unity-design team mailing list archive

[Thorsten Wilms <t_w_@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On 03/16/2011 02:59 PM, Lee Hyde wrote:
> On 16/03/11 13:01, Thorsten Wilms wrote:
> > If you are not under too tight constraints, the questionshouldn't be
> > how something is being done, not even how users would like to do it, but
> > rather: how should they do it?
>
> I thoroughly disagree with this assessment of UI/X design for the
> following reasons:
>
>      1. It flies in the face of Ubuntu's "Linux for Humans" motto
>
>      2. There is a risk of over-intellectualising UI/X design

You actually don't disagree with the assesment, because to do so, you 
would have to understand what I said, instead of just loading off stuff 
that is bugging you, but has nothing to do with my post ;)

I made no statement regarding any perceived motto or philosophy of 
Ubuntu or any design decision that has been made in it at all.

As I can't come up with a car analogy (those tend to be so very 
fitting!), lets look at sports:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fosbury_Flop
Something like that would be the ideal outcome of asking "how should it 
be done" and is unlikely to follow from a less ambitious question.

Interaction design is not all about what the computer does, it is also 
about the user side.

Note that user satisfaction can absolutely be a factor feeding into it. 
It's just tricky to deal with "future user's satisfaction, once those 
who learned the old way got over their reluctance".


--
Thorsten Wilms

thorwil's design for free software:
http://thorwil.wordpress.com/