

On the rise of digital design - thomholwerda
http://www.osnews.com/story/26715/On_the_rise_of_digital_design

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clumsysmurf
For those who would like to read more about the design philosophy of Metro, I
would recommend "Brave NUI World" (Wixon).

Another book "The Mobile Frontier"(Hinman) briefly summarizes NUIs in Chapter
2, and concludes with an excellent interview with Mike Kruzeniski (Creative
director at Microsoft in the Windows Phone Design Studio).

Hinman describes our current situation as being stuck in a chasm between GUIs
and NUIs, with designers taking entrenched metaphors from GUIs and attempting
to apply them to gestural interfaces and NUIs.

Hinman, Wixon, and Kruzeniski argue that skeuomorphic designs are insufficient
for ephemeral and networked information.

Essentially, "Authentically Digital" means "content is the interface". Its a
shift to focusing on the interaction, not the interface. Kruzeniski cites
Photosynth's UI as an example of where mobile UIs are going.

As an Android developer since 2009, Windows Phone has me pretty excited from a
technological standpoint. Android and iOS are essentially WIMPs with desktop
metaphors. Maybe iOS has more skeuomorphism. But I see Android's Holo as
simply a theme, not a fundamental difference in the UI of the system. Just
lipstick on a pig, err WIMP, essentially.

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elisehein
Interestingly, if I would've read the discussion out of context, I definitely
would have thought the author meant digital as shadowy and gradienty, and
analog as flat.

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hayksaakian
The progress in of design clearly follows growth and adoption curves.

Early designs are 'analog' because users have no frame of reference.
Components become increasingly stylized over time as analog parts become
distractions rather than aids. Now we're back to digital.

I imagine the same will happen to the next revolutionary consumer technology.

Google glass? Who knows.

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digitalengineer
A good read for sure. It's not just a style, in order to differentiate
themselves from Apple, MS and Google went with the 'digital' or 'flat' design.
We can argue if they ever even could, were it not for Apple and the iPhone,
but 'flat dsign' works really well! The biggest winner is the user. We're
seeing a "maturing" of mobile design. I can't wait to see Apple's response.

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mtgx
What is exactly is "digital" about a design language that has been used for
decades in the real world in parks, airports, roads, and so on as signage? To
me that just seems like a "flat" variation of skeumorphism.

