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Design is how it works, not how it looks. This article seems to mainly be talking about the "polish" of a design. There are more important principles which don'
by pazimzadeh 4y ago
Design is how it works, not how it looks. This article seems to mainly be talking about the "polish" of a design. There are more important principles which don't have anything to do with polish, such as not putting the Cancel button next to the Ok button.
More like this:
https://lawsofux.com https://lawsofux.com
https://asktog.com/atc/principles-of-interaction-design/ https://asktog.com/atc/principles-of-interaction-design/
https://www.nngroup.com/articles https://www.nngroup.com/articles
I recommend prototyping the flow/feel of the app before working on the polish, or the functionality:
https://principle.app/ https://principle.app/
- mpweiher 4y ago> Design is how it works, not how it looks. I think we're getting confused by fuzzy and overlapping definitions of different scope. Absolutely, design is also how it works. However, how it works is also very much engineering. In fact, I'd argue that the overlap is even stronger there.
- petilon 4y ago> Design is how it works, not how it looks. No, it is not. If you're Steve Jobs then yes, but otherwise how it looks and how it works are usually two different job functions. People who are good at visual design are not usually knowledgeable enough to do functional design, and people who are good at functional design are not necessarily good at visual design.
- illiarian 4y ago> No, it is not. Yes, it is. If it's about how it looks, then it's illustration, not design. > how it looks and how it works are usually two different job functions. Again, no. If you skip functionality in your design, you will end up with an unusable product.
- TuringTest 4y agoBut if you skip the looks in your design, you'll end up with a product that works worse. It may not look rational, but then humans do not have a 100% rational behaviour. https://lawsofux.com/aesthetic-usability-effect/ https://lawsofux.com/aesthetic-usability-effect/
- illiarian 4y agoIt's not an either-or ;) Edit: don't also forget, that after initial perception comes the actual usage.
- creativenolo 4y ago> No, it is not. Bold statement for something subjective. I think you are confusing design and art (from your own experience or misfortune). The processes of visual design have informed (or formalised) the design as a process in other fields. Artists have a style as a function. Designers (visual or not) have process. No one is great at everything. Mediocre designers are either too visual or not at all (especially the latter), in my experience. Good to great designers grasp both and have breath. Even the ones that don't have art as a function can direct, steer and brief the art of a project (or be resourceful with it.) But you can't have design without process.
- petilon 4y agoMy comments are based on experience working on projects where some designers (who went to art school) heard Steve Jobs say "design is how it works, not how it looks" and then decided that they own the "how it works" part. The result, from what I have seen, is disastrous. Functional design (how it works) and visual design (how it looks) is really two different job functions. You don't need an art degree or even be good in art in order to design the functionalities or even interactions of a product. At the same time, being good in art and designing cool looking UI doesn't make you qualified to design the functionalities or interactions of the product. Not even close. Both job functions are needed to build a good product. In rare cases one person may be able to do both.
- doctor_eval 4y agoJobs said, "In most people's vocabularies, design means veneer. It's interior decorating. It's the fabric of the curtains of the sofa. But to me, nothing could be further from the meaning of design. Design is the fundamental soul of a human-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service." Design is not just one thing or another. It happens at each layer. From deciding how many options you want to present to the user, to how they will be presented. Or deciding how to deal with errors in the backend, versus reporting them in the front end. Design decisions are made the whole way through. I think this is visible with lots of Apple products because some people complain that they aren’t flexible enough. But reducing configurability is as much a design decision as the colour of the icons. (And sometimes more challenging)
- samsolomon 4y agoAny product designer is expected to be knowledgeable about both visuals and ux. There are huge benefits to having people on the product team that can research, assess and design solutions.
- eschneider 4y agoFor a site about UX, you'd think https://lawsofux.com https://lawsofux.com would have picked a better url. O_o
- inanutshellus 4y agoevokes memories of "expertSexChange.com -- err, I mean, ExpertsExchange.com" back in the day.
- Stratoscope 4y agoESC/EE eventually moved to a new domain with a hyphen. I wonder if Pen Island ever did?
- wellanyway 4y agoLmao
- wizofaus 4y agoOdd, when I first clicked that second link it opened a page that was virtually unreadable on a mobile device (Android Chrome) - the text literally curved off the left hand edge of the screen. Which made the first sentence "The following principles are fundamental to the design and implementation of effective interfaces[...]for[...]mobile devices..." suggest there was little point reading on. But on reloading in another tab it was basically fine (though I'd argue still not optimal).
- pazimzadeh 4y agohttps://www.nytimes.com/1888/07/06/archives/easier-to-give-advice-than-take-it.html https://www.nytimes.com/1888/07/06/archives/easier-to-give-a...
- wizofaus 4y agoWell yes, and worse, after opening it on a desktop browser, it still looks pretty average, and the way the background brightens as you scroll down is very distracting.
- phaedryx 4y agoCan you really divorce design from appearance? My first clue of how to use something is how it looks.
- chadash 4y ago> Design is how it works, not how it looks. I think it's both. Interior designers are primarily interested in aesthetics. Same for the majority of famous fashion designers, who are usually not focused on making utilitarian clothes. It seems like most peoples' definition of design would include the work in those fields. UX is a better description of the aspect of design that cares about functionality and not aesthetics.
- Uehreka 4y ago> Design is how it works, not how it looks. After over a decade of people jumping into these discussions with this line, I’ve gotta push back: Design is also how things look, and how things look can be important. Consumers care about how things look. If we dismiss presentation and drive people towards UX stuff every time it comes up, then the people we talk to are going to end up having good ideas that no one buys because the packaging is a mess. Yes: If you have a pretty modal but it can’t be dismissed by clicking outside of it, that’s Bad Design. But when you’ve hammered in all those errant nails and built something that works well, often you look at it and go “I wish it weren’t so ugly”. And we do need books/resources to give people the building blocks they need to make an app that people will agree is “basically good-looking”. (And then hopefully more advanced books/resources about particular styles so people can develop their own stylistic voice)
- threatofrain 4y agoI'd also note that despite Jakob Nielsen's prominence nobody designs like he suggests. We should be open to the idea that beauty and delight may be more important than usability or features.
- JohnFen 4y ago> We should be open to the idea that beauty and delight may be more important than usability or features. Oh, please no. We already have more than enough of that line of thinking. In software, especially, we see far too much pretty stuff that is horrendous to actually use. I'll take the ugly thing that makes my life easier over the pretty thing that does the opposite every single time.
- falcolas 4y agoRespectfully, fuck that. Beauty matters the first time you use it, whereas functionality matters every single time. Or, in business terms, beauty has terrible ROI.
- HelloNurse 4y agoIt depends. For typical software and websites, beauty matters every single time: when you like something more and more and more every time you use it, to the point of increasing usage, recommending it, spending money and so on; and when you hate something so much that functionality is effectively reduced by avoidance, distraction, fatigue, rage quitting etc.
- BalinKing 4y agoThis criticism feels fairly ironic, since the first guideline at lawsofux.com is the “Aesthetic–Usability Effect: “Users often perceive aesthetically pleasing design as design that’s more usable” (https://lawsofux.com/aesthetic-usability-effect/ https://lawsofux.com/aesthetic-usability-effect/).
- sprkwd 4y agoForm follows function.
- canadianfella 4y ago[dead]
- wst_ 4y agoOne does not exclude the other, right? I'd say you could split it into functional design and visual design. Both are design. Both are important.