Three Perfect Tools An Article by Tim Bray www.tbray.org There is a particular joy in a product that just does what you need done, in about the way you expect or (thrillingly) better, and isn’t hard to figure out, and doesn’t change unnecessarily. Here are three to learn from. toolsperfectiondesign
Apps Getting Worse An Article by Tim Bray www.tbray.org Too often, a popular consumer app unexpectedly gets worse: Some combination of harder to use, missing features, and slower. At a time in history where software is significantly eating the world, this is nonsensical. It’s also damaging to the lives of the people who depend on these products. ...Maybe we ought to start promoting PMs who are willing to stand pat for an occasional release or three. Maybe we ought to fire all the consumer-product PMs. Maybe we ought to start including realistic customer-retraining-cost estimates in our product planning process. We need to stop breaking the software people use. Everyone deserves better. It begins with craft uxsoftwareproducts
We want you to work with an artist Normally after the design was built, you would find places for the art to be located and then you would go out and select the artist that you wanted. That is historically, the traditional way to go. But this time, someone else was calling the shots. A planning official, basically, who comes along and says, “We want you guys to work with an artist.” And the architects are like, “Sure of course.” But then the official goes—“No, you don’t quite understand. We want you to use an artist as a co-equal member of the design team.” That is, the artists are going to have just as much control as the architects. It was really unheard of. Some Other Sign that People Do Not Totally Regret Life 99percentinvisible.org It passes by the river artcollaboration