug the Diamond BVU195 USB external video display adapter, then reboot my MacBook Pro in Safe Mode (you do this by holding down the Shift keyboard button when Mac OS X is restarting) and let it reboot.

Once Mac OS X is running again, go to System Preferences and click Displays. That's it. Close the System Preferences window and reboot your machine, this time in normal mode.

After OS X returns, plug in your Diamond BVU195 USB external video display adapter cable. The third monitor should come back online and you can use it again.

Honestly, I have no idea why this worked, but it did and that's all that matters to me!

Designing Windows software: Seeking Windows 8 desktop application guidelines

2012-02-04T23:07:48Z

The release date for the Windows 8 public beta is rapidly approaching - most guesses are for the end of this month - and I'm really looking forward to installing and using Windows 8 as my primary operating system.

I did the same when the Windows 7 public beta was made available and that software caused me very few issues, so I feel confident that Microsoft will deliver a great product that most people will be able to happily use on a daily basis.

Looking at Windows 8 from a builder's perspective, almost all of the marketing and communications towards developers and designers from Microsoft about Windows 8 has been focused on Metro style apps: what they are, how to make them and in which ways they'll be delivered; that is, through the Windows Store. And of that information, most of it has been directed towards developers.

So, what about designing Windows 8 desktop applications?

Overall, any official information from Microsoft about desktop applications in Windows 8 has been scarce. For those of us who design custom Windows desktop software for a living, this lack of detail has been disconcerting. What's the future of Windows 8 desktop applications? What are these applications supposed to look like? What themes and default controls are we supposed to use? What rules and standards do we need to follow to ensure our custom software fits seamlessly into the Windows 8 desktop environment?

Since Windows 8 was revealed at Build, there's been a number of commercial products released that bring many aspects of the Metro design language to desktop apps. Metro-inspired, pre-packaged controls like DevExpress' DXv2 (see screenshot below) and Telerik's RadControls for WinForms are some key examples here.

As much as these products are beautifully designed, highly polished, and well, generally just look awesome, I remain unconvinced that they are the definitive future of Windows 8 desktop applications as a whole. This is because, with desktop apps, users need precision control.

With desktop apps, people need to handle multiple windows at once, manage files across the system and perform many different types of actions at any time. In my experience, the Metro style app interface style is more geared towards consumption than creation. Great for a dashboard and perfect for simple tasks like browsing, typing and viewing (such as on a Windows Phone or in a basic app on the PC) but not so hot for more complex decision making and complicated system-user interactions.

Now, you can see where Microsoft has been applying some of the key Metro guidelines to Windows 8 itself. For instance, the file copy/transfer window that Microsoft shared on Building Windows 8 is a clear nod towards Metro in its simple grid, colours and language.

Another good example is the Windows 8 Task Manager as also shared via Building Windows 8. The typography and layout really speak to the Metro design principles.

From all of the reading I've done - which as I mention above, is limited in its volume - the way in which Microsoft is applying Metro (in its minimalistic way) to Windows 8 desktop applications is how us designers should also be applying it to our own work. That is, squeezing in Metro where it makes sense from an information perspective, but sticking with "standard" Windows design elements for the rest of our application interface. The question for designers is how much of each do you apply and what is the recommended ratio between Metro and desktop elements?

While no one is going to stop you from bringing the whole visual language, presentation and interaction model of Metro into custom WinForms or WPF apps, that doesn't always mean you should nor will it be the go-to solution in every situation. I just don't see how it could. Along those same lines, if the WinRT default design is Metro - at least, I think it is! - what does the new standard of WinForms or WPF application look like? This?

What I'd like Microsoft to do is to completely pull back the curtain and provide designers of their desktop applications a clear vision, strategy and designer-oriented documentation for how we're supposed to move forward. I love coming up with totally custom interfaces, but I also want whatever I create to still look and feel like a true Windows app. I, as much as any designer, want my Windows 8 desktop applications to be the best they can be; we simply need some crystal-clear guidance for how to do that.

When I say "guidance", I'm talking about supplied templates and exact measurements from Microsoft, like desktop applications' recommended margins, padding, alignment and spacing plus colours, vocabulary, typography and icons. They've done a very good job with this on Windows Phone. But when it comes to Windows itself, this is the only MSDN article that I can find regarding margins, padding and spacing, yet it doesn't even include any numbers! All there is are simply vague references to what those terms mean. In this User Interface Text article, Microsoft actually details font sizes. That's exactly the level of information that we need, just much, much more of it.

As you'd expect, Apple provides extensive documentation for user experience and user interfaces in their Mac OS X Human Interface Guidelines. Compared to the Windows User Experience Interaction Guidelines, Apple's version is much more visual, better laid out, has more detail and is way easier to understand. For instance, first look at this section on Windows Frames from Microsoft and then compare to the Apple documentation on windows. Apple puts this all into a single section packed with information, while Microsoft scatters it throughout their MSDN website for designers to seek out and discover on their own.

Let's hope that Windows 8 takes a cue from Apple and does the same thing for its latest and greatest operating system: cohesive, consistent and clear, designer-oriented Windows desktop application guidelines.

With the success of Windows Phone and how even diehard Apple users (many of whom are designers) actually like how the phone looks and works, it's easy to see that Microsoft is onto something big. At this stage in the game, with Windows 8 and its slew of desktop applications coming very soon, they need to capitalize on that momentum and keep attracting and talking to designers. Everybody, and I mean everybody - designers, developers and users in general - will reap the benefits of such a move.

Cash Hound is available in the Windows Phone Marketplace

2012-01-31T18:51:49Z

This past weekend, our Windows Phone app, Cash Hound, was made available for download in the Marketplace.

We've talked a lot about Cash Hound here on our blog, for obvious reasons. We're really happy with how the app has turned out and what it does. We also want people to buy it. Yes, I have no shame.

In business and at home, having accurate, up-to-date knowledge of your finances is key to staying afloat. While there's already many cash flow apps and spreadsheet templates out there, we believe Cash Hound is, of all those available options, the simplest, easiest and best way to stay on top of your cash flow. The app is equally useful for both business owners and those who manage their home finances.

So, if you're lucky enough to have a Windows Phone, we urge you to take Cash Hound for a quick walk around the block.

We think Cash Hound is pretty darn awesome. Here's hoping you do too.

Designing Windows software: Moving our Windows Phone app, Cash Hound, from design to prototype

2012-01-19T18:32:13Z

After we learned that we won the Fast Track to the Mobile App contest, we looked at our schedule for this month and next, both of which were already packed, and were perplexed as to how we'd shoe-horn the actual development and design of our app into that time period.

Oh boy, was it ever going to be tight.

When I submitted our app design to the contest, I really didn't think we'd win. Truthfully, I was hoping for an honourable mention, but that was about the extent of it. I knew I'd have some stiff competition, so to have won, well, it still kind of blows my mind.

The app we submitted was based on rough, some rather lofty, ideals and features; we knew parts of it were going to be simpler to build while others were going to take much longer and require substantially more thought, experimentation and testing.

Mike and I decided to leave the app design as it was submitted and start developing the back-end services and technical architecture first. This would give us time to think about how the app works and make modifications to the software interface and interaction design, if any, based on what was going to be technically possible in the given time-frame. We can always add more features and details later; our current focus needed to be on whatever core functionality would help us get a high quality, first version of the app to market.

This "design, then quickly prototype" approach has given us a chance to play with the app and get a feel for what needs to be done, rather than drawing it all in a design program, like Adobe Fireworks (which is what I used to design the interface). It also afforded us time to research other apps more in depth, which is good, because we hit a snag with the app's name.

Our app used to be called Rhythmatic until we found an already existing product called Rhythmatic in the Apple App Store. Oops. As it's a possibility that we may bring our app to other platforms in the future, we wanted to keep that door open and so re-named our Windows Phone app to Cash Hound. We then hired a brilliant local illustrator to design our Cash Hound icon.

Look, a puppy!

After the app's back-end pieces were in place, we moved to look at the visual design and user/system interactions again. I knew that there were some key areas of the app that I want to clean up, optimize and polish. What I submitted to the contest was pretty bare bones; I wanted to dress it up and really pay attention to the visual and interaction design of Cash Hound.

As the weeks have flown by, Mike has gradually applied the new look/functionality to our app prototype. We continually tested it in both the emulator and on our Windows Phone devices to get a good handle on how it all felt, behaved and worked. As of yesterday, we've got a fairly polished app running in Expression Blend and Visual Studio, not to mention on our phones, pulling in real data. It's getting close...very close.

We always prefer getting to a workable prototype sooner than later, so that's what we're doing here. We've learned from years of experience that while you can have great looking software in a design program, that design may or may not hold up to real world use once it's actually built. To mitigate that risk, we do things fast.

Our preference when it comes to process is to always do some initial design up front, but then build as quickly as possible so we, and others, can get hands dirty. As time ticks by, we apply more polished design and interaction layers. We're confident enough in our design and development abilities to do so, and that makes a huge difference when it comes to shipping good software on time and on budget.

To date, we've been solely focused on building our app, thus, we don't have much in the way of marketing going on yet. That said, we do have a Cash Hound Twitter account if you're of the tweeting sort, so we invite you to follow our progression there, here or on the Core77 blog. Thanks!

Designing Windows software: Measuring vertical spacing for Windows Phone apps

2012-01-17T20:02:21Z

Spend any amount of time designing a Windows Phone app and you'll discover that 12 is the magical number of pixels in the horizontal grid. But what about vertical spacing?

With Windows Phone, the horizontal grid is consistently laid out in 12 pixel wide columns across the screen. Everything is then a multiple of 12: 24, 36, 48, 60 and so on. Jeff Wilcox brings this specification up in his handy Metro design guide for developers.

In that same blog post, Jeff states, "In some situations it may be appropriate to use 6px or 18px numbers (often when spacing text and other elements vertically), but try 12px first, it’s consistent and clear. The magic number of Windows Phone.".

Problem is, 12px as a suggested vertical measure doesn't line up. Given the 800px height of a Windows Phone screen, if you divide 800 by 12, you end up with an unfortunate "66.6" as the number of grid rows. That's not a definitive grid at all.

After some experimentation and testing, I've since discovered that the correct vertical spacing is actually 16px. Not only does 16 divide nicely into 800, but it also cleanly splits the application bar in half (8px top and 8px bottom). Clean, precise and repeatable.

Now, aligning elements vertically on Windows Phone is not a guarantee of consistency for your app software interface; it's more of a helpful aid. Type itself is also not naturally consistent in its presentation, so you should probably use this 16px measure as a general baseline.

If you, like me, design Windows Phone apps in Adobe Fireworks, here's the template that I use, with both grids (12px x 12px and 12px x 16px) intact, that you can download. I've included each for comparison's sake.

Happy designing!

Making for happier customers

2012-01-11T19:33:53Z

On our company page of this website, we talk briefly about the culture of Subvert. From listening to other people's opinions to charity donations and outsourcing tasks to delivering both speed and quality, we have a number of core beliefs that keep us on track.

Something that I've been thinking about as of late is how we can make people, that is, our customers, happy. Or if they're already happy, even happier.

It's usually not that difficult to make somebody else happy. The challenging part is swallowing your pride and humbling yourself before them; to become their servant. Is servant too strong of a word? I don't think so. "Servant" is perhaps an unpopular term these days, which is lousy, because the underlying meaning is very powerful when you consider it in the context of a service-based business.

We, as a company, perform many duties for others. We consult, we plan, we design, we build, we ship and we manage. We help others improve their businesses through our knowledge of software, websites and digital marketing.

To me, all of this sounds like servitude. And none of it is beneath us. It's who we are and what we do.

Which leads me to the making of happier customers.

We firmly believe that Subvert should do whatever makes our customers happiest, as long as it's not completely unreasonable. Of course, knowing where that border of irrationality lies is something you need to figure out for yourself and your own company.

We've made some mistakes over the years, but in each case, we've tried to learn from those errors and improve ourselves. Happy customers are earned, one at a time. It's not the quickest or most glamorous way to the top, but it's genuinely satisfying.

Doing something nice for somebody else - for instance, not billing for every minute they engage you, fixing something that only you know is broken at no extra charge or not stopping work simply because the project budget has run a bit over - will do wonders for your reputation. Small gestures like this go a long way towards customers recommending your company to others and them returning to you at a later date.

Everyone always remembers how they were treated. Would you prefer to be the bad experience or the fond memory?

Five years

2011-12-31T20:58:35Z

The end of 2011 means that the fifth anniversary of Subvert is on the horizon. It's hard to believe that this company is already almost half a decade old. What started as a part-time "hobby" in our spare bedroom has grown into a full-time business that employs two staff and is soon to be supporting another person.

With this milestone in mind, I've put together a walk down memory lane. To make it extra fun, I went through our historical archives and grabbed screenshots from the various Subvert websites that have represented us over the years.

2006

Subvert officially became a company in February 2007, but I registered and started using the domain name subvert.ca in 2006. At the time, I was doing a little bit of consulting on the side while I was working at Aasman, but it was mostly home to just my blog.

2007

When Subvert actually became a real business, I really had no idea of what I wanted the company to become. As a solution, I just threw myself out there. My offer to do anything helped me to figure out what people thought my best skills were and how I could help their organizations. By far, the biggest draw was usability testing and user experience research, something we still do in a major way today.

Here's a photo of my spare bedroom office at the time.

2008 (first year)

This was the year that I got really busy. In between personal websites like Urban Yukon and client websites like Whitehorse Star, I also managed to do a fair amount of work outside the territory for companies in B.C. and Alberta. In doing this, I realized how out of touch I felt with the rest of my industry - being located in Canada's far north will do that to a fella - so I started up a series of blog interviews with agencies and solo developers. This resulted in me making some great contacts and friends.

2009 (second year)

The third year of Subvert saw a lot of huge changes.

On January 1, 2009, I moved from our spare bedroom to an office. I looked a lot of places before I settled on this spot, located right across the street from the Yukon River in downtown Whitehorse. The building was old, but the other tenants and location were great.

At this time, I also chose to switch from using Apple Mac OS X to Microsoft Windows. More and more, I was working with other companies and contractors building Windows or Java-based applications, and OS X was causing too many issues.

In March 2009, my wife and I went to MIX, a Microsoft-sponsored conference aimed at user experience designers and developers. It was at this conference that I decided I didn't want to run Subvert by myself anymore. Not only was I burned out from working too much, but I felt like if I was going to stay interested, I needed to find myself a business partner. Someone who could help move Subvert from just designing applications, software and websites to actually building them.

Well, from the first time that I met him, I knew I'd found him. That person was Mike. We'd worked together on some other projects and we got along great, so we started talking. In October 2009, it became official.

2010 (third year)

In 2010, Mike and I had the privilege of working with some amazing clients, from all over North America, on projects that have really stretched us to learn new things and utilize cutting-edge technologies. From GIS web mapping applications to WPF software and mobile apps to enterprise software, we've been lucky to have designed and built some pretty cool stuff.

Yukono was a website I had dreamed about for years and in February 2010, we made it happen. I'd say that Yukono is what put us on the map, at least locally, when it came to awareness of our company. Now, almost two years later, the website is still going strong and has a vibrant user community behind it.

In October 2010, we moved to our current office; a brand new space atop another Whitehorse historical landmark.

The work and products that we delivered in 2010 started to put us on a new path: bigger, more complex systems with more demanding requirements and features. As such, we tuned up and documented our processes, while also getting more serious in our approach. That didn't mean we lost focus of who we were and where we came from; just that we looked at our world and our clients a little differently.

We also worked on a lot more software and applications than websites during 2010, a pattern that would continue in a greater capacity during 2011.

2011 (fourth year)

This past year has been a transitional one for Subvert. We moved from mostly working for others to making and selling more stuff ourselves. With some help from Yukon College, we built and shipped Flik, our first-ever commercial software product.

Our second software product, this time for Windows Phone, is due to be released in February 2012. I did some initial design work to enter a Microsoft-sponsored contest and we won, so now it's on us to get the app to market in less than two months. Good thing Mike is as brilliant as he is.

In addition to our own products, we also built a few more GIS web mapping applications, some enterprise software and a number of awesome websites. We also helped organize a very successful Yukon Technology conference and delivered a number of WPF applications for clients. We continue to be blessed with great customers and challenging projects.

2012

The past five years has been a wild ride filled with plenty of ups and downs, but such is business (and life, for that matter). To anyone out there looking to start their own company, all I can is this: don't give up. Building something of significance takes time, commitment and, once in a while, brute force, but it will happen if you stick with it.

Looking forward, Mike and I are extremely excited about 2012. Excited about what we'll create, what we'll ship and what we'll learn. From Windows Phone apps and ASP.NET systems to Windows 8 software and ArcGIS applications, we're lining up some cool new stuff. I have a feeling that this year will be our biggest and best yet.

Here's to a great 2012!

Our Windows Phone app, Rhythmatic, wins at the Fast Track to the Mobile App Design Challenge

2011-12-14T00:25:13Z

Microsoft Windows Phone and Core77, an industrial design magazine, recently held the Fast Track to the Mobile App contest. The international competition asked designers to come up with business-focused apps specifically tailored for Windows Phone.

On a personal level, this was a particularly rewarding contest to win. As a high school student who got accepted into Ontario College of Art's Industrial Design program, but never went (I instead chose a completely different post-secondary path), this specific area of design has always been important to me and very much a part of who I am. If you could look back through all of my childhood drawing books, you'd see them jam-packed full of industrial design-type illustrations for sports equipment, clothing, footwear, technology and all sorts of other everyday items. I guess, in some ways, this is my interest coming full circle.

Now, what was appealing to us about this contest is that it wasn't just asking for design concepts and leaving them as just that: ideas. The Windows Phone design team and Core77 actually want to see the apps created by designers be turned into functional, sellable apps in the Windows Phone Marketplace. And then, after they are in the Marketplace, completed apps are going to be eligible to receive additional marketing and promotion from Microsoft, the App Hub, Core77 and at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.

So, we decided to enter. Our idea was Rhythmatic: a dynamic, intelligent business cash-flow management app that leveraged some of the big features of Windows Phone, namely integration with Office Mobile and Live Tiles. After some time spent sketching, talking about and sitting down to design several of the individual screens for our app, we submitted Rhythmatic (as in the rhythm of running a business) to the contest website. And waited.

Yesterday we found out that Rhythmatic won! Yep, that's right, out of all the entries that the judges received, our app was chosen to be included in the top five of all entries worldwide.

What's next for Rhythmatic? We get to actually build it. The goal is for the app to be available in the Windows Marketplace in early 2012 with help and guidance from appointed senior Windows Phone designers. That's admittedly not a lot of time, but we've got plenty of experience building stuff fast. Really fast. So we're taking it upon ourselves to make this happen and we couldn't be more excited.

Stay tuned for updates on Rhythmatic as they come. Core77 has also assigned a writer to the development story who will be documenting our experience over the coming weeks and months. So that's now also official: we've become own reality show.

Off we go...

The reports of Windows Phone lacking in apps are greatly exaggerated

2011-11-28T19:55:35Z

Tech journalists who demo a Windows Phone often lazily adhere to a predictable formula in their review:

1. Easy to use!

2. Refreshingly different!

3. Live tiles!

4. Not enough apps.

On the last point: I really wish that this pattern would stop. It's not fair of journalists to criticize the lack of apps for Windows Phone compared to those of Apple iOS or Android; they are doing a disservice to their readers by focusing on such a small, inaccurate "issue" of the Windows Phone user experience.

Many people will read that last "Not enough apps" line and blindly dismiss Windows Phone as a good alternative to its competition, when in reality, it truly deserves your attention. Windows Phone has plenty of apps, many of the same as on other platforms, if you only search the marketplace.

I'll admit that I'm not a heavy app user. On my aging iPhone 3GS, I've only got 60 apps installed and 22 of those were added by default from Apple (therefore, 38 from independent developers). I've downloaded just over 100 apps in my two years of owning the device.

Last January, we bought a Samsung Omnia 7 running Windows Phone, from Expansys. We did this to be able to test, experiment and play with the new platform. Earlier this spring, Mike moved from his iPhone to a HTC HD7 with Windows Phone. I plan to do the same over the coming year.

On the Omnia 7, I've been able to find more than suitable replacements for the apps I regularly use on my iPhone. All it takes is searching the Windows Phone Marketplace and clicking the get/buy button on the app you want. Could it get any easier than that? Windows Phone even offers a free trial on every app in their marketplace; a feature that's sorely needed in the Apple App Store.

So, let's go through the third party apps, screen by screen, that I have installed on my iPhone and I'll point you towards the Windows Phone options that have the same functionality, and often, publisher.

The first screen on my iPhone:

TSN Mobile. There's no TSN app at present, but if you don't care about the service provider, there's ScoreMobile or ESPN ScoreCenter both of which are equally good. I use ScoreMobile.

CBC News. Again, no dedicated Windows Phone app at present, but Globe and Mail is a terrific replacement.

Harvest. Try Harvest Time Tracking. When TimeTractor finally launches, it will be a killer option.

Done-zo. Not needed; see below.

Reminders. This app is part of iOS and is run as a different app. Not so with Windows Phone, where it's integrated as part of Calendar, which I find to be a much more natural position. Plus, being packaged, it takes up less real estate on your phone.

Cyclemeter. Try RunKeeper which has very similar functionality and a better interface. It's also free.

Pkt Weather. WeatherMaster is sweet. Featuring Live Tile support so that your home screen is always up-to-date, WeatherMaster is a colorful, relatively attractive weather app option.

Reeder. Wonder Reader also syncs with Google Reader, just like Reeder.

Twitterific. Like Facebook below, Windows Phone has a built-in Twitter app, but I prefer rowi.

Facebook. Another built-in app, but unlike iOS, it's deeply integrated into the entire Windows Phone experience. For instance, Facebook events are part of your phone's central calendar.

The second screen on my iPhone:

RBC Mobile. I don't use this app very much, so the basic web browser version is more than adequate for those rare occasions that I do.

ING Direct. There's a Windows Phone app for ING DIRECT Canada.

Flickr. In using both the iOS and Windows Phone version of this app, I feel the latter is superior. Photos are bigger and the side-to-side swiping is oh-so-natural.

CBC Radio. CBC has quite a number of its channels available in a mobile version. Surprisingly, they only have a French version of CBC Radio at present, but no English version. Not a problem; I rarely use this app. Also, I'm sure English radio is on its way.

Alarm Clock. Night Stand Clock is the one to pick. As an aside, I've only used an alarm clock probably three times in the past seven years. Our kids are my alarm clock; they wake up every day at 6:00 a.m. for some insane reason.

Tag. Although Tag Reader is a good app, with Windows Phone, you don't even need to install it. Mango (Windows Phone 7.5) has a built-in tag/QR code reader with Bing.

Tipulator. Give Tip Calculator a shot. Bonus points for being less cartoony and cutesy than the iOS app.

Flixster. Same on Windows Phone.

Mixology. Cocktail Flow is a superior app to Mixology: more colourful, easier to use and there's actual pictures of the drinks.

Amazon. No app required. Simply go to Amazon and pin the website to your start screen.

Canadian Tire. Hooray! No buggy, complicated app required. Just go to Canadian Tire and pin the results to your start screen.

Yellow Pages. There's a Windows Phone app called...wait for it...Yellow Pages.

And finally, the third screen on my iPhone:

This is my kid screen: Games only. Itsy Bitsy, Diego Music, Super Why! and PAC-MAN, to name a few.

I'm not much of a gamer, but suffice to say, the Windows Phone Marketplace is stacked with games. The other day I downloaded and showed our older kids the game called Kinectimals. Suddenly getting the high score in Fairies Fly didn't matter anymore. Kinectimals blew their mind (as it did mine).

So, if you're shopping for a new phone, give Windows Phone a chance. Don't be swayed or deterred by the greatly exaggerated reports of Windows Phone lacking in apps, because it's simply not true. There's more than enough in the marketplace to satisfy the needs and curiosity of the average user.

Designing Windows software: Cut the chrome

2011-11-23T21:29:18Z

The more Windows desktop software I design, the more I find myself being influenced by the principles of Windows Phone in my work. That doesn't mean that what I produce always looks like it belongs on a Windows Phone device, but rather it's that I translate those concepts, at a high level, to the interfaces I design.

Several of the Metro principles reflect design beliefs that I've held for a long time, much longer than Windows Phone and the Metro design language have been around, so it's nice to be validated and confirm that I'm not completely out to lunch with my opinions!

The Windows Phone principle that I'd like to speak to here is "content, not chrome". Microsoft states that this principle, "...accentuates focus on the content that the user cares most about, making the product simple and approachable for everyone."

If you browse through the available apps in the Windows Phone Marketplace, you'll see this principle being respected and applied by many publishers. Some great examples are Facebook, RunKeeper and Kik Messenger, all of which place minimal emphasis on the header of the app - where the logo and other non-critical elements typically sit - and instead give the application space much more room, as per the "content, not chrome" principle. An extreme example is Speedo Plus which nearly has no chrome whatsoever; the application space is almost completely filled up with the app content.

If you click through to the larger version of the image above, you'll notice that all of these apps have headers of 30 pixels or less in height, as is. When you're designing an actual Windows Phone software application interface, which is 480 pixels wide by 800 pixels tall at 96 DPI, that's about 40 pixels in height.

What's unfortunate is that many of the most popular apps in the Windows Phone Marketplace don't adhere to this principle. Some really aren't too bad (after all, whitespace is good) - Foursquare and Yellow Pages are about 70-80 pixels in height – but others are just plain ridiculous – eHow is over 90 pixels and Groupon tops the charts at over 130 pixels in overall height. Again, at the actual 96 DPI, 480 pixels wide by 800 pixels tall size, that's an additional 10 pixels tall.

The notion of "good" design is highly subjective; a fact that I'm all too well aware of in my own work. What gets the thumbs up from someone may get double thumbs down from somebody else. My only wish is that for new Windows Phone designers – and other new (or old!) Windows desktop software designers, for that matter – is that they learn to recognize, respect and apply the Metro design principles and common standards in their interface work. These standards go a long way in creating a consistent, predictable and enjoyable user experience.

So, suck up that header and cut the chrome. Put your application's focus on the content that the user cares most about, not the decorative frame and elements around it.

Hiring: Junior or Intermediate Developer

2011-11-16T23:59:25Z

We are looking for a Junior or Intermediate Developer to join our team.

You are a talented and enthusiastic "Jack of all trades" who lives in or is willing to re-locate to Whitehorse, Yukon. You likely excel at one core language, but are skilled in a number of other languages and web technologies because you love this stuff and are stoked to learn new things. You’re also a creative problem solver who enjoys working with designers and senior developers to find solutions.

This is a full-time position, but we’ll give you some contract work to start and see how things go. If everything works out, we’ll set you up in our office in downtown Whitehorse with a mega-fast computer, big monitors, comfy chair and all sorts of other awesome perks. You’ll get to work on client projects as well as commercial products that we make and sell ourselves, like next generation Windows desktop and Windows Phone software, plus web applications.

Your experience

1+ years in a web development or programmer role, whether working for yourself or somebody else. While we value a Computer Science degree, what you’ve done is more important than a piece of paper

Our requirements

Skills in at least one of the following: C#, PHP, Java or HTML and Javascript

SQL and database development experience

Creative problem solver who enjoys working with designers and senior developers to figure out solutions together. You would never think “Just leave it to the designers.”

Ability to work independently while still bringing bigger issues to senior team members

Exceptional attention to detail

If you are interested in helping Subvert make awesome stuff out of the Internet, please email info@subvert.ca with a link to programming examples and a short message introducing yourself.

Five reasons why Flik is better than built-in Windows file sharing

2011-11-02T19:22:32Z

Last week we announced the availability of Flik, the first-ever commercial software to be wholly designed and built by Subvert. Although file sharing has come a long way with Microsoft Windows 7, we thought we could still significantly improve the experience; the result is this product.

Microsoft has a simple built-in file sharing feature called Homegroups. If you're on a home network, it's pretty straightforward to set up Homegroups. Just enable the feature, join the group that shows up and pick the folders or libraries you want to share. The problem with Homegroups is two-fold: first, you need to be on a home-based network, which in our case, being in an office, doesn't apply. The second is that you can only share with other people who are using Windows 7, so if you're on a network with computers running Windows Vista, XP or Server, even Mac OS X, you're out of luck.

Windows 7 also gives you the ability to share files and folders with anybody on your network, independent of their Windows operating system version. The issue with this built-in feature is that it's too difficult to set up for non-geeks. First you need to pick the folder you want to share, then choose the user or groups who will be able to see it and finally, apply a series of cryptic permissions. If that sounds easy, turns out you're a geek (don't worry, we are too).

So, how is Flik different and what it makes it better than built-in Windows file sharing?

Reason #1: Ridiculously easy setup

With Flik, we wanted to make it dead simple to share files and folders with other people on a Windows network. After months of design, development and testing, we finally got the process down to a single step: install Flik on your computer. That's it. The software then continuously shouts out to others on the same network who are running Flik and allows you to connect with them in a matter of seconds. Close the application window and Flik stops shouting. Open it again and you're available in an instant.

Reason #2: Notifications

Using the built-in Windows file sharing, if somebody drops a file into your shared folder there's no way for you to know that it's there. The person could send you a follow-up email, text message or voicemail - maybe even smack you upside the head - but until they do or you check yourself, there's no alert. With Flik, the software displays a subtle notification in the Windows Taskbar whenever new stuff shows up.

Reason #3: Chat messaging

Windows file sharing is anti-social by nature. All you're doing is sending files and folders back & forth, which is fine, but if you want to send a message or toss in some additional details regarding what you've sent, that needs to be passed along in another file. There's also no way to historically go back and see what was said about a particular file or folder. With Flik, chat messaging is baked right in. As such, you can use Flik as a dedicated network chat application without having to install more software.

Reason #4: Send anything

The types of files that work best with built-in Windows file sharing are documents and folders. If you want to share a snippet of text or a website address (URL) with another user, it gets confusing and is hard to do. This is actually why we built Flik in the first place; an easy way for us to send interesting and/or important information back and forth between members of our team.

Reason #5: Big files are no problem

Transferring very large documents or folders across an internal network is easy with Windows file sharing, but crazy slow. In our testing, we were able to send a 200 MB file from one Flik user to another in less than 20 seconds. With the built-in Windows file sharing, that process took well over a minute. Imagine what would happen with a 900 MB file or a 2 GB archive. This is particularly useful for people who need to share big files with others on the same network but want to avoid paying huge Internet bandwidth costs by having to upload/download files to an external, web-based service like Dropbox.

So, to wrap up...

As you can tell, we're really proud of Flik. We want to tell the world how useful of a product it is so that people will buy a license and make us wildly rich (okay, maybe that's a bit of a stretch). But, others are already starting to talk about and share Flik with others, which is pretty darn amazing. It's fun building cool stuff.

We hope you will find a place for Flik on your own computer(s). Let us know what you think if you do.

Signing WPF software with an Authenticode Certificate

2011-10-25T19:57:59Z

As we were nearing the release of our latest WPF software project, Flik, we decided to get serious and buy an Authenticode Certificate for the application.

After looking around the internet and talking to several providers, we decided on kSoftware. kSoftware is a COMODO official partner and as we found out, have terrific customer service. I emailed them to see if their certificates could be used to sign Silverlight .xap files, and they quickly responded, asking me to send one over. The customer service rep then used his own certificate to sign my file and sent it back as proof that it worked. Now that's awesome!

Buying the actual certificate was easy, but meeting all of the identity validation requirements was a lot of work. We had to fax in several types of documentation, including our business license and telephone bill. We also had to make a bunch of changes to our subvert.ca domain registration so that our whois record was just right. After we got our proverbial ducks in a row, we received a quick phone call, and our certificate was issued.

Once we had the certificate and I'd installed it onto my machine (this happens automatically when it's issued), I exported it as a .pfx file using these instructions. The .pfx file is what we use for signing the ClickOnce manifests and the application itself. Visual Studio 2010 makes doing this stuff really easy, but it took me a couple of tries to actually get this working properly.

In your project properties, go to the Signing tab and check the "Sign the ClickOnce manifests". Then you use the "Select from File..." button to go and select the .pfx file you created earlier and type in your password. Depending on when your certificate expires, you can save yourself some grief by including a time stamp with your certificate. Your certificate provider will have a timestamp url that you can use for just this purpose. By time stamping and signing it, it basically says that your code is trusted even if your certificate has expired. Because at the time of signing, it was trusted.

That takes care of making sure your ClickOnce installer shows your organization as the publisher, rather than "Unknown Publisher", which can look dicey. And nobody likes dicey software.

The second step is to sign the executable file that is being run on the client's computer. I thought that in the bottom of the Signing tab where it says "Sign the assembly" was the right place to do just that, but man was I wrong. It gave me nothing but grief to the point that I did some more research and decided it would be best to simply scrap that plan and instead add a Post-build event.

Every time I build the application, it uses our certificate to sign the generated executable and timestamps it as well, just like the ClickOnce manifest. Now, we have an installer that is signed and an app that is signed!

I should also add that running a signed application doesn't mean it's bug-free, it just means that it was actually us who built it (which means it's nearly the opposite of bug-free).

To see this Authenticode Certificate magic in action, download and install Flik. Then, if you dig the Flik software itself, you can always buy a license. Just sayin'.

Subvert RSS feed fixed

2011-10-25T18:48:25Z

A month ago, one of our adoring fans (really, just someone who reads our blog) wrote to tell us that this website's RSS feed was wonky. We thought, "No way!". But then we looked ourselves. Oops. Yep, it was wonky. As in totally unreadable.

Our RSS feed somehow got blowed up.

Then, as it usually goes, we got busy doing other stuff and forgot about fixing the RSS feed. Oops, again.

Today we're happy to announce that this is no longer the case. Our RSS feed is now working properly. So, if you're already a subscriber, our sincerest apologies for the hassle. And for those of you who didn't even know we had a RSS feed, you're most welcome. Subscribe today and never miss another thrilling update.

Designing Windows software: Measuring the application frame for maximized windows

2011-10-23T18:10:21Z

When designing Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) software, you can choose to either utilize the default Windows theme, with all of its built-in sizing and controls, or create your own from scratch. With the regular window frames setup, it's easy to know the size of each window control because those decisions are already made for you. On the other hand, with a custom theme, you need to figure out those measurements yourself.

Designing a specialized WPF theme is tricky. With what amounts to a blank canvas for your application, it's easy to get carried away with new ideas or radically different approaches simply because you can. WPF gives you the power to do almost anything you want, design and interaction-wise. But as it's said, with great power comes great responsibility.

Part of this responsibility is to ensure your custom application frame - the main window of the software that is not document/content-based - measures exactly (or at least, as closely as possible) the same dimensions as the default Windows style. This helps to ensure that your WPF software integrates seamlessly into the rest of the Windows desktop experience and isn't jarring and unpleasant to use compared to other Windows software that's also been installed. If we look at the standard theme, you'll notice there's some common control sizes.

For the window frame itself, that's 38 pixels tall and 14 pixels wide.

Something else you need to account for is the instance of a maximized window. This is when the user clicks the maximize button and your software changes sizes to consume the entire available view. A maximized window is different from full-screen mode in that the Windows taskbar still commands a primary position, which you also need to measure:

The taskbar is 40 pixels tall, as it ships. This measurement doesn't take into account people who manually increase the height of their Windows taskbar - it can double in height, up to 80 pixels and even move to the top or sides of a screen - but honestly, there's not much you can do about that from a design point of view. Windows itself will compensate for the bigger taskbar, with the result being less room for your software interface. Such is life.

In total, these components tack on an additional 78 pixels in height and 14 pixels in width to your custom application frame, so be sure to get those in place before putting any significant time into visual design. It'd be a tragedy to design a beautiful WPF custom theme and then find out, upon starting to code the XAML in an editor, that your base measurements were way off. You'd have to start from scratch all over again. Spend time in the beginning to get your framework laid out properly and you'll be safe.