DESIGN & THEORY

November 13th, 2020

A great idea for how something should look isn’t nearly the same thing as a great idea for why it should have such aesthetics.  Often design problems are tackled in the reverse.  A reason for why the design should be a certain way comes before the implementation, and often the final product is a bit, unexpected.  Rarely is there a perfect symmetry between the confidence behind why aesthetics should be a certain way and the confidence inspired by the final look.  

In some areas it doesn’t matter. A combustion engine is often a complex and awkward knot of design.  The reason behind such aesthetics is purely practical - that is, it’s purely in service of the question: why should it look like this?  The answer is simple: this needs to be next to that, this need to be tilted at that angle, a hose needs to connect those two distant things, etc.  The question of making such practicality look good is rarely considered and if so, it’s always a secondary consideration.

User Interface in the digital world, or UI as it’s commonly referred to offers a rare circumstance where the two worlds converge with equal importance.  Building a purely practical interface can result in a screen bordered with dozens if not hundreds of buttons.  Ironically, this isn’t practical to use at all, because without prior knowledge about what all those buttons do, it’s practically impossible to use - the barrier to entry is quite high.  The best user interfaces combine an intuition about what the user will need in what order and present those tools at just the right time, with just the right representation in just the right spot.  

This can be quite difficult because it’s a perfect fusion between aesthetics and practicality.  It’s the equivalent of a world where cars could not hide their engines under smooth glossy metal skin, but if the engine was the car, and was judged as much for it’s raw appearance as it was for it’s performance.  Indeed, in the world of UI, performance is a function of raw appearance.  

The designer’s theory has to be one strictly of practice and reaction.  Meaning that, starting with a theory, especially a very specific philosophy about why something should look a certain way can lead to utility that falls flat in the hands of a user.  Theory is perhaps best to be devolved back to something like a ‘vibe’, something vague, more like a style such as ‘minimalist’ as opposed to a rigid practicality of absolute functionality as we often see with programs like photoshop and cad programs that are carbuncular monsters of countless buttons, layers, optional views and needless customization.

Functionality and utility are design considerations that can expand near infinitely in the digital world.  A button can be built to do each and every little thing.  Aesthetics as separate from functionality become an important limiter on what sort of functionality is necessary.  An artistic eye, like that of a stone sculptor becomes one that is more concerned with everything that needs to be removed in order to get it just right.  The theory here becomes one of balance and practice: add the function, and see it looks good, looks right - in other words, let sexiness guide what stays and what has to go.

GORDIAN SOLUTION

November 12th, 2020

Supposedly, when Alexander the Great was heading east, he came across a legendary knot in Phrygia, near the modern day capital of Ankara in Turkey.  That impenetrable tangle of rope was bound to a prophecy about any person who could undo the knot.  The prophecy foretold that whoever could accomplish the task would go on to conquer all of Asia.  And relatively speaking, Alexander accomplished this to an undeniably impressive extent.

The common story is that Alexander took out his sword and sliced the knot in half.  This is the picture perfect solution - it looks good in a movie, it sounds epic and it’s iconic of the sort of bravado that would be required to set out upon distant horizons with the aim of conquering all the land of one’s fellow man.

The real story is naturally disputed, and the most prevalent alternative interpretation offers far more nuance and substance to ponder.  The fabled Gordian knot apparently bound an Ox-cart that was linked to the founding of the previous king to the place where it was kept.  And regardless of the version of the story, Alexander apparently did puzzle over the knot without success.  It’s just like the classic hero, impatient like his ancient shadow Achilles to toss away slow and steady concentration for an impetuous answer riding on the edge of a blade.

The alternative, however, holds that after realizing that knot was impossible in it’s current state, Alexander pulled the linchpin from the yoke of the ox-cart, thereby freeing the two ends of the cord.  It takes a rather cleverly tied knot to be remedied without access to the ends of the rope in which it’s made, and most aren’t of this variety, and neither it seems was the Gordian knot.  The trick, perhaps, was to realize that it actually was impossible in it’s current state, and to change the circumstances surrounding the knot in order to get at it in a meaningful way.

A giant tangled knot is a great metaphor for any complicated problem.  Such knots bewilder as to where one should start, and it demands that it’s form be totally studied and learned by the challenger at the task in order to make any meaningful headway.  How perfect is that description for much of the most challenging and worthwhile tasks that face us in life?  

So often we are lured to think of the quick solution, the get-rich-fast scheme, the short cut, the sharpened blade to slice right through the cantankerous problems of life.  And yet, so often, if not always, such short and quickly considered solutions of speed backfire, whereas the slow work, the consistent consideration and the willingness to sit down and really solve wins out the race, like the steadfast tortoise trundling past the sleeping hare, exhausted from it’s ill-fated  sprint.

Quick, decisive action certainly has it’s place - as on the battlefield.  The point is to realize when the context begs for one or the other slower, more considerate solution.  Civilization has created an environment more and more conducive and in need of that slower, more considerate strategy - that Gordian solution that hides behind the flashier, popular, impatient action.

INFINITE FACETS

November 11th, 2020

For anyone who has read or listened to a good chunk of what this platform offers will notice trends in topic.  Episodes, or posts tend to orbit the same concepts.  Indeed for some -god forbid- it might even seem repetitive.  The goal isn’t to bang anyone over the head with the same thing so much as it is two other insidious goals that are far more difficult: to find a better way to convey an idea and to perhaps find the slippery and subtle nuance that will resonate deeply with each individual person.  What makes sense to one is gibberish to another, and what sounds common place to many might be golden insight for one.

It’s always a fresh astonishment when a reader reaches out about an episode that felt mediocre.  “I hope you made the gesture of a chef’s kiss when you hit send on that episode!” One reader recently wrote in response to an episode that had me questioning my ability to write well in the first place.

Every topic out there has virtually an infinite set of ways that it can be treated, described, and explored.    Certainly not all are worthwhile.  Any random set of words could be claimed to be a treatment of any one topic, though such a whimsical association does little if any good beyond being pedantic about this notion of there being infinite facets to every topic.  

Writing in this way is much like spending time with someone you know quite well.  No matter how well you know someone, no matter how much mutual time has been spent, there is always infinite surprise buzzing beneath the surface of every person.  Though it’s the same person, there’s simply no way to know exactly what subtle shade and nuance of their being will express itself to us in that sweet moment of merely connecting with another.

Even more important is that familiarity can breed the magic of synergy, producing results that are continually better through time.  This is obvious within the realm of writing when we move through drafts of a single piece of writing.  Sometimes it takes a hundred readings before a simple fix makes a sentence shine beautifully. 

We need only extrapolate this to pieces of writing all revolving around the same topic.  Who knows what will emerge on the next pass.

HEADY ITEM

November 10th, 2020

Imagine looking at your to-do list and seeing the item: start a business.  Few people are perhaps likely to put such a heady item on their to-do list, but the point here is to illuminate the potency of the tasks we delegate to ourselves, and what sort of correlation -if any- exists between the difficulty of the task and the likelihood that it actually gets done.

There is a further distinction to be made.  Certainly there must be difficult things on the lists -written or not- of every person who wishes to grow, otherwise such growth just doesn’t happen.    We need difficulty and challenge in order to expand our abilities.  But difficulty isn’t necessarily correlated with specificity - which is a far more important metric regarding the tasks we assign ourselves.  

Specific is good.  Difficult doesn’t necessarily indicate anything about our ability to get it done.  Difficult and vague is far more challenging than a task that’s difficult and specific.  A hazy task offers many different possible directions for starting, whereas specific narrows this task considerably, raising the chances that progress will actually happen.

The perennial question arises: which way to go?  Which direction is likely to be bring about the the successful conclusion of our goals fastest?

Apply these questions to that original heady to-do item: start a business, and they don’t necessarily winnow the field down to a consideration that’s more efficient.  A bizarrely specific question that applies generally is more useful: What is the first aspect of this task that can be narrowed with a question?

Or rather: where is the thin edge of the wedge?  How do we slice off the first thin bit of the problem where meaningful progress can be made?

Further, we can ask: what sort of businesses actually exist?  And from here we can further specify to: what sort of structures exist that would be most in line with the sort of life we wish to lead.

These sorts questions take a huge topic and cordon off huge portions of possible answers the fastest - which is exactly what we need in order to make progress.  Larger steps in the beginning lead to the right small steps in the end.  Small steps in the beginning are likely to lead to a lot of wasted time when we eventually realize we’ve been making small steps in the wrong territory and the wrong direction and suddenly need to abandon all that effort time spent.

Heady items on the to-do list are best modified by a good starter question that cracks the egg and gets things rolling.  Best to first the most specific way to eliminate as much of the subject as possible.

THE STUDENT

November 9th, 2020

There’s nothing quite like getting slapped in the face by reality.  The wake up call, the reality check, the humbled grounding.  Despite the aggressive way this experience is described, and as brutal as it can feel, we refer to this same thing as the best teacher.  This is either a comment on the potential nullity of our teachers, or it’s perhaps not the best way to describe the role of reality.  

Anyone who has been a teacher knows that students can be quite a handful, coming with their own particular understanding, stubbornness and perspective about what to do and how to do it.  There is a rather naive view of the teaching profession as simply imparting information, knowledge and know-how.  Unfortunately the task before all teachers is quite a bit more complicated and difficult.  A classroom is always a smorgasbord of various attention spans, temperaments and rabble-rousing.  The task is first and foremost an awfully difficult social experiment: simply corralling the attention of a bunch of young, still-developing humans is a feat in of it self.  Almost anything else is usually more attractive to such attention spans than the subject to be taught - not to mention their exceptional ability to deride the attention of each other.

Beyond this, a teacher has to calibrate for the lowest common denominator in terms of who understands what.  If half the class came from a different school which didn’t cover the same material, then those who already know it have to go over it again so everyone can get on the same page.

This is really what teaching is all about: getting someone on the same page.

First with each other, and then with the teacher who knows more.

Far from the teacher being a rude wake up call, it’s often the students that present a rude wake up call as to the magnitude of the task at hand.  This isn’t to say anything about kids at all - kids will be kids, but rather to point out that teachers are far more understanding, forgiving and generous than reality usually is.  And yet we call reality the best teacher.

Strangely, it makes a bit more sense if you flip the roles, and cast reality as the student who simply doesn’t understand what you’re trying to do.  It’s the teacher who iterates their approach in order to get the student to understand the lesson at hand.  So too with our role as we try to make something happen in the world.  We iterate our approach to try and make an idea, goal or dream come true.

Failures and errors in our approach always have to do with some sort of unknown aspect of reality, much like a teacher who is trying to teach calculus to a class that hasn’t even learned algebra.  It’s not that the students require a harsh wake up call, but that the teacher needs to back peddle the subject so that it can all make sense.

Far from having one’s own dreams crushed by the cricket-sound of a disinterested reality, it’s perhaps more enabling and productive to see reality as a student that simply can’t yet see where you’re coming from and what you’re trying to do.

The same sort of questions arise as we try to iterate for the next attempt, but the framing is filled with far more agency:

What have you missed that needs to be done so that your message, your work and your art can be understood, and loved?