It’s a wide-ranging discipline. The focus of this site is on the front-end of the web but my design inspiration is drawn from numerous sources. I think it’s in looking outside our areas of expertise and practice that we can often take our most valuable lessons.
Design processes usually entail decisions made on the basis of subjective opinions and experience. If good design is our goal, what we hope for is that the people whose subjectivity shapes the product are people who have devoted time or careers to understanding the questions and implications of their design decisions. At a fundamental level, of course, we need to define what design is and what ‘success’ entails for any product design project.
But what’s been generally evident across sectors over the last decade is a shift in focus from what products do to how they do it. On the web we’ve seen a mass migration to Ajax-driven applications whose responsiveness approaches that of their desktop counterparts. The smart phone, longstanding friend of the traveling businessman, found mass market appeal with Apple’s superior iPhone aesthetics and interactivity. A more venerable example is Southwest Airlines’ continued differentiation in Air Travel due to its unique and networked structure. Web apps, at their core, still do mostly what they used to, the iPhone is still just a very smart phone, and Southwest still flies airplanes into airports. Differences lie in the executions.
In the context of this blog, Design is how we execute. It’s colors and alignment, but also interaction and responsiveness. It’s building today while thinking of tomorrow. It’s beauty, engagement, pleasure, viscera, and responsibility.