Design VS Usability in real life
Today I learned a valuable lesson in design and how you can apply what you learn on the web about design and usability in real life situations.
It started when I bought a lamp for my desk and I wanted to place it there. Sounds simple enough, right?
Wrong.
My desk space is very limited. And even though I have another two “tables” in my room to put my things on, they are already occupied and aren’t good to serve as working desks. So basically, I wanted to put on my desk my laptop, the speakers and sub-woofer, the router (preferably in a position where I could see it’s leds) and leave enough room for me to write and work on.
After various attempts I think I found the perfect layout for working space without compromising functionality, but, what I did sacrifice was design. Just before I made this change, my desk looked neat and tidy. Now it looks smaller and cluttered but at least now I can use it without sacrificing my sight (due to low light) and still check things on the laptop if I need to.
When you are building a website, or re-arranging something, whether it’s your room, your office or your desk, keep in my mind that the nicest arrangement of the items is not always necessarily the best. Even though things might look nice to you, you shouldn’t place things in a way that will make the way you interact with them harder.
Then again, I’m not saying to go back to early Web 1.0 design either. I’m just saying that there is always a middle ground between the elements of design and usability in everything so you can find peace of mind without sacrificing a lot of sore sight.
