10 things I learnt from 2 years at the Government Digital Service

A talk about the top 10 things learnt from working on a website that changes every day, is constantly growing and has to work for everyone in the UK.

A text-only version is available at https://github.com/tombye/redevelop-2014-presentation.

Transcript

1. Tom Byers
 Front-end Lead 
 Government Digital Service
 @tombaromba
2. 10 things GDS Tom
3. I’m from the Government Digital Service GDS Tom
4. We’re a team at the heart of government building digital public services GDS Tom
5. We started by building GOV.UK GDS Tom
7. We’re now transforming government services GDS Tom
8. GDS 25 of government’s biggest services redesigned to meet the needs of users Tom
9. To do that we’re working with digital teams in departments all over the country... GDS Tom
10. As well as building common tools for analytics and signing in, improving the way government buys technology, and making sure civil servants have the right skills to run digital by default services GDS Tom
11. We work in open, agile, multidisciplinary teams, relentlessly focused on user needs GDS Tom
12. 1. Think about access first GDS Tom
13. How do they get to your content? GDS Tom
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16. 2. Learn the tools your users have GDS Tom
17. How do they use their machines? GDS Tom
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21. Tom GDS
22. GDS Tom 1 2 4 3 5 6 7 9 8
23. GDS Tom 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
24. GDS Tom
25. 3. Your design is a tool too GDS Tom
26. How easy does your page design make it to access your information? GDS Tom
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28. 28 GDS Tom
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30. “The web is, by its nature, stateless so your design needs to give users some context” ! @markhurrell GDS Tom
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32. 4. Don’t ask bad questions GDS Tom
33. GDS Tom GDS Tom
34. Does your form work as a conversation? ! @cjforms GDS Tom
35. Don’t underestimate how hard a single task can be ! Think about someone with no prior experience of websites using your forms GDS Tom
36. GDS Tom
37. 5. Tasks cannot be too simple GDS Tom
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39. 6. Text is the primary visual interface GDS Tom
40. https://www.gov.uk/service-manual GDS Tom
41. https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/user-centred- design/how-users-read GDS Tom
42. “Users only really read 20 to 28% of a web page” GDS Tom
43. “You don’t read one word at a time. You bounce around. You anticipate words and fill them in.” ! “By the time you’re 9 years old, your brain can drop up to 30% of the text and still understand” GDS Tom
44. 7. How well you write affects everything you do GDS Tom
45. GDS Tom
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47. 8. Screen readers show how good your markup is GDS Tom
48. GDS Tom
49. The OS gets this information from your HTML GDS Tom
50. 9. Progressive enhancement is about resilience as much as it is about inclusiveness ! @bradwright GDS Tom
51. https://gds.blog.gov.uk/2013/10/21/how-many- people-are-missing-out-on-javascript-enhancement/ GDS Tom
52. 10. What you don’t know yet has the highest value GDS Tom
53. 11. Publish, don’t send GDS Tom
54. GDS Tom
55. We believe sharing what we do will make it better, so you can see lots of our thinking and working online... GDS Tom
56. Read more:
    GDS Blog – http://gds.blog.gov.uk
    Design Principles – www.gov.uk/design-principles
    Digital Strategy – www.gov.uk/digitalstrategy
    Service Manual – www.gov.uk/service-manual
    Performance – www.gov.uk/performance
    Assisted Digital – http://assisteddigital.blog.gov.uk
    Digital Inclusion – http://digitalinclusion.blog.gov.uk
    Our code – www.github.com/alphagov GDS Tom
57. Attribution:
    Slide 18 (left) https://www.flickr.com/photos/barkbud/4220648321
    Slide 18 (right) https://www.flickr.com/photos/larskflem/503118033
    Slide 19 (left) https://www.flickr.com/photos/larskflem/5088121460 Slide 19 (centre) https://www.flickr.com/photos/kimsandiego/8168063548 Slide 19 (right) https://www.flickr.com/photos/66879463@N00/4946025923 Slide 25 https://www.flickr.com/photos/jason-morrison/1954452273 GDS Tom
58. Thanks!
    ! Tom Byers
 @tombaromba