Современные информационные технологии/2.
Вычислительная техника и программирование
Vyrezkova
A. V.
Irkutsk National Research Technical University, Russia
Design is the creation of a plan or
convention for the construction of an object, system or measurable human
interaction (as in architectural blueprints, engineering drawings, business
processes, circuit diagrams, and sewing patterns). Design has different
connotations in different fields (see design disciplines below). In some cases,
the direct construction of an object (as in pottery, engineering, management,
coding, and graphic design) is also considered to be design.
Designing often necessitates considering
the aesthetic, functional, economic, and sociopolitical dimensions of both the
design object and design process. It may involve considerable research,
thought, modeling, interactive adjustment, and re-design. Meanwhile, diverse
kinds of objects may be designed, including clothing, graphical user
interfaces, skyscrapers, corporate identities, business processes, and even
methods of designing.
Thus "design" may be a
substantive referring to a categorical abstraction of a created thing or things
(the design of something), or a verb for the process of creation, as is made
clear by grammatical context.
All businesses, no matter what they
make or sell, should recognize the power and financial value of good design.
Obviously,
there are many different types of design: graphic, brand, packaging, product,
process, interior, interaction/user experience, Web and service design, to name
but a few.
A
building’s foundation defines its footprint, which defines its frame, which
shapes the facade. Each phase of the architectural process is more immutable,
more unchanging than the last. Creative decisions quite literally shape a
physical space, defining the way in which people move through its confines for
decades or even centuries.
Working
on the web, however, is a wholly different matter. Our work is defined by its
transience, often refined or replaced within a year or two. Inconsistent window
widths, screen resolutions, user preferences, and our users’ installed fonts
are but a few of the intangibles we negotiate when we publish our work, and
over the years, we’ve become incredibly adept at doing so.
But
the landscape is shifting, perhaps more quickly than we might like. Mobile browsing is expected to outpace desktop-based access
within three to five years. Two of the three dominant video game
consoles have web browsers (and one of them is quite excellent). We’re designing for mice
and keyboards, for T9 keypads, for handheld game controllers, for touch
interfaces. In short, we’re faced with a greater number of devices, input
modes, and browsers than ever before.
There
are plenty of rules and principles of great design but when it comes to a
website's landing page, it is almost an exact science. It's about
'conversion-centred design', or using the design of the landing page to
persuade a user towards a particular action.
The
first, and arguably most important, task is to find a clear USP (unique selling
point) for the product or service in question, and then use the landing page
design to focus everything on one primary call to action (CTA). This might be
getting the visitor to register their details, say, or make a purchase there
and then. Whatever the goal, it's up to the design of the page to channel the
user towards it – whether through use of white space, contrasting colours or
more explicit directional cues.
Clear,
succinct headers and sub-headers and punchy, easily scanned bullet points are
the order of the day. The landing page should
be prominently branded, often incorporate a 'hero' image to communicate the
product or service at a glance, and cut straight to the point to avoid users'
attention drifting.
The Rational Model was independently
developed by Simon and Pahl and Beitz. It posits that:
1. designers attempt to optimize a design candidate for known constraints
and objectives,
2. the design process is plan-driven,
3. the design process is understood in terms of a discrete sequence of
stages.
The Rational Model is based on a
rationalist philosophy and underlies the waterfall model, systems development
life cycle, and much of the engineering design literature. According to the
rationalist philosophy, design is informed by research and knowledge in a
predictable and controlled manner. Technical rationality is at the center of
the process.
Fluid grids, flexible images, and
media queries are the three technical ingredients for responsive web design,
but it also requires a different way of thinking. Rather than quarantining
our content into disparate, device-specific experiences, we can use media
queries to progressively enhance our work within different viewing contexts.
That’s not to say there isn’t a business case for separate sites geared toward
specific devices; for example, if the user goals for your mobile site are more
limited in scope than its desktop equivalent, then serving different content to
each might be the best approach.
But that kind of design thinking
doesn’t need to be our default. Now more than ever, we’re designing work meant
to be viewed along a gradient of different experiences. Responsive web design
offers us a way forward, finally allowing us to “design for the ebb and flow
of things.”
Reference list
1.
Ковешникова, Н. А., Дизайн: история и
теория: Учеб. Пособие. – М.: Омега-Л, 2005.
2.
http://alistapart.com/article/responsive-web-design
3.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/gyro/2012/05/03/welcome-to-the-era-of-design/#1fe4dca217e7
4.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design