
The Design of Everyday Things
Chapter 1 of ‘The Design of Everyday Things”, The Psychopathology of Everyday Things” by Donald. A. Norman
Preface
- Humans are clumsy when they use products that are badly conceived and designed.
- A (big) example of mechanical error blamed on the operator is Three Mile Island.
- There is a difference between knowledge and information.
The Psychopathology of Everyday Things
- There is too much poor design in the world, that’s why most people can’t use all the objects they own.
- It is possible to not be able to open doors. They might be pretty, but will provide no clue on how to use them.
- Visibility is important principle of design.
- Natural signals are part of natural design.
- Simple devices are getting more and more functions, which is a bad thing.
- There is a possibility that the psychology of materials matters.
- The affordances of materials (what it is meant to do, or be used) can be a blessing and a curse.
- False casualty leads to superstition.
- Everyday things are made of many parts.
- We figure out how things work from their visible structure: affordances, constraints, and mappings.
- People can figure out how scissors work via its visible structure. The opposite would be a digital watch.
- When designing for people, designers must (1) provide a good conceptual model & (2) make things visible.
- Users can predict the outcome with a good conceptual model.
- Designers must talk to the users, otherwise users will end with the wrong mental model.
- The mental model is based off the system image (perceived actions and visible structure).
- Have to make instructions easy to remember when in stress.
- Some features are just useless.
- Bad products are a result of lack of visibility & poor conceptual model.
- Designers can come up with features for almost any situation.
- A car has good design due to having things visible, good mappings, and natural relationships.
- Single controls are actually good.
- When there are more functions than controls, we begin to have an issue.
- It is best in design when people have to remember less. This means a good relationship between placement of the control and what it does.
- “Good design takes cares, planning, and thought. It takes conscious attention to the needs of the user.”
- The paradox of technology (added functionality means added complexity) is fast approaching.
- Feedback is important.
- There will always be the battle of cost versus usability.
- If a design fails, designers will not try to fix it, because they are afraid it will be ignored.
- The development of technology: High complexity, followed by low complexity (comfort level), then back up to high complexity.
- Once the product is stabled, anything added after adds to the complexity.
- “Whenever the number of functions and required operations exceeds the number of controls, the design becomes arbitrary, unnatural, and complicated.”
- Clever design can minimize the paradox of technology.
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