Justin Deltener's Blog

Far too many applications are being developed by logical, structured, and rigid methodologies. We live and breathe by the heartbeat of Business Process Diagrams, Control Flow Diagrams and Database Schemas. While this will produce a very predictable result, it inherently stifles creativity. It all makes a lot of sense really. If you’ve a developer then you know how documenting the knowns of a project keep you sane and cover your ass. It’s like somehow we keep striving to make a more intelligent automation mechanism for us to do less, be more productive and wow the big wigs. This just reeks of stereotypical corporate bullshit. Break out your shell, risk a little and grow as a person.

I’m constantly challenging myself to bring a creative dimension into my development. I long for the day I can sit back at my desk, chill out with some nice ambient beats and imagine what development should be like. A development pipeline that’s efficient and logical and a final product that is aesthetically pleasing and is architected to leave the end user with a positive emotion. It could be satisfaction in the final product, confidence in their ability to utilize the software and be productive or excitement at finally having the software that perfectly fits their need.

I can’t tell you how horribly sick and tired I am of all the user control garbage the industry has pushed down our throats. I’m going to suffocate from stagnation.

Yay let’s see how many different ways we can show a list control. Hey let’s start embedding controls into OTHER controls, wow that counts as a brand new control right? That means we have 5,234,090,234 different controls! That’s good right?

I keep thinking of how we can merge efficient user interfaces with emotionally fulfilling ones. There are obvious interfaces which totally suck ass. The one I currently hate the most has to be Microsoft SQL 2000 Enterprise Manager.

This has to of been created by Drooling Monkey Retards. Let’s give you a list of all your databases, but gosh you only really need to see the first 7 letters of a database name right?? I’m getting pissed just thinking of it right now.

I keep pushing myself to think outside of my comfort level. Why can’t we have visually pleasing 3d controls that group or collapse information in a logical, predicable fashion and use colors to denote something that’s emotionally connected? We can see so much more information at once and be able to know at a blink which garbage to filter out visually. Or balance that against something that’s got much less going on visually, but is intuitive enough to show you exactly what you need to see and nothing more.

The Revolution – Less is more

I’ve noticed in the past few years that there have been many applications that wildly popular because they are so friggen easy to use. Google has an input box and a button for F’s sake. My corporation just switched to Google calendar because a) Its horribly simple to use and b) it actually WORKS as you would expect it to. The interesting aspect to these interfaces is they are very flat and minimalistic in nature. Things are colored differently when separation is needed, but one will notice fewer borders, little gradients etc. Yet at the same time I FEEL good when I’m using the applications. It does what I want it to and I don’t get drowned by feature bloat.

This revolution signifies to me that we are entering into an age when we really have a significant number of contributors that are willing to advance the face of software and user interface development. For far too long the titans of the industry have pandered their dumbed down bloated wares onto us and we’re finally answering the challenge with solutions that are simpler and provide a much more satisfying experience. I’m emotionally connected to these solutions because of their simplicity. Google has taken the time to know me and to know what I really want even when I really say I want it all.

I really think far too many people don’t even think about emotional impact of their user interfaces. How can a color or sound or the curve of a report change how an end user feels about your product? How can you use the Less is more approach to wow a user by simply knowing them and making them feel like you really took the time to understand them? In the end its all about connections.