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As a designer first turned developers in the early 2000, I beg of you to learn the gestalt. Frameworks, languages, computers, come and go, but the human body d
by keyle 1y ago
As a designer first turned developers in the early 2000, I beg of you to learn the gestalt.
Frameworks, languages, computers, come and go, but the human body doesn't change and the knowledge I have in design, I carry every day and have barely changed over the years. Sure there are new patterns now... "hamburger buttons" and swiping, but the logic remains the same. Human's don't change quickly. They discover things the same way.
Learn about visual hierarchy, visual rhythm, visual grouping, visual contrast, visual symmetry; the golden rule; the theory of colours etc. Think "subject" first, like in photography. Design for first glance & last glance.
Go beyond "do these align".
Think in the eyes of your user as if it's their first visit, there is no content yet, etc; as well as if it's their 1000th visit; cater for both cases; first and power users.
Understand the gestalt, understand the psychology behind design... Why does bright-red jumps at you, at a visceral level?
Feeling that something feels right is great, but understanding deeply why it feels right is a superpower.
Understand the human brain, its discovery process (how do babies discover the world), "why do westerners look top left first"? And you might innovate in design, instead of designing to not offend anyone; or worst, copying dribbble and other sources because "they spent the money".
Trust me if you can learn React or Kubernetes, you surely can learn the gestalt and understand "the design of everyday things"! That knowledge won't expire on you, you'll start seeing it everywhere and you'll carry it for the rest of your life.
- CrulesAll 1y agoReally true. If you could recommend three books/papers that go down this path, it would be appreciated. Norman's book is a great start!
- mixedbit 1y agoI love "The Design Of Everyday Things", the book doesn't talk much about computer UI, yet the 7 design principles it introduces allow to make much more informed design decisions, where design is not just the matter of taste and aesthetic, but of achieving well-specified goals. For example, if the user has no way to figure out what a button in the UI does, and needs to click the button to check it, and even then can't figure out what has happened, it is a more prominent design failure than misalignment of the button.
- andreareina 1y agoNorman doors are still the bane of me.
- LandR 1y agoMy local co-op for about the last 10 years had a norman door, and multiple times a week I would pull rather than push or vice-versa. Then finally a couple of weeks ago they've sellotaped a handwritten push / pull on both sides. So it mustn't have just been me getting it wrong every time!
- oneeyedpigeon 1y agoMore doors should take a leaf out of USB-C's book...
- bluGill 1y agoUnfortunately either direction doors are harder to weather seal and energy efficiency matters a lot. Just give me a clear handle that indicates which push/pull and I'll do the right thing every time - this is cheaper as well (but it might not fit with your senses)
- Lu2025 1y agoMost doors in public places need to open to the outside for ease of evacuation in case of an emergency.
- mattmanser 1y agoOne that drives me crazy is copying text from messages. So many apps fall foul of the button problem you describe above. Even chat apps. In Whatsapp every time I want to copy some message text I have to hunt for where the copy icon is, it appears far away from the message at the top of the screen with 5 other icons, none of which it's clear what they do. Slack is at least a little better than this, when you highlight a message it offers similar functionality but with a modal where it's easier to find the "copy text" option as it's labelled. Worse are the apps that try and make it hard to copy text because they want to force you to share via their app to drive engagement.
- Frieren 1y ago> "hamburger buttons" I work on a desktop PC and "hamburger buttons" frustrate me beyond reason, in the same way that many other "modern" designs. I understand that cost benefit of having just one implementation for mobile and desktop. But it is still annoying. > Frameworks, languages, computers, come and go, but the human body doesn't change and the knowledge I have in design, I carry every day and have barely changed over the years. This is the part that adapting interfaces for the small tactile screen of a phone and then using them on big desktop screens seems so wrong. The design is probably fantastic but it is applied to the wrong interface. The people that designed the desktop interface were good at it and should not have changed. I wish UI designers went back to desktop interfaces for big screens. But mobile has economy of scale on its side so probably it is not going to happen. > "the design of everyday things" Great book.
- bigstrat2003 1y ago> I understand that cost benefit of having just one implementation for mobile and desktop. But it is still annoying. Of course it's annoying. When desktop software is using mobile UI, that's the result of a deliberate choice to make the software worse (something you care very much about as it affects you) in order to save the company money (something you don't care about). It would be weird if you weren't annoyed by such blatant disrespect for their customers.
- akoboldfrying 1y ago> blatant disrespect Let's stop pretending that "companies" could just do things better at no extra cost. I prefer a desktop UI on a desktop, but I also prefer paying less for software I use, and halving the UI development costs to enable that is a pretty sensible tradeoff.
- whstl 1y agoCompanies are definitely not saving money here. They're actually spending a shit-ton of money on designer-hours and developer-hours in order to have everything custom, but still with a subpar experience. It's similar to accessibility: a huge chunk of free off-the-shelf options are more accessible compared to the non-accessible chimeric design system of most modern web apps and sites.
- card_zero 1y agoWhich golden rule do you have in mind? The rule of thirds?
- MarcelOlsz 1y agoThe problem with designers is I have to google words like "gestalt" and perform some sort of sacred incantation to "learn" it, all while forcing my eyes to roll back forward. Who can afford to think like this though? FAANGS? Every designer I've worked with loosely knows some design theory that is impossible to question beyond a quick "hmm maybe a few more pixels on the padding?" and is largely a pixel pusher due to pressure. If I started to talk about visual grouping and the golden rule my boss would have blown a gasket. I can't name a single well-designed app off the top of my head. I can name a million good-looking ones though. The problem with design is people have to eat. The UI reaches an ideal point but is never frozen, it lasts a limited amount of time before they start shaping the hedge down to a stump. Linear comes to mind. Spotify too. How are you going to reach a good design for a music player when there's 7000 people that need to put in 40 hours a week? A little lighter on the "gestalt" and a bit heavier on the "will this design murder the weekends of my dev team and scramble the brains of my users" please.
- balamatom 1y agoThat's a problem with your bosses, not with your designers.
- guappa 1y agoYeah most designers are bad at their job. Doesn't mean design can't be done properly.
- MarcelOlsz 1y agoMaybe before I die I will catch a glimpse of this mythical creature.
- balamatom 1y ago>Trust me if you can learn React or Kubernetes, you surely can learn the gestalt and understand "the design of everyday things"! I understand and share the underlying sentiment, but it seems to me like quite a lot of people are suspiciously satisfied with how learning React or Kubernetes has entirely blinded them to the fact that the everyday things do indeed have a design.
- amonith 1y agoEveryone wants developers to learn everything all the time... Software development, infrastructure management, testing, business analysis, design, even marketing and communication sometimes. We have to pick our battles. Guess what employers ask for from developers during interviews and 90% of the work. Plot twist: not design.
- balamatom 1y agoNor anything else that's as much as intended to be based on taste and good sense, really.
- cheshire_cat 1y agoI assume you're referencing "The Design of Everyday Things" by Donald Norman? Is this the book you recommend people read to learn about "the gestalt"? Are there any other resources/books/courses you can recommend?
- fedeb95 1y agodo you have any pointers on where to start? Books maybe. Thanks
- dimitrisnl 1y agoAny good book recommendations?
- leakycap 1y agoRobin Williams - any of her books with "For non-Designers" in the title, even if it is old, it is gold
- Valk3_ 1y agoHow do you become good at this? Is it simply practising doing UI/UX interfaces over and over and over and over until you get it? Do you have some specific advice on how to get "there" faster? I recently stumbled across this Refactoring UI book[1], heard it's sort of popular, know if it's any good? [1] https://www.refactoringui.com/ https://www.refactoringui.com/
- xandrius 1y agoDoing more certainly help, especially doing it more but deliberately. Trying new ways, getting feedback and repeat.
- wpm 1y agoPersonally, I immediately don’t trust this book because the example on the page of the list UI puts a big red X over the version I prefer and find easier to read.
- naasking 1y agoHalf agree. The left version I feel has too many sharp lines and bold distinguishing features, so you don't know where to look, where the version on the right has too few so you don't know where to look.
- wpm 1y agoI know exactly where to look, the little squiggly lines called letters and numbers, nicely separated from other rows with actual visible separators, instead of just floating out in the same ocean of grey.
- bluerooibos 1y agoYet another $149 course. The best online resources are free.
- 3abiton 1y agoWhat are some of your favorite book recommendation on this?
- kannanvijayan 1y agoThere's a risk of misaligned perspectives here. What you've called out is meaningful, but it includes an implied requirement that you're not spelling out: the time and effort and attention to detail, along with the history of experience, to really apply the principles you are talking about to a project. When I read the main article, I interpreted it from my perspective. I'm mostly a systems person. I can appreciate the points you mentioned, but I don't have those other implied things that are prerequisites for applying those concepts effectively. Without rules of thumb like these, the UIs I design end up looking like grade school collages. Building UIs that make people _feel good_ when using them is not my core competency. I'm just looking for a baseline level of quality. I believe there are two cohorts here: the people who want to make UIs that are beautiful, and the people who need to make UIs that are not hot garbage.. and we're reading the article from our respective perspectives.
- lainzhow 1y agoSure, any good learning sources?
- whitepoplar 1y agoCan you recommend some good books on how to learn these things?
- bluGill 1y agoHe did - "the design of everyday things" is a book that has been around for decades and is still the best introduction to these. The book doesn't cover computers at all. Though I warn you, I read it 30 years ago and I still cannot enter a kitchen without cursing how bad the stove is.
- vaylian 1y agoFrom reading the original comment, it is not apparent that "the design of everyday things" refers to a book with that title. When I read the comment the first time, I didn't understand it. Communicating through writing is hard. Just as designing something that can be easily understood is hard.
- bluGill 1y agoIf you don't know the book it wasn't clear. Anyone who knows the book would catch the reference.
- 64d032fe 1y ago"This system is about achieving the best possible design with the least amount of effort. There’s no need to know about the psychological impact of colors, which fonts are best for which purpose, golden ratios, etc." Translation: I don't need to know why I am doing anything but hey, it looks okay to my eye, and I didn't spend a lot of effort on it. Now I have more time to write a blog post about it that mostly advertises my app.
- KolibriFly 1y agoMight be time for me to finally re-read The Design of Everyday Things
- mtillman 1y agoDesigners who remove scroll bars and window borders so you can’t click and drag are computing’s version of a terrorist. It’s an active assault on performance.
- serpenskisidiot 1y ago"minimalism" doing everything except its intended purpose
- stefs 1y agoregarding "go beyond 'do these align'": > This system is about achieving the best possible design with the least amount of effort. There’s no need to know about the psychological impact of colors, which fonts are best for which purpose, golden ratios, etc. This is expert-level design knowledge that is just distracting if you’re not on that level. The key is to focus on the few important aspects, and not try to optimize every tiny detail.
- derangedHorse 1y agoThis does not strike me as a way one should go about making "good-looking user interfaces" as described in the article. What you are describing is UX, and UX doesn't necessarily imply an aesthetically pleasing UI. I can make things that are very useable but don't look very nice.
- j45 1y agoI wish there was a community for designers turned developers.
- feoren 1y agoYour advice is completely un-actionable. "Learn the gestalt?" Do you mean the principles of gestalt design? Because half of those are entirely about designing clever logos, not about making useful UX. If designers spent less time gooning over the FedEx logo, everyone would be better off. The remaining principles are good to understand, but all the challenge is in applying them for specific cases. Or do you mean: simply understand all of human psychology and design UIs that work for everyone? That seems to be what you're saying, but both are impossible. Nobody really understands human psychology, especially those who think they do. Show me a psychology finding that is applicable to UI design and I'll show you a study of 30 college freshman that doesn't replicate. And you cannot design a UI that is intuitive for everyone; people are too different, and the "average person" literally doesn't exist. So what exactly is your advice? Know everything and apply that knowledge appropriately for your specific situation? React and Kubernetes have clear documentation, tutorials, and canonical ways of doing things. UX design has a couple of clever books. The analogue of "just learn good UX design" is not "just learn React", it's "just learn how to write readable, maintainable, clear, performant code everywhere." It takes decades.
- Fire-Dragon-DoL 1y agoResources to learn this?