Interruptions are a blunt force of disruption, cutting the deepest because it’s the context (the why, when, what, where, and who) that’s often the first thing lost in the aftermath of it, making it so difficult returning to the thing we were doing.
Weird thing is, it’s not until I began thinking about how Under Cloud does what it does that it became obvious how resistant it is to interruptions, so I had to reverse engineer the mechanics of it!
But it isn’t one definitive thing that inoculates it to the worst effects of interruptions but a commingling of ideas, decisions, having followed intuition, and experimental user interface design that got it there.
It’s been a journey that’s involved writing a literature review (using Under Cloud), touching on: berrypicking by Bates, M. J. (1989); information encountering by Erdelez, S. (1999); and the work of psychologist Gloria Mark, who’s spent decades studying people studying.
What’s been most interesting has been learning about the science behind these problems, and I stumbled on some of it by accident, while building the best product I could.
Under Cloud allows me to jump into work from ages ago as it happened moments ago with minimal loss of time to the usual protracted reappraisal and sense-making that happens.
I have grand plans for Under Cloud, and everything it’s doing at the moment is the foundation to everything else in the future.
Make great research unforgettable with Under Cloud — sign up for free.