On the first night of class, I had asked to everyone:
What is interaction design?
While formally trained in this creative domain, I really hate using the textbook response to defining interaction design. Simply, I associate this study with a single word, Play.
Interaction designers strive to create useful and usable products and services. Following the fundamental tenets of user-centered design, the practice of interaction design is grounded in an understanding of real users—their goals, tasks, experiences, needs, and wants. Approaching design from a user-centered perspective, while endeavoring to balance users’ needs with business goals and technological capabilities, interaction designers provide solutions to complex design challenges, and define new and evolving interactive products and services.
Interaction design, like user experience design, has evolved to facilitate interactions between people and their environment. Unlike user experience design, which accounts for all user-facing aspects of a software or system, interaction designers are (typically) only concerned with the interaction between users and computers. This niche is referred to as human-computer interaction.
During the first day of class, we’ll watch a lot of videos about what it means to be digitally connected and interacting. We’ll be reflecting on how this thing we have come to call technology is integrated in almost everything we do. Don’t believe me? Well, then you should do the first homework assignment (if you’re not my student, that is).
Creative Fields (and just getting it down right)
Design is a conceptual work, production of a concept for a solution, a process of elimination of things that you think, feel and believe do not fit as a solution to your intended goal
Development is a production of finalized specification/idea (at least in theory) or something that makes sense and close to what you are looking for (although in many cases it is not like that), basically a conversion of your design/idea into working end product
Interaction Design (none specific to field) – concept/understanding how one/individual interacts with an entity and how to design the process of interaction of that individual with the entity. that entity can be anything you pick it to be, for example your car, or your toaster, web browser and website that you view in a browser.
Visual Design (none specific to field) – concept/understanding of aesthetic appeal and impact of an entity with which individual interacts/looks at
Web Design (field specific) – concept/understanding of an idea that is a technology(s) specific and includes aspects of multiple design concepts such as but not limited to: interaction design, visual design, user experience design, user interface design and so on
User Experience Design (none specific to field) – concept of designing user experience, which in turn includes visual design and interaction design plus the limitations of the field in which such design work is happening
User Interface (some what specific to field) – concept of designing an interface through which user can interact with the product, gui in soft/web app or an steering wheel in a car
User Interface Development (none specific to field) – is a process of converting user interface design concept into functioning interface that creates physical connection between individual and product.
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