Interface Design Code, Inspiration, and Camels
Over at Functioning Form, Luke Wroblewski has written a post called The Impact of Interface Design Markup which deals with interface design technologies, certain to be a major topic in the future. He includes a quote from Bob Baxley suggesting that future visual designers might lay out more of their design in production code, rather than in some visual-editing application like Fireworks or Photoshop. A prime example of this, of course, is SVG, or scalable vector graphics. If browsers get support for these, then graphic designers can start laying out complete pages in code, with nary an HTML tag in sight.
Jeff Veen has an interesting post about when/how design happens. He suggests that often the solutions to design problems come after he’s stewed on them for a while. This sounds right, but the usability side of me cringes a bit, knowing how the most inspired solutions, which work great for designers during their time on the project, sometimes end up working not at all when real users get their hands on them. Probably not in Jeff’s case, but users are the ultimate arbiters of any project.
Finally, if you haven’t already, go read Camels and Rubber Duckies by Joel Spolsky. And obviously, don’t just think in terms of software…
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Comments
1. Elaine 11:17am, Mon 4th, 2005
Ah, but if what you’re “stewing in” is user research, then that’s got to make a difference, and maybe that’s the point!
(I had much the same experience with the last big redesign of my main work site.)
2. Josh 1:28pm, Mon 4th, 2005
Elaine, I think you’re right that that is Jeff’s point. When I said I cringed, I was thinking about how many times I’ve heard designers extoll on their “inspired” solution to a difficult problem. And then their solution turn out to be, well, not so good.
Unless you’re paying for someone of Jeff’s caliber (and sometimes even when you are), be careful about who is telling you the design is good or bad…because the only opinion that really matters is the users.
3. Paruresis 9:26am, Sat 2nd, 2008
Interesting article I’ll go check that out.