Comments on: The Age of Human Factors http://www.adeptechllc.com/2008/02/13/the-age-of-human-factors/ Software, Process and Security Fri, 21 Nov 2008 13:28:49 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 By: Keith McMillan http://www.adeptechllc.com/2008/02/13/the-age-of-human-factors/#comment-83 Keith McMillan Wed, 13 Feb 2008 19:41:04 +0000 http://www.adeptechllc.com/2008/02/13/the-age-of-human-factors/#comment-83 Thank for your comments, Peter! Apple's SDK can provide us with some nice looking building blocks, but I don't know that this keeps you from assembling some unusable mess from the parts, oh I wish it could. I've not read Apple's style guide, and it's possible that being much more of a design oriented company, theirs is better than most. A style guide certainly helps, and can give you guidance to help you make your application more usable. I still think you need someone who can take that guidance and apply it to your unique application, in order to come out the other end with something elegant. I know I'm not that person, and I think they're pretty rare, too. Thank for your comments, Peter!

Apple’s SDK can provide us with some nice looking building blocks, but I don’t know that this keeps you from assembling some unusable mess from the parts, oh I wish it could.

I’ve not read Apple’s style guide, and it’s possible that being much more of a design oriented company, theirs is better than most. A style guide certainly helps, and can give you guidance to help you make your application more usable. I still think you need someone who can take that guidance and apply it to your unique application, in order to come out the other end with something elegant. I know I’m not that person, and I think they’re pretty rare, too.

]]> By: Peter H Coffin http://www.adeptechllc.com/2008/02/13/the-age-of-human-factors/#comment-82 Peter H Coffin Wed, 13 Feb 2008 19:07:19 +0000 http://www.adeptechllc.com/2008/02/13/the-age-of-human-factors/#comment-82 A big part of what Apple's done as well, when making these nice interfaces, is provide the tools and libraries to make them usable and useful to programmers as well. That doesn't mean that it's not possible or even difficult to make a BAD interface on the parts a programmer constructs, but the parts that are provided by an OS and the interface guidelines Apple provides do point out a lot of the ways to make an application "play well with others" in terms of consistant use. It worked that way with Macintosh System stuff, then with Newton OS, and (presumably) will happen again if/when Apple gets around to authorizing (key term, perhaps) development kits for the iPhone as well. Then again, maybe I'm just wishing for another Newton... A big part of what Apple’s done as well, when making these nice interfaces, is provide the tools and libraries to make them usable and useful to programmers as well. That doesn’t mean that it’s not possible or even difficult to make a BAD interface on the parts a programmer constructs, but the parts that are provided by an OS and the interface guidelines Apple provides do point out a lot of the ways to make an application “play well with others” in terms of consistant use. It worked that way with Macintosh System stuff, then with Newton OS, and (presumably) will happen again if/when Apple gets around to authorizing (key term, perhaps) development kits for the iPhone as well.

Then again, maybe I’m just wishing for another Newton…

]]>