UX Fathers
Hello World.
In a recent job interview I was asked about my UX methodologies; It really stubbed me. In all my prep for that specific interview I had neglected to organize my thoughts and ideas about…. where my thoughts and ideas come from! While that was an embarrassing interview, I felt like it gave me a lot to think about and it gave me a new roadmap of how to push myself further into the field of UX. So please indulge me while I list and discuss a few resources I’ve used to learn about UX.
Jakob Nielsen - Usability Heuristics for User Interface Design. (1995) I was introduced to this guide by Justin Threkeld when I interned at redpepper. He had me study and use it to test the usability of software, website, and apps. It’s been a constant companion and a printed copy hangs next to my computer screen at all times.
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/ten-usability-heuristics/
Apple - Human Interface Guidelines (2019). An essential guide for designing ANYTHING (not just apple products). This guide reads like a book and has both high level and low level ideas about Interface design.
https://developer.apple.com/design/human-interface-guidelines/ios/overview/themes/
John Maeda - The Laws of Simplicity (2006). A perfect companion piece to Apple’s Human Interface Guidelines; Maeda applauds the beauty and genius of apple’s products for their simplicity. His book guides you step by step through 10 different pieces of simplicity. It’s a guiding light for designers and should be required reading for the field. He is most famous for writing, “Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious and adding the meaningful.“ Read a summary and application of the material in the link below.
https://hatchedlondon.com/keep-it-simple-stupid/
It seems an embarrassingly short list and I feel it’s cheap to try to fluff this up with a bunch of random articles I’ve read over the years. However, I’m going to include a few resources that I’m planning on or currently reading.
The design of everyday things (reading now)
Atomic design (http://atomicdesign.bradfrost.com/)
Don't Make Me Think, Revisited
Thanks for reading