Filed under design …

Mar 20 2010
2 Comments
design, rants

Mobile UI designers vs. Web UI designers: Fight!

Daily I am reminded of how different our worlds are.

A frustrated question I have:
How can mobile UI designers so staunchly refuse UI norms and paradigms from a field that has, over the last 10+ years, run circles around them with constant rapid design iteration and instant direct user feedback?

How often do I hear designers from a mobile background say things like “oh but users won’t get that!” Really? Have you tried it? “Yes we user-tested a quick Flash prototype during production some time ago.”

Uh. Ok. Did you actually test it out in the real world? Have you ever actually played with it in a functioning prototype? Have you interacted with users on a feedback forum, in blog comments, or in person at a conference?

That’s nothing compared to the organisational differences inherent in the two types of production. From what I have seen so far, designers and devs and management from the mobile side live and die by super detailed “spec documents”, strict processes and even stricter timelines. (To be fair, this is because they’ve been tied to the unforgiving schedule of the production of physical devices which their products are tied to.)

There’s alot of talk about WRT vs. Native SDK for mobile UIs, but is anybody looking at the very difficult design culture clash between practioners of each? It took a few weeks for me to realise the huge black holes, the unknown unknowns, between us in our communications. Way off assumptions from both sides.

“You need to spec the height of this box.” (Web designers will feel the pain here…)

And let’s not even speak of desktop UI design. God forbid you bring up a UI element we all use everyday in our web browsers.

Mar 07 2010
Leave a comment
design, observations

Cutting Up An Ox

(from “The Way of Chuang Tzu”, translation of the classic taoist, by Thomas Merton, a book that has followed me most of my life.)

Prince Wen Hui’s cook
Was cutting up an ox.
Out went a hand,
Down went a shoulder,
He planted a foot,
He pressed with a knee
The ox fell apart
With a whisper,
The bright cleaver murmured
Like a gentle wind.
Rhythm! Timing!
Like a sacred dance,
Like “The Mulberry Grove”
Like ancient harmonies!

“Good work!” the Prince exclaimed,
“Your method is faultless!”
“Method?” said the cook
Laying aside his cleaver,
“What I follow is Tao
Beyond all methods!

“When I first began
To cut up oxen
I would see before me
The whole ox
All in one mass.
“After three years
I no longer saw this mass.
I saw the distinctions.

“But now, I see nothing
With the eye. My whole being
Apprehends.
My senses are idle. The spirit
Free to work without plan
Follows its own instinct
Guided by natural line,
By the secret opening,
The hidden space,
My cleaver finds its own way.
I cut through no joint, chop no bone.

“A great cook needs a new chopper
Once a year – he cuts.
A poor cook needs a new one
Every month – he hacks!

“I have used this same cleaver
Nineteen years.
It has cut up
A thousand oxen.
Its edge is as keen
As if newly sharpened.
“There are spaces in the joints;
The blade is thin and keen:
When this thinness
Finds that space
There is all the room you need!
It goes like a breeze!
Hence I have this cleaver
Nineteen years
As if newly sharpened!

“True, there are sometimes
Tough joints. I feel them coming,
I slow down, I watch closely,
Hold back, barely move the blade,
And whump! the part falls away
Landing like a clod of earth.

“Then I withdraw the blade,
I stand still
And let the joy of the work
Sink in.
I clean the blade
And put it away.”

Prince Wen Hui said,
“This is it! My cook has shown me
How I ought to live
My own life!”

- Zhuangzi (translated by Thomas Merton)

Tagged
Feb 20 2010
Leave a comment
design, observations

Sophisticated simplicity

One of the definitions of sophisticated is “having a refined knowledge of the ways of the world cultivated especially through wide experience.”

Approaching any situation or task from a variety of perspectives invariably gives one the ability to more fully understand and engage with it.

When approaching the job of designing something with the ability of multiple perspectives, which one might gain with a “refined knowledge of the ways of the world cultivated especially through wide experience,” with an eye towards simplicity and straighforwardness, the result can perhaps be deemed to be “sophisticated simplicity.”

It is the kind of simplicity that comes out of the process of wittling down a thing that often times is by nature quite complex, by considering many of the factors, issues, possibilities, opportunities, ramifications, desires and needs involved.

And doing so with the kind of style and taste one might also accrue with “refined knowledge of the ways of the world cultivated especially through wide experience.”