- Feb 2025
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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The fundamental idea of a walkthrough is to think as the user would, evaluating every step of a task in an interface for usability problems.
I think this is a smart way to find problems in a design. Walking through a task as if you were the user helps spot confusing steps or areas that need improvement. I agree that this method is useful because it focuses on the actual experience of using the interface. However, it might not always catch every issue since real users may think differently than the person doing the walkthrough. That’s why combining this with real user testing could give a more complete picture of usability.
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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Usability tests can help you learn about lower level problems in a user interface (layout, labeling, flow, etc.), but they generally can’t help you learn about whether the design achieves its larger goals (whether it’s useful, valuable, meaningful, etc.). This is because a usability test doesn’t occur in the context of someone’s actual life, where those larger goals are relevant.
I think this is an important point about usability testing. It helps find small issues like layout and navigation, but it doesn’t show if the design is actually useful in real life. I agree that testing in a lab setting can’t fully show if a product is valuable to users in their daily lives. Just because something is easy to use doesn’t mean people will actually want to use it. This makes me realize that other types of research, like real world testing or user feedback, are needed to truly understand if a design works.
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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When you’re designing a user interface, you’re looking for a design that makes these gulfs as easy to bridge as possible. In most screen-based user interface design, bridging these gulfs requires a few strategies.
I agree that a good user interface should make it as easy as possible for people to understand and use. When designing a screen based UI, the goal is to remove confusion and make actions clear. This makes me realize how small details, like where buttons are placed or how information is shown, can make a big difference in how easy an app or website is to use.
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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As you can see, prototyping isn’t strictly about learning to make things, but also learning how to decide what prototype to make and what that prototype would teach you. These are judgements that are highly contextual because they depend on the time and resources you have and the tolerance for risk you have in whatever organization you’re in.
This perspective on prototyping is insightful because it highlights that the process is just as much about decision making as it is about execution. I agree with the idea that choosing the right prototype depends on context, as different constraints like time, resources, and risk tolerance play a major role in shaping the approach. It changes the way I think about prototyping not just as a way to test functionality, but as a strategic tool to maximize learning while minimizing unnecessary effort.
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www.pewresearch.org www.pewresearch.org
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It is also important to ask only one question at a time. Questions that ask respondents to evaluate more than one concept (known as double-barreled questions) – such as “How much confidence do you have in President Obama to handle domestic and foreign policy?” – are difficult for respondents to answer and often lead to responses that are difficult to interpret. In this example, it would be more effective to ask two separate questions, one about domestic policy and another about foreign policy.
This shows why clear and focused survey questions are important. Questions that ask about two things at once can confuse people and lead to unclear answers. Splitting them into separate questions helps researchers get more accurate and useful results.
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medium.com medium.com
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Don’t simply copy the designs you find in your research. The competitors may not be using best practices. Instead, be inspired by the solutions found in your research and adapt the solutions to fit your brand, product, and users.
This is an important point in UX design don’t just copy what others are doing. Competitors might not always follow the best practices, so copying them could lead to mistakes. Instead, take inspiration from their ideas and improve on them to create something that fits your brand and users better.
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- Jan 2025
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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In many ways, being critical is easier than being generative. Our society values criticism much more than it does creation, constantly engaging us in judging and analyzing rather than generating and creating things. It’s also easy to provide vague, high level critical feedback like “Yeah, it’s good” or “Not great, could be improved”. This type of critique sounds like feedback, but it’s not particularly constructive feedback, leading to alternatives or new insights.
This makes a good point about how it’s often easier to criticize something than to create something new. I agree because in many situations, people tend to give vague feedback like “it’s good” or “needs work” without offering real solutions. For example, in a school group project if someone says, “Your part is okay, but it could be better,” it doesn’t explain what needs to change. On the other hand, saying “Add more examples to support your point,” gives clear direction and helps improve the work. This shows why vague criticism isn’t helpful and I like how the reading pushes us to give more thoughtful constructive feedback instead.
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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Another way to generate creative ideas is to steal them from other contexts. Why would you spend a bunch of time generating good ideas when there are so many good ideas already out there? Find those good ideas, combine them into something new, and you’ll have something even better. These good ideas can come from anywhere: look to products on the market, products that are no longer on the market, the solutions that people are already using to solve a problem. One of the least studied repositories of great ideas is in libraries, which store descriptions of nearly everything ever invented. Want to design a better input device for mobile computing? Researchers have spent the last 60 years investigating thousands of them, and they’ve carefully described how to make each and every one of them, detailing how well they worked. You could take any of these, start a company based on them, and never have to invent anything.
I agree with this part, why waste time creating something entirely new when there are great ideas already out there? These ideas most likely won’t be perfect, but that’s the beauty of it. You can take the idea, figure out the flaws, and make it better. This approach not only saves time but also encourages creativity by building on proven concepts. I think this method is particularly useful in innovation because it shows that progress doesn’t always mean starting from scratch but maybe rethinking and improving what already exists.
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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One simple form of knowledge is to derive goals and values from your data. What are people trying to achieve? For example, let’s say you did a bunch of interviews about trying to find a place to rent in Seattle. One person talked about trying to afford rent, another person talked about trying to save time by finding the right location, another person had a physical disability that made the layout of the house important. You need to extract these goals and represent them explicitly and try to understand what they are. Different designs may serve different goals, and so understanding the space of goals that you might design for is critical.
I agree that understanding the space of goals is critical because different designs solve different problems for different people. For example, in education, a design for students might need to address goals like improving accessibility for disabled learners, creating interactive tools for engagement, or offering resources for those with limited internet access. Just like in the housing example, identifying and prioritizing these goals ensures that designs are meaningful and serve a wide range of needs effectively.
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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If you’re clever, perhaps you can find a design that’s useful to a large, diverse group. But design will always require you to make a value judgement about who does and who does not deserve your design help. Let that choice be a just one, that centers people’s actual needs. And let that choice be an equitable one, that focuses on people who actually need help (for example, rural Americans trying to access broadband internet, or children in low income families without computers trying to learn at home during a pandemic—not urban technophiles who want a faster ride to work).
I agree with this take because it highlights the importance of prioritizing fairness and addressing real needs in design. It’s a useful reminder that design decisions reflect values and can either help underserved communities or simply cater to convenience for those already well off. This perspective reinforces the idea that impactful design should focus on solving meaningful problems for those who truly need support, which is something I find inspiring and worth striving for.
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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Participatory design, of course, has the risk of overlooking key stakeholders, and therefore producing designs that do not work for everyone.
I agree with this because it points out a big issue with participatory design: it can leave out important voices. While getting input from users is helpful, missing key people can lead to designs that don't work for everyone. It reminds me that good design needs to include everyone’s perspective to be truly effective.
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faculty.washington.edu faculty.washington.edu
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In professional contexts, design is often where the power is. Designers determine what companies make, and that determines what people use.
I agree with this statement because it emphasizes the powerful role of design in shaping the products and tools we use daily. Designers not only create visually appealing items but also decide how things function and solve problems, which directly impacts people's experiences. This perspective is useful because it highlights the responsibility designers hold in influencing not just industries but society as a whole.
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