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Weird question, but why is there so much bad UI out there? Do you feel like you've failed as a field when commonly used applications like Gmail and adobe reader
by babahoyo 8y ago
Weird question, but why is there so much bad UI out there? Do you feel like you've failed as a field when commonly used applications like Gmail and adobe reader have such bad user experiences?
- 1wu 8y agoI think Gmail has great UI, but I recognize that assessment is partially a matter of taste and partially a function of how I think. Better UI/UX doesn't always lead to better business outcomes.. Sad, but true. It's (arguably) a young[er] field, relative to software or hardware engineering. Maybe things will get better :)
- babahoyo 8y agoYeah i guess the UI isnt that bad. Performance > UI in many cases for me though. Hopefully responsiveness times are something people consider more in designing an interface.
- jasonhong 8y agoI'd say it's a combination of several factors, including: - The designers / developers thinking that they are typical users, and that they know how things work ("You are not the user" is the phrase we repeat a lot here at CMU) - A lack of education about how to design things (e.g., basics of perception, design patterns, basic interaction principles, conventions) - Time and money - A common mentality that "we can fix the UI at the end" - Legal requirements, marketing, corporate partnerships, etc, that is all of the cruft that doesn't focus on user experience - For popular products, a very large user base, which means legacy support (people don't like change), and different people using different features (I once heard that people only use ~20% of features in MSWord, but it's a different 20% for different people)