The navigation is our property RENE: Tell me what we have. Of value. GAEL: Whatever we've bought in cargo so far. I don't know what you want me— RENE: Anyone can buy goods. What do we really have? What do we sell? GAEL (realizing): The route. RENE: Yes. The navigation is our property. To copy a man's route is to steal it. Shane Carruth, The Modern Ocean Into the system of flight navigationownership
Up and Down the Ladder of Abstraction An Essay by Bret Victor worrydream.com The most powerful way to gain insight into a system is by moving between levels of abstraction. Many designers do this instinctively. But it's easy to get stuck on the ground, experiencing concrete systems with no higher-level view. It's also easy to get stuck in the clouds, working entirely with abstract equations or aggregate statistics. This interactive essay presents the ladder of abstraction, a technique for thinking explicitly about these levels, so a designer can move among them consciously and confidently. From a roving viewpoint abstractionunderstandinginteraction