I really enjoyed the project that I came here for (despite the work space) – usability research and identifying gaps and balances between design and usage.  Doing research is one of my favorite parts of my job.  After interviewing 20 people, I encountered the usual quota of characters:

• The super chatty
• The arrogant
• The quiet
• The obnoxiously flirty
• The shy sweet smart
• The overly-perfumed-cologned
• The luddite
• The snarky
• The funny office sign – an engraved plaque on a computer “Please don’t touch the screen”

I’m a bit grouchy at this point. I miss my wife and daughter.  Last night my daughter screamed “I want my mommy” (I’m her mommy, my wife is her momma) and that just about killed me.  I miss being home.

P.S. Why is Rachel Maddow on at 10pm in Austin but not til 11pm in San Francisco? I’d watch her more often but 11pm is usually too late for my working parent life.  There’s an ad about sexual predators “Exploiting A Minor is a Major Offense” on the Rachel Maddow show here in Austin?  That stinks of the hateful lie  that gays recruit children.  Or maybe it’s not quite that targeted but it raised my radar.  I’m cranky.

Today Shutterfly completed frustrated and annoyed me – they removed Search! I don’t know when they removed it – I just know it was there the last time I looked for it.

Recently I uploaded 600+ photos to my Shutterfly account with the plan to print all of them, index them in an album by filename and then be able to easily (I thought) go back to Shutterfly, search for a photo by filename, and print muliple copies of specific photos.  I think it’s easier to browse through and compare 600+ photos when they’re printed in an album.  It’s more difficult, I think, to browse and compare that many photos in a web browser.

After I uploaded the photos I couldn’t find the search/find to search my photos as I had done in the past.

Shutterfly’s help section indicates that they have a “Find” feature to search the photos in your account by date, by filename, and so on.  Their help FAQ has a question “How can I find specific pictures?” and answers the question with this:

I searched the site for help for how to find my photos by filename and finally sent a request to their customer service.  I wrote:

I’d like to search the photos in my account by filename, and, for example, find the photo with filename IMG_2868.jpg

When looking at “My Pictures” the only search option is to search the web site. The help section suggests that there is a Find feature at the top of the page but I don’t see it. I took a screenshot of what’s at the top of the page when I’m viewing my albums and pictures — and I’ve attached it to this question

Could you please tell me where, in this screenshot, is the Find icon referenced below?

Their customer service replied really quickly (within 7 hours) with this:

The find feature you mention is not one that we currently have available. We may offer it in the future, but have no immediate plans of doing so. We have removed this feature from our website during our recent upgrade and this feature is no longer available. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause you.

Please let us know if we can offer any additional assistance.

At the top of Shutterfly’s customer service email there’s a link to respond:

I clicked on the link and got this page:

I entered my email address and name and got this (argh!)

Now I’m going to do the tedious task of putting all of those 600+ photos on a different photo web site where I can manage and search them and print multiple copies as needed.  Snapfish doesn’t have this functionality, but Kodak Gallery does.

Here’s Kodak Gallery’s option to search your albums for specific photos:

Kodak Gallery also has an iPhoto plugin so that meets my Mac-friendly needs.  I tested Kodak Gallery’s “search album” functionality and it worked just the way I needed it to – it found the photo by filename and then I could easily order prints and then search for another photo and order prints.

Then I discovered dotphoto which does what I need:

1. Multiple upload options that work for Mac
2. Search feature that can search filenames, titles, etc for photos in my albums
3. 3×5 photo printing

This is a huge help for online browsing/puchasing – so many times web site users find something they want on a web site only to discover, a few clicks later, that it isn’t available in the size they want.  Just don’t show them (tease!) a product if it isn’t available in their size.  Of course, Zappo‘s also has the helpful option to “email me when my size is in stock,” but Zappo’s (and many other online retailers) only let you search by one size at a time.

Many people fall between sizes or sometimes buy one size up or down from their “regular” size.  It’s about time an online retailer recognized this with their browse/search/filter tools.

Kudos to Boden’s web site team for a super useful search/filter option!

Usually Facebook is one of the more unhelpful sites I use regularly – a confusing mess of undercooked noodles that I pry apart to find the thing I want. I love that I don’t get any spam in my Facebook inbox and I used it a lot for email with friends.

I’m helping a high school friend plan her wedding at San Francisco City Hall in a couple weeks (she’s flying in from Florida! Yay!) and we’ve been planning via Facebook messages. I was looking for the Facebook message where she said what she and her bride-to-be are going to wear.

Click, back button, click, back button, scroll, back button, and so on. Then I noticed that Facebook had planted a helpful yellow message at the top of my Inbox after a few back/forths – I’ve never seen the search box for messages before – cool!