The factor most closely linked to support costs is the extent to which the user interface matches the way the users think and work.

– Don Norman

To me, driving is not an end in itself. It is just a tool for solving the problem of getting from point A to point B. The less I have to learn about how to accomplish this task the better.

My goal is not to become a car expert. My goal is to get to my destination conveniently. I don’t want to “have greater control over the experience”; I don’t want “more power”; heck, depending on where I’m going, I often prefer to take the bus, where I have no control over the experience at all!

It occurred to me as I read commenter after commenter try to convince me that my own personal priorities were incorrect that I drive a car the same way most people use a computer. They don’t want to know about the difference between ROM and RAM or how many floppy disks you can store in a 6 megabit cable modem. They just want to surf the web, send email, and look at pictures of their grandchildren. (Okay, they may want to do other stuff too, but knowing the difference between PIO and DMA is definitely not on the list.)

The New Old Thing > I Drive a Car the Way Most People Use a Computer

The answer: quite a bit (if you’re good).

The seminal work on design philosophy. In just over 200 pages Don Norman details the psychological principles of design. The book was written in 1988, so the examples may be a little dated, but the principles remain the same.

• Visibility
• Feedback
• Affordances
• Natural Mappings
• Constraints

I feel like a switch has been turned. I’m constantly evaluating the design of various objects. I’ve always noticed poor design (everyone does, it’s annoying) but now I’m excited by fantastic design. When something is designed such that I can accomplish my task without breaking my train of thought, that’s great design. It should “win a prize.” Doors are of constant scrutiny after finishing this book. I cringe when confronted with a vertical handle that needs to be pushed or a horizontal bar with “PULL” on it. An amusing example: What’s Wrong with this Door << Not the User's Fault.

The book concentrates on physical objects (ie the ‘Norman Door’), but there is no reason the idea’s can’t translate to UX. The chapter on poor design and user error was especially interesting.

I point out that the design is faulty and that others make the same errors. Still, if the task appears simple or trivial, then people blame themselves

I encounter this all the time with technology. Poorly designed software can turn people off from computers completely. Developers have gotten quite a bit better at this over time. Microsoft Office 2007 and it’s ribbon menu was a bold redesign, which payed off well.

Great design flows without interruption. It is modeled with human interaction in mind, requiring no instructions or labels.

Wherever labels seem necessary, consider another design.

It’s a great point. By utilizing constraints, natural mappings, and visiblity a designer can communicate with the user. No instructions needed.

Sometimes designers utilize these principles incorrectly or by accident. Users are then communicated bad information and errors result.

When someone makes an error, there usually is good reason for it

A few other tidbits I found interesting:

Whenever the number of functions and required operations exceeds the number of controls, the design becomes arbitrary.

ie, the digital watch my Dad can never program.

And just how important design is:

Suppose that each everyday thing takes only a minute to learn; learning 20,00 of them occupies 20,000 minutes – 33 hours or about 8 forty hour work weeks.

How do people cope?

Part of the answer lies in the information available from the appearance of the objects and part comes from the ability of the designer to make the operation clear.

All things considered the book was a fantastic read. It delivers a foundation for my interest in UX. I’m looking forward to reading more of Norman’s work.

Objectified looks great. I hear the film has a segment shot inside the top secret Apple design facility, and even an interview with design ‘Czar’ Jonathan Ive. Exciting stuff. To my knowledge, the only other time Steve allowed a Jonathan Ive interview was back in 2004.

A solid read that attempts to dissect the success of design centric companies like Apple and Ikea. The authors emphasize ‘design as a process not an event‘ and the (somewhat clunky) idea of  ‘customer supply chain management’. The case study on Motorola was interesting. “Motorola doesn’t have a design culture. It has an engineering culture that tries to be a design culture.” I think quite a few companies fall into this category.

The book itself is well designed. Hard backed with large imprinted text on the front, it catches your attention (it caught mine in an airport bookstore while I was trying to catch a flight home). Though the stiff binding makes it difficult to read without both hands.

Fresh off my interviews with Microsoft this book was exactly what I needed to pique my interest in design. It changed the way I look at software development.

Coding Horror: Avoiding the Uncanny Valley of User Interface