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Weboword - This is what I have been doing lately.

A successful design always begins with a nice idea. Here's an idea me and my colleagues have been working around with.

Human Centered Design - Little things that can transform user experience!

Product design is like bringing a story to life. It is about creating an experience for the user that makes him/her feel satisfied. People talk about being considerate to human beings in day to day life. I think its time product design teams used the same philosophy while designing. Many a times the focus while designing is to make things unique, externally beautiful, compact etc. but what is sometimes, critically forgotten is to incorporate the "human element". After all, what good is a design that is brilliant to look at and costs a lot of money but leaves frowns on the faces of it's users.

Here are a few cases that cross the bar with regard to most parameters of design but unfortunately (and I say this because I have been bitten a few times) miss out on the human element, on some count or the other.

1) Improper placement of Laptop Charging point: Most laptops have a charging point that is located on the back side (See 1 below), which makes attaching and detaching the power cord a pain because
a) the point is not visible without the user having to lift the entire body and turning it around.
b) it becomes increasingly tough to access (for the user from front - 2) the point when the laptop lid is open (which is a very highly probable case). I mean, people might want to put their laptops on charging while working or disconnect the charger, in case the batter is full. It really becomes tough. I personally hate this part.

1 (Acer 5920)

2 (Acer 5920)

What can be a really convenient option is to have the charging point positioned on the sides of the laptop which is easily accessible and viewable at all times (with the lid open or closed). (See 3 below). A small thing such as this can really create a big difference in the user experience (because power cord connection and disconnection is a high frequency activity as far as laptops are concerned)

3 (Apple MacBook)

2) Double hand MP3 players: Single handed back-hands are rare amongst tennis players. The same is the case with Mp3 players :). For players that are designed only to play music and nothing else, why is it that the user has to engage both his hands to operate them (See 4). I can understand that high-end MP3 players such as the Ipod Touch etc have a large number of other functionalities that sometimes require the user to use both his hands but run of the mill players should definitely be designed so that they can be used and operated single-handedly (literally :)).

It is quite obvious that it would be a much better situation for a user to have his other hand free while he/she toggles with the controls on the device.

4 (Ms MP3 player)

The point that I am trying to make is simple. When you know that the end-user of the product is a human being, just step into his shoes and design.

Human centered design is the future.

Watch David Kelley (IDEO) talk about Human Centered design on TED.

Fat free Design, True Minimalism or Missing the Point?

I'm a great believer of minimalism. For me the beauty of any design lies in achieving the necessary functionality in as bare a setting as possible. Designers all over the world favor minimalist design philosophies and it shows in most of the things that are designed today. Be it consumer electronics, decor products, daily use items, automobiles; designers as well as the end-users have really begun to appreciate (or to take it forward, live by) minimalism.
Here are a few products that set the benchmark for minimalist design:
1) The Leaf Lamp by Yves Behar

2) The Macbook Air by Apple

3) Alparda’s Arc Desk by Aziz Sariyer



4) Water Bottle design by Fig Tree

Well I guess, this list can go on and on. But the point I want to make here is that, in the attempt to be minimalist, designers tend to commit some basic mistakes. Here's an example:

Flash memory giants Kingston launched a very minimalist cap-less pen drive - DataTraveler 100


The Pen-drive features a neat slide mechanism to lift/drop the USB head. The aim, from what I see, is to do away with a cap and have a compact setup.

But there are some real flaws that should have been looked at:
1) The slider has no locking mechanism at the top (when the USB head is completely out) and so it becomes a pain to insert this pen drive in USB ports (especially hard to access USB ports -like behind the CPU of a PC). Every time, you try inserting the drive, the USB head starts to slip back in. You really have to press the slider hard to plug the drive in. Plug and Play pen drive - Well, not quite!
2) The open top means you better keep it away from water. Aaah, I guess that washes away all the minimalism. :)

So the point that I am trying to make here is that while designing its good to to have an overall outlook where you are looking to create minimalism but then it shouldn't be the case that you miss the point in a big way and actually create tons of problems for the end-users.

Here's a remarkable talk by Captain Organic - Ross Lovegrove about the power and beauty of Organic design (Fat free design) on TED.

Lovegrove's talk

Enjoy!

You are not a man just because you have an Erection!

Contrary to general belief, design is not about creating outlandish forms nor is it about developing mind-boggling shapes. For me design has a simple meaning.

It means "Functionality". Designs should be functional. In case a design is unable to solve the basic purpose it is meant for, it is simply nothing more than "junk" to me. No matter how artistic the form of the design, how beautiful the color combination, how wonderful the layout; without it having all the necessary elements that ensure perfect functionality, its all worth nothing.

For me the true essence of design lies in the tiniest of details. It is about uncovering even the last bit of obscurity and darkness. It should be as clear as water. What this basically means is that unless and until, a designer goes through, in great depth, each and every little aspect of his creation, bearing in mind the overall functionality to be achieved, a design is never complete. A famous designer once said that "..design should be such that you should not have to provide a user manual with your product..". This basically means that the design output should be so fluid and intuitive that the end-users should be able to wake up from half-sleep and still be able to use the product (or whatever it is that has been designed), the first time he/she sees it. All this can only happen when a designer has a strong grip on all the details as well as all the functionality in his creation.
Here's a link where Paul Bennett (IDEO) talks about finding design in the details:
Paul Bennett talks about finding design in the details.
So, basically what I want to say is that what basically matters for a design to be classified as successful is to ensure perfect functionality before anything else. The other facets can follow. So, that is what I mean when I say "You are not a man just because you have an erection".