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User-centric GUI Design Explained to All

Posted by michael on from the bears-repeating dept.

TuringTest writes "The webzine User Instinct carries an article on Usable GUI Design showing that good user interfaces are not beyond the means of free and open software development: 'This article presents five key points of user interface design [...] that any software developer should be able to use.' In related news, The Economist writes against software complexity in an interview to MIT's John Maeda, PhD in interface design. See also OpenUsability, a project for testing user interfaces in a bazaar-like model. The specifics of UI design in Open Source projects has been previously debated on Slashdot."

4 of 355 comments (clear)

  1. Re:FIST by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    we want klerk, we want klerk,
    give us a K, give us a L give us a E give us RK
    what do we get

    WIDE PAGES.....

  2. It's a Raskin rip-off by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    This article would be a clear case of plagiarism if it wasn't such an incomplete rip-off of all the stuff in Jef Raskin's book "The Humane Environment".

    Okay, some saving credit for the good contemporary examples.

  3. Ha ha by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    The guy with a PhD in interface design and a Masters in CS can't make simple plug and play devices work.

    I think this says more about CS degrees than it does about the complexity of today's systems.

    Hey, Mister PhD - heard of Google?

  4. Re:iPod and iTunes Complexity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    I don't "get it". iTunes, like most of Apple's applications, are dumbed-down interfaces that generally do not cover my needs. Its not even because my needs are particular advanced, but I'm just not able to adjust to its annoying interface. Essentially Apple's software make a bunch of assumptions that you will use the computer in a very specific way. If you use it exactly that way then I suppose you'll love their apps, but if your preferred way of doing things just slightly differ, then you will quickly find Apple's software to not be customizeable to your needs at all.

    As for the iPod, I cannot really comment much on that one. Knowing all the hype about my supposedly-superior-UI-design powerbook, I'm willing to bet money its UI design is way overrated. :)