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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Design_of_Everyday_Things https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Design_of_Everyday_Things "Doors can have two states: open or clo

• egypturnash 6y ago
  I’m looking at the front door of my apartment as I type this, and I can see sixteen states for it quite easily. It’s got a lock on the doorknob, a deadbolt, and a big window with a blind. All of these can be open or closed independently of each other; add on the basic “is it open or closed” and that’s four binary choices for 16 states. Also there is that fun state of “open but will lock behind you because the doorknob lock does not prevent you from closing the door, hope you have your keys on you or someone inside” though that’s maybe more a special case in the state transition table than an actual state?
  • base698 6y ago
    Do those things have affordances or do you pull out your state table?
  • sbierwagen 6y ago
    Another fun state: open the door, then turn the deadbolt. Now the door can't be closed! Attempt to close it hard enough and you can bend the deadbolt shaft. Now the deadbolt can't be retracted, and the door is entirely disabled! An arcane edge case, but something a clumsy child could do in less than a minute. How could we tolerate such an awful design? Who is responsible for this catastrophe?
• wombatpm 6y ago
  Except sliding glass doors, where the closed state can look very similar to the open state. People walk into closed glass doors all of the time.
  • bobthepanda 6y ago
    The above excerpt is supposed to be the guidance for how to design a good door. I don’t think a door people regularly walk into out of confusion is a good one.