Projects, Projects…..

So I recently read a very good book on simplicity, The Laws of Simplicity by John Maeda. While I was reading, I twittered some short summaries of what I was learning. Some of it was obvious, some of it not so obvious. I’ll repost the twitters here and go into a little more detail on some of the finer points the book had to make. I’m looking forward to the second book in the series called “The Value of Simplicity” which is apparently going to focus a bit more on the business side.

• Reading the laws of simplicity a good book for our team to read 06:40 PM April 23, 2008 from txt
• Chapter 1 - reduce provide something small that will be sure to delight and surprise with its function and quality 06:45 PM April 23, 2008 from txt
• Chapter 2- in organizing function find areas to integrate together into one control ajax gives us great power here 07:04 PM April 23, 2008 from txt
• Back to Simplicity Ch. 3 - Reduce time where you can. Cant? Hide it w/ distractions. Maintain a flow of time. No one likes a stopped clock. 10:22 AM April 24, 2008 from TwitterFox
• Ch. 4 - Learn - Think of kids learning to walk. Gradual, repetitive leading to motivated, independent with a reward of personal growth.
• Chapter 5 difference - finding a rhythm of simplicity and complexity that keeps a users interest
• Ch six context- resist using all whitespace think of google search and how the primary function pops
• Ch 7 Emotion - give everything you develop life and it’s function will have importance. This is a bit crunchy, but I think it makes sense.
• Ch 8 Trust - “In simplicity we trust” something simple, does what it says, earns trust. Complexity scares us.
• Ch 8 trust (cont.) - Undo button gives comfort to someone but is somewhat of a fake trust mechanism. undo power can lead to “I don’t care”
• Ch 8 trust (cont.) - Is UNDO there because you don’t even trust what you’ve developed, or is it there for a real customer use. 06:39 PM April 24, 2008 from web
• Ch 9 Failure - Not everything can be simplified. Recognize failure to simplify in the beauty of the complexity - think of a flower. 06:47 PM April 24, 2008
• Ch 10 - Make the complex, simpler by moving it away - SaaS : simplifying what I need locally and doing the hard stuff far far away. 06:53 PM April 24, 2008
• Ok, I’m done with the book so no more boring tidbits. I plan on expanding on the little summaries in a blog post soon on cjproject. 07:05 PM April 24, 2008 from web

Chapter 1 was very interesting and a good hook. I liked the idea of something small almost demanding a feeling of pity. You want to hold it, care for it and soon you are completely delighted in all that it can do. The example he kept going back to was the iPod. So little….. so simple….. so frail??? ….. nope, this thing is AWESOME! Wouldn’t we all like to strive for our users to have that experience.

One of the ways to delight is to hide functionality until it’s needed. Let the user gradually discover it. Think of common video game tutorials, or one great example he used in his book was learning to walk. It doesn’t need to happen all at once. As a matter of fact it would be downright insane to expect it all to happen at once, so don’t throw it all up on the screen the first time the user visits.

I liked the ideas in Chapter 5 because it relates to my favorite acting lesson. In Chapter 5 it talked about difference and it’s importance. You can’t have simplicity without complexity. On stage, I tell my actors to look for opposites in every scene. Add complexity to the character and the decisions and actions the character takes will inspire more interest from your audience. This is hard to translate to software UI, but I think about it as providing someone with a simple view that has a lot of complexity. Think of how much is in a simple AJAX UI these days with the ability to leave the screen in place while performing all sorts of hidden actions to uncover new functionality within the control.

I’ll write more later. Need to head out to catch the 6:45 home. Hope this enlightens. Would love to hear your thoughts.

-Corey