I Disagree
This comment from ApplesAndOranges misses the point:
What your companies app wants: full tax details as required by the government so we tax you the correct amount.
If your app wanted something as simple as google (a none specific set of words) you’d only have one input box and a button too.
To which I reply…that’s not really what this comic is about. A comic is not a literal statement of fact. Did you really think I was claiming — or even remotely implying — that a data-entry application can be written with a single field and button?
Using the specific example of tax forms, there are many competing tax software packages. Although all must collect the same data, their usability and efficiency varies widely. There is much more to this puzzle than a 1-to-1 mapping from data entry fields to database fields.
And using Apple as another example, contrast their MP3 player user interfaces with competing products. Again, all of these devices perform the same tasks and have the same data behind the scenes. Yet the Apple product is simpler and more efficient. We can apply many of the same design principles to tax software.
If you need to collect ten pieces of data, that is an essential complexity. But most GUIs are littered with accidental complexity. That is what the comic is about.
By and large, companies do NOT create good user interfaces. These apps do not need:
- Cluttered, sloppy GUIs.
- Poor keyboard navigation.
- Modal dialog after modal dialog. Modality is a cheap and lazy programming fix and is frequently abused. This locks users out when they need to browse to some other screen for research while in the middle of a data entry task.
- Bad scrolling, forcing users to reach for the mouse to see essential data.
- Weird data entry fields that interfere with “normal” typing. Avoid weird custom components that attempt to do auto-completion for things like dates and decimals unless they are PERFECT. Anything less interrupts the flow.
- Sluggish performance, such as making long server calls on the EDT.
- COBOL-like presentation that converts EVERYTHING TO ALL CAPS. (ick…ok, that’s just a pet peeve)
- 12 “extra” fields to capture unrelated data that some committee decided was important. (The truth is, there probably isn’t a committee. Instead, features creep in one-by-one from various interests throughout the company)
It is easy to tack on features. It takes focus and discipline to create exactly what you need, and no more. Sure, if your tax form needs N pieces of data, you’ll need N fields. But few corporate apps are that efficient.
And another comment from Steve Bennett:
(by the way, thank you for using your real name — I use mine)
Your company’s app is probably industry specific and will be used by a smallish number of people for hundreds or thousands of hours to do their job. Power, flexibility and efficiency become far more important than intuitiveness, beauty and user-friendliness.
I don’t think most custom apps are flexible, efficient, or powerful. 
How many times have you ordered something at a fast food restaurant and watched as the poor cashier struggled with a horrible GUI? I fail to understand how it requires 37 keystrokes to order a taco without lettuce.
Ease of use is a competitive advantage! If thousands of stock brokers spend thousands of hours using some proprietary tool, a quality GUI is damn important. I’ll even argue that fade-ins, animations, drag-and-drop, and overlays are also important, effective ways to convey additional information without cluttering the GUI.
But that’s pie-in-the-sky stuff. For the most part, I think typical apps don’t even get the basics right.
I just subscribed to your blog today, and I have to say that my first new feed of it is exactly what I needed. You are able to concisely and with authority list the relevant details, leaving out the implied easy stuff. Making jokes about software and web development can be a hard line to walk. Most of the time, I think, jokes about design are elitist and not very funny. Your stick men tell stories that some uber-advanced Flash developers can’t say with 3 minutes of Timelines and Actionscripts. Thank you.
-raven russell
ps feel free to write me back directly, if you want.
mmm seems that apple do everything well .. er except provide a reliable power cable to their ’simpler and more efficient product’
http://www.appledefects.com/wiki/index.php?title=Magsafe
People often confuse Apple’s simple interfaces with dumbed-down capabilities. The fact is, a lot of thinking goes into their software before a line of code is written, and there’s a whole lot happening under the hood the user never sees.
Case in point: compare setting up a Windows wireless client for a wifi network with a seldom used encryption scheme to doing the same on a Mac. The Windows dialog will have multiple levels of complexity and all of the text fields and drop-down boxes need to be correctly set or a cryptic “failed to connect to wireless network” alert will pop up. Many iterations may be required. On the Mac, you enter the encryption key and the software spends a few seconds figuring out the rest. The latter was much more difficult to program, and deceptively simple to interact with.
If Apple were to design a tax calculation app (heaven help them), I suspect they would put a lot of effort figuring out what most of the entry fields should be from various databases and other sources, rather than transferring that burden to the user. These types of custom apps generally require a lot of redundant data be entered, like both a product UUID and its price, or today’s date.
@ Raven - I agree with you.
@ Eric - Great Blog, I love it!
Apple takes the time to get their products and software right the first time. I believe this is what sets them apart from say…Microsoft? It seems to me that Microsoft is only interested in getting their software out quickly to be the latest and greatest. Just my opinion I suppose
Happy Weekend!
I laughed out loud when I read “I fail to understand how it requires 37 keystrokes to order a taco without lettuce.” That happened to me just the other day. The young woman taking my order ended up just giving up and calling back to the people making the tacos that they didn’t have lettuce…
Hallelujah!
Steve says: “Power, flexibility and efficiency become far more important than intuitiveness, beauty and user-friendliness.”
I say: “Power, flexibility, and efficiency” and “intuitiveness, beauty, and user-friendliness” are not mutually exclusive. Just because Google has a simple interface does not prevent it from being powerful and flexible.
Accept googles single field is very powerfull, I mean, I can, “site:stuffthathappens.com usability”… and search for usability on just stuffthathappens.com.