Principles exist at a higher level than any pattern. They can be considered patterns for the patterns, if you will. Each pattern, and each detail of interactive or presentational design, should adhere to each of these principles at all times.

This resource is an evolution of an introductory section for the book Designing Mobile Interfaces. Each section and chapter in the book began with a discussion of the core principles for their sections, as well as other helpful guidelines that apply to those patterns.

While many people still talk about the constraints of mobile devices—how they have small screens and are hard to type on—I focus on the value they bring by not making users type and by doing things that no other devices can do.

Sensors are the real key to the magical appeal of mobile devices—and location is one of the first and best of these sensing technologies. Knowing users’ location is an excellent way to tie their reality to the digital experience you’re designing, and understanding the technology and how to integrate it is important, and a lot more complex than most people realize.

I am a huge process nerd so have written up a lot on it over the years. Here, for starters, I have gathered them all up for when you want to know what I think of it.

Eventually I’ll likely update this to actually have some text itself explaining my thoughts on how to build — most of all — a UX team that works well with modern assumptions of speed and efficiency.

I regularly encounter people, or posts, that refer to all criticism as bad. That it stifles creativity, especially for us sensitive artsy designer types. I could hardly disagree more. Criticism is a key part of discovering new ideas and working collaboratively. I am not brilliant enough to get by without help from others.

Digital products are about content. Even controls are pointless if users don’t understand their purpose and cannot read about what they do. The most important thing you can do for universal access and usability is to make sure everyone can read your website, app, or wearable.

Read on for reliable, research-based sizes for all your text and icons, on wearables, mobile phones, tablets, desktops and laptops.

One of the things I pride myself on is practicing technology and process agnosticism. However your organization works, whatever you want to build, we can work that way.

Except for one thing we hold near and dear. We always want to be sure we’re making a quality product. By quality, we mean things along the lines of the formal business definitions. ISO 8402–1986 has a good one…

You need to do a retrospective or post-mortem, but find the process vague, uninformative, entirely too negative, or it causes arguments?

Yeah, try the After Action Review method instead. It’s a collaborative, inclusive assessment, and one you can perform after any major activity or event. Not just bad projects, but good ones. Not just at the end of projects, but at the end of each phase.

Here’s your manual on being a good, productive, collaborative, and not-annoying, information worker in a modern, western office.

Mobiles are not different from desktops because they are small but because they are connected and personal. Good products don't just meet a niche, but leverage the native intent of the interface. Lately, we have heard some gnashing of teeth as developers try to figure out how to make things that are useful for the Apple Watch. Meanwhile, users of Pebble wonder what the fuss is about as much has already been figured out regarding wearables.