Zenefits: A new approach to business insurance

If you have ever been given the task of researching what type of insurance your start-up needs, look no more. Zenefits is a start-up company out of Y-Combinatory that is putting on a unique spin on the Insurance industry. 

Categories: Startups Entrepreneurship web

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Hackathon Strategy: Rapid Prototyping with Django

So you've been invited to a hackathon or registered for one on your own. There's a few tips and tricks here at Yeti that we've come to figure out after attending a few ourselves.

Categories: Development Django TastyPie Hackathon

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How to use git? A beginner's guide

When writing source code for a computer application, we need a place to save source code. A single software developer can save source code on his own computer and perhaps back it up regularly. This solution, however, does not scale when multiple developers are involved. Source control tools assist in collaborative software development by allowing multiple developers to work on source code concurrently.

Categories: Development

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Building an Application is a lot like Building a Bicycle (well, at least in the beginning)

In my most recent experiment of building a new road bike I noticed that the process kept getting delayed due to lack of preparation. I basically approached this project with the ego that I could just remember all the parts I would need. In reality I just kept forgetting one small part, would order it, and then would quickly realize that I forgot just one more part.

Categories: Development Design Applications web mobile

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Designing for Emotion

Meeting new people is fun, and in the design and development start-up scene here in San Francisco, one of the most fun ways to meet new folks is by going to meet-ups. My favorite question that I inevitably have to answer when telling a new face about myself is why I studied sociology and how it applies to design. Many people don't realize that in order to create something that users truly enjoy, the design needs to successfully appeal to their emotions and create a positive memory that stands out.

The most interesting liberal arts tie-in with design I have found is how "Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs" can be reformatted into a hierarchy of design. For those that don't remember or were never taught, Maslow's Hierarchy is a framework that states no matter who you are, every human has a basic pyramid of needs and can't ascend to the next step unless the previous has been fulfilled. From the bottom to the top they are: Physiological (the need to breathe, eat, sleep), Safety (safety from bodily harm, loss of family, property of job), Love/Belonging (intimate connection to other humans), Esteem (sense of self, respect and confidence to excel in life) and Self-Actualization (fulfillment in being creative, solving problems and following a moral code to serve other earthlings).

Maslow's approach to identifying human needs can help us understand our goals when designing interfaces as well. We could certainly live content lives existing on the bottom three levels of the hierarchy but as top tier San Franciscan designers we strive to live in that top layer. If we apply Maslow's hierarchy to interface design it would look something like this:

Categories: design

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