9 Jef Raskin Quotes on Design

Jef Raskin quotes on design

1. Imagine if every Thursday your shoes exploded if you tied them the usual way. This happens to us all the time with computers, and nobody thinks of complaining.

2. It would be wonderful if we could just tuck in a few loose ends and change a handful of details of present systems to have them work properly. Unfortunately, we have learned that the GUI concept has fundamental flaws that cannot be corrected by small changes. These flaws have to do with incompatibilities between the designs of both GUIs and command-line interfaces and the way our brains are wired. As we cannot change the way our minds work, we must change the interface design.

5. Once the product's task is known, design the interface first; then implement to the interface design.

6. Users do not care about what is inside the box, as long as the box does what they need done.

8. The system should treat all user input as sacred.

9. A computer shall not harm your work or, through inaction, allow your work to come to harm.

10. A computer shall not waste your time or require you to do more work than is strictly necessary.

11. An interface is humane if it is responsive to human needs and considerate of human frailties.

13. I've moved on, grown and learned in the years since then, and am designing interfaces that make the Mac's GUI feel as clumsy to use as the Mac made the old DOS-based systems feel primitive.