hci IoT ui · 2 comments · 350 words
The best gadget I got in lockdown was a set of motion activated lights. They have no user interface. I walk by them in the dark and they turn on. Midnight piss? No fumbling for a light switch, no shouting to a digital assistant, no logging in to an app. Simple. I love it. It got me thinking about other things which have "zero interfaces". Once they're set up, they just keep quietly working. …
Continue reading →api developers hci programming ui · 20 comments · 1,250 words · Viewed ~23,433 times
I've been thinking a lot about APIs and their design recently. I stumbled on this fantastic quote from Greg Parker: Greg Parker@gparkerA programming language is a user interface for developers. Language authors should learn from HCI principles.❤️ 41💬 6🔁 019:10 - Wed 22 February 2012 When I first started learning C++ (back in the bad old days) I was convinced that any 1st year student could desi…
Continue reading →hci necropost ui usenet · 400 words
This is a necropost - resurrected from one of my ancient USENET posts. Some web-browsers use "Stop Loading" icons that were represented with USA stop signs. To anyone else in the world, that's just a red octagon. Similarly the spell-check button in MS products is a tick over an "ABC". I don't know what the spell check button is like in countries with a different lexicography. Also, in…
Continue reading →Computer Science hci IoT necropost uea usability · 1 comment · 10,350 words · Viewed ~254 times
In 2002, I wrote this dissertation as part of my B.Sc. at UEA. I've kept this edition as close to the original as possible. I've added in links (where they still survive) and inserted a few comments where I was ludicrously wrong or unexpectedly right. This paper is not especially well-written and, if memory serves, received only a adequate mark. Terence Eden - 2016 Executive Summary This…
Continue reading →hci necropost usability usenet · 1 comment · 550 words
This is a necropost - resurrected from one of my ancient USENET posts. One of the problems I've encountered is that most people (users and, to an extend, designers) are socially conditioned to believe that tasks should be difficult. They expect a learning curve that isn't always logical. It stems from childhood when we don't understand something and are told "that's just the way it is". Users …
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