Page 229 -

198 Chapter 6 The process of interaction design

could have. At the Royal College of Art we tried to
work with users, but to be inspired by them, and not
constrained by what they know is possible.
The second stage is thinking, "What should this
thing we are designing do?" You could call that con-
ceptual design. Then a third stage is thinking how do
you represent it, how do you give it form? And then
the fourth stage is actually crafting the interface--ex-
Department, developing a actly what color is this pixel? Is this type the right
program to enable artist-designers to develop and apply their size, or do you need a size bigger? How much can you
traditional skills and knowledge to the design of all kinds of get on a screen?-all those things about the details.
interactive products and systems. One of the problems companies have is that the
GC: I believe that things should work but they feedback they get is. "I wish it did x." Software looks
should also delight. In the past, when it was really dif- as if it's designed, not with a basic model of how it
ficult to make things work, that was what people con- works that is then expressed on the interface, but as a
centrated on. But now it's much easier to make load of different functions that are strung together.
software and much easier to make hardware. We've The desktop interface, although it has great advan- I
got a load of technologies but they're still often not tages, encourages the idea that you have a menu and
designed for people-and they're certainly not very you can just add a few more bits when people want ~
enjoyable to use. If we think about other things in our more things. In today's word processors, for instance,
life, our clothes, our furniture, the things we eat with, there isn't a .clear conceptual model about how it I
we choose what we use because they have a meaning works, or an underlying theory people can use to rea-
beyond their practical use. Good design is partly son about why it is not working in the way they expect.
about working really well, but it's also about what
something looks like, what it reminds us of, what it HS: So in trying to put more effort into the design as-
refers to in our broader cultural environment. It's this pect of things, do you think we need different people
side that interactive systems haven't really addressed in the team?
yet. They're only just beginning to become part of GC: Yes. People in the software field tend to think that
culture. They are not just a tool for professionals any designers are people who know how to give the product
more, but an environment in which we live. form, which of course is one of the things they do. But a
graphic designer, for instance, is somebody who also
HS: How do you think we can improve things? thinks at a more strategic level, "What is the message
GC: The parallel with architecture is quite an inter- that these people want to get over and to whom?" and
esting one. In architecture, a great deal of time and then, "What is the best way to give form to a message
expense is put into the initial design; I don't think like that?" The part you see is the beautiful design, the
very much money or time is put into the initial design lovely poster or record sleeve, or elegant book, but be-
of software. If you think of the big software engineer- hind that is a lot of thinking about how to communicate
ing companies, how many people work in the design ideas via a particular medium.
side rather than on the implementation side?
HS: If you've got people from different disciplines,
HS: When you say design do you mean conceptual have you experienced difficulties in communication?
design, or task design, or something else? GC: Absolutely. I think that people from different
GC: I mean all phases of design. Firstly there's re- disciplines have different values, so different results
search-finding out about people. This is not neces- and different approaches are valued. People have dif-
sarily limited to finding out about what they want ferent temperaments, too, that have led them to the
necessarily, because if we're designing new things, different fields in the first place, and they've been
they are probably things people don't even know they trained in different ways. In my view the big differ-