4 ms·

Why Do We Interface? (2020)

47 points by Destiner 3y ago

nottheengineer 3y ago
Good read, but it focuses a lot on conveying information to the user. The issue nowadays is often the other direction: Interacting with GUIs often feels clunky because there are unnecessary steps, moving buttons on websites or weird mouse rituals that require dragging something a very certain way. Improving on that should be more of a focus imo.
- BlackFly 3y ago
  I share your feeling. It feels like design almost became a goal in and of itself due to the fact that--for some users--a good design will be a decisive factor in making a purchase. This is much more measurable than user satisfaction and efficiency since the influence happens at the purchase point which is observable to the business. Good designers know this, hence the related mantra of, "The customer is not the user," but when you have gotten that far, McNamara fallacy often is your default: you know all the metrics are biased, so you use the only thing available. Touch pads in automobiles feels like the prototypical example of this. Terrible for functionality, shipped due to... it being fancy? People purchasing it because there was no alternative or it took actually using it for quite some time for the defects to be apparent.
  - marcosdumay 3y ago
    Well, companies adopt design fads for rational reasons. Yes, we have "Fisher Price" UIs because people buy (or at least brought) them. We have touch screens everywhere because that's what was on scify and makes people think it's advanced technology. But the same way that fads come, they also go. Currently it's chic to have physical buttons, and a lot of people already pick the "VB6 looking" software instead of the "Fisher Price" one. Large companies are always late to fads, so expect them to only move after those decisions are universal. Those also almost universally lack good taste, so expect them to push those new trends way beyond any reasonable amount.
throwaway290 3y ago
I think the article has some valid (but not new) points, like "design is communication", but is otherwise handwavy and full of water. I couldn't bring myself to wade through trite/imprecise/self-contradictory passages ("interfaces are for information", "we interface because we are human", then "the purpose of information interfaces has always been to communicate more quickly, more deeply, to foster relationships, to explore, to measure, to learn, to build knowledge, to entertain, and to create"--so turns out not all interfaces are for information and instead the purpose of interfaces is communication? idk). The timeline of "information mechanisms" serves, like most of the text, unclear purpose and seems to be a hodgepodge of vaguely related concepts ("music", "Walkman", "Snapchat", "Small Speakers"). IMO the author can do better, this did not deserve unearthing from 2020 and I'd rather read Medium is the Message for example.
j-a-a-p 3y ago
Confusing book, that ironically has the subject on interfaces - something that almost by definition should convey information as clearly as possible. Confusion as the title of the book, why do we interface? evolves to a perhaps more interesting: why do we design? but it then leaves that question unanswered. Then is goes on to explain the alphabet and I bounced.
toinewx 3y ago
The reading experience is mediocre. It looks like he went a bit overboard with the site. As for the ideas mentioned, it's more fluff and designer hype/dogma than anything solid.
- cobertos 3y ago
  There are some interesting gifs of interesting interfaces, a couple of it's core ideas were solid, but the examples werent short or concrere enough. The supporting links also made it hard to get _why_ they were linked without reading the whole article. Felt more like a blog post.
akira2501 3y ago
Interface design is, to me, purely an exercise of human compromise. I'm always a little bit amazed and baffled by the people who see it as a fundamental operation that can be understood in it's own terms.
cobertos 3y ago
Nitpick, "The core purpose of graphics in a GUI is not to be pretty" - Maybe for programs where it is for user reading and modifying data. But I'd argue that is only a fraction of interfaces. Small business websites are very much made to look a certain way, to make you feel the business is competent and trustworthy. You only really need the data that is their phone number or contact details or inventory specifics. But yes, data-based UI is just assembling data in the shape that a human brain can download faster, which can be more efficient if tailored to be brain-specific (e.g. a notes app is laid out by the user who will consume the data).
SPBS 3y ago
I get the whole site is designed in a very cool (and creative) way but it feels so draining to read. - Everything is green, WHERE do my eyes go? - Oh, I have to click to go to the next section. Instead of scrolling. - Fat dickbars on the top of the page. In fact, dickbars on the side too. - I get the feeling the author is using a large monitor because on my 13 inch laptop the sentence "The core purpose of graphics in a GUI is not to be pretty" written in a big font doesn't all fit on my screen. Also, the font is so horrible to read it didn't even register in my mind until I copy pasted it here and could see it in a normal font.

47 points by Destiner 3y ago

Good read, but it focuses a lot on conveying information to the user. The issue nowadays is often the other direction: Interacting with GUIs often feels clunky because there are unnecessary steps, moving buttons on websites or weird mouse rituals that require dragging something a very certain way. Improving on that should be more of a focus imo.

BlackFly 3y ago
I share your feeling. It feels like design almost became a goal in and of itself due to the fact that--for some users--a good design will be a decisive factor in making a purchase. This is much more measurable than user satisfaction and efficiency since the influence happens at the purchase point which is observable to the business. Good designers know this, hence the related mantra of, "The customer is not the user," but when you have gotten that far, McNamara fallacy often is your default: you know all the metrics are biased, so you use the only thing available. Touch pads in automobiles feels like the prototypical example of this. Terrible for functionality, shipped due to... it being fancy? People purchasing it because there was no alternative or it took actually using it for quite some time for the defects to be apparent.
- marcosdumay 3y ago
  Well, companies adopt design fads for rational reasons. Yes, we have "Fisher Price" UIs because people buy (or at least brought) them. We have touch screens everywhere because that's what was on scify and makes people think it's advanced technology. But the same way that fads come, they also go. Currently it's chic to have physical buttons, and a lot of people already pick the "VB6 looking" software instead of the "Fisher Price" one. Large companies are always late to fads, so expect them to only move after those decisions are universal. Those also almost universally lack good taste, so expect them to push those new trends way beyond any reasonable amount.

throwaway290 3y ago

I think the article has some valid (but not new) points, like "design is communication", but is otherwise handwavy and full of water. I couldn't bring myself to wade through trite/imprecise/self-contradictory passages ("interfaces are for information", "we interface because we are human", then "the purpose of information interfaces has always been to communicate more quickly, more deeply, to foster relationships, to explore, to measure, to learn, to build knowledge, to entertain, and to create"--so turns out not all interfaces are for information and instead the purpose of interfaces is communication? idk). The timeline of "information mechanisms" serves, like most of the text, unclear purpose and seems to be a hodgepodge of vaguely related concepts ("music", "Walkman", "Snapchat", "Small Speakers"). IMO the author can do better, this did not deserve unearthing from 2020 and I'd rather read Medium is the Message for example.

j-a-a-p 3y ago

Confusing book, that ironically has the subject on interfaces - something that almost by definition should convey information as clearly as possible. Confusion as the title of the book, why do we interface? evolves to a perhaps more interesting: why do we design? but it then leaves that question unanswered. Then is goes on to explain the alphabet and I bounced.

toinewx 3y ago

The reading experience is mediocre. It looks like he went a bit overboard with the site. As for the ideas mentioned, it's more fluff and designer hype/dogma than anything solid.

cobertos 3y ago
There are some interesting gifs of interesting interfaces, a couple of it's core ideas were solid, but the examples werent short or concrere enough. The supporting links also made it hard to get _why_ they were linked without reading the whole article. Felt more like a blog post.

akira2501 3y ago

Interface design is, to me, purely an exercise of human compromise. I'm always a little bit amazed and baffled by the people who see it as a fundamental operation that can be understood in it's own terms.

cobertos 3y ago

Nitpick, "The core purpose of graphics in a GUI is not to be pretty" - Maybe for programs where it is for user reading and modifying data. But I'd argue that is only a fraction of interfaces. Small business websites are very much made to look a certain way, to make you feel the business is competent and trustworthy. You only really need the data that is their phone number or contact details or inventory specifics. But yes, data-based UI is just assembling data in the shape that a human brain can download faster, which can be more efficient if tailored to be brain-specific (e.g. a notes app is laid out by the user who will consume the data).

SPBS 3y ago

I get the whole site is designed in a very cool (and creative) way but it feels so draining to read. - Everything is green, WHERE do my eyes go? - Oh, I have to click to go to the next section. Instead of scrolling. - Fat dickbars on the top of the page. In fact, dickbars on the side too. - I get the feeling the author is using a large monitor because on my 13 inch laptop the sentence "The core purpose of graphics in a GUI is not to be pretty" written in a big font doesn't all fit on my screen. Also, the font is so horrible to read it didn't even register in my mind until I copy pasted it here and could see it in a normal font.