Learning From Terminals to Design the Future of User Interfaces

“We made painting feel like typing, when we should have made typing feel like painting.” Our Interfaces Have Lost Their Senses by @Wattenberger https://t.co/zcXe0WAbyP

This “undulant interface” was made by John Underkoffler. The heresy implicit within is the premise that the user, not the system, gets to define what is most important at any given moment; where to place the jeweler’s loupes for more detail, and where to show only a simple overview, within one consistent interface.

This is common with new technologies -- the first iterations focus too much on the technology itself instead of the user experience the technology facilitates.

I get the feeling that the median vocabulary of interactions with computers is shrinking. I see so many people who’s entire computing experience is laboriously moving the mouse, clicking on buttons, and maybe poking ⌘C and ⌘V. For knowledge workers who spend half their waking hours using a computer, that’s akin to being a professional athlete who n... See more

20 years ago, Jef Raskin (the founder of the Macintosh project) asserted that the desktop interface strategy was “inefficient and inhumane.”