layout: true name: base layout: true class: center .header[.floatleft[The (awful) Design of Everyday Things].floatright[.white[Christopher Biggs — @unixbigot]]] .footer[.floatleft[.hashtag[lca202] Jan 2020]] --- layout: true name: inverse class: inverse, middle template: base --- layout: true name: callout class: middle, italic, bulletul template: base --- layout: true name: pink class: middle, pink template: base --- layout: true name: toply class: italic, bulletul template: base --- layout: true name: toplypink class: italic, bulletul, pink template: base --- layout: true template: callout .crumb[ # Welcome ] --- class: center, middle template: inverse # The Internet of Everyday Things ## .orange[IoT and the future of domesticity] .bottom.right[ Christopher Biggs, .logo[Accelerando Consulting] <br>@unixbigot .logo[@accelerando_au] ] ??? Abstract: As an evangelist, community leader and consultant in the Internet of Things space, I have strong opinions about how IoT can improve our lives. Thirty years after its publication, Donald Norman's seminal book "The Design of Everyday Things", which examined how the tiny usability touches in everyday items matter so much, remains relevant and important. In fact, Don just last year wrote that the technology industry badly needs to re-focus on the true meaning of Human Centered Design, observing that despite his decades of advocacy, the same kinds of design flaws continually recur. We are just a handful of years short of the centenary of the publication of Modern Architecture pioneer Le Corbusier's maxim "A house is a machine to live in", yet our architecture remains stubbornly steam powered. My position is that we ought step back and critically reexamine the shape and detail of our workplaces and homes. The great labour saving devices of the 20th century freed us from much physical drudgery, but significant cognitive burden remains. I will examine, in the abstract and concrete, how much cognitive load is imposed on us by our environment. It has been written that a modern human makes 30,000 choices every day. For example, why are our light switches placed for the convenience of builders, not inhabitants. Why do so many of our labour-saving appliances require us to spend so much time monitoring and pampering them. How often do you stumble about in the dark fumbling for a light switch. Wouldn't you prefer to discover the failed refrigerator or flooded storeroom before the contents are ruined? Join me for an imagination of how Living In The Future could truly be better. Outline: Technology is a process Le Corbusier and Norman. School for the gifted. Return to basics: user intentions, affordances, self-documentation Software is eating the world. Including hardware. Including all hardware's faults. Lets look at some principles and examples that get it right and wrong * The law of the three seashells (discoverability) * Could you explain it to Queen Victoria * The principle of least surprise So what does technology look like when we reevaluate it from first principles. * the seven stages of action 1. what do I want to accomplish - discoverability 2. what are the alternative action sequences - feedback 3. what action can i do now - conceptual model 4. how do i do it - affordances 5 what happened - signifiers 6 what does it mean - mappings 7 is it okay, have I accomplished my goal - constraints --- class: center, middle template: inverse # The Internet of Everyday Things ## .green[IoT and the future of domesticity] .bottom.right[ Christopher Biggs, .logo[Accelerando Consulting] <br>@unixbigot .logo[@accelerando_au] ] ??? Hi everyone. I'm Christopher Biggs, and thank you for falling for my clickbait title. This is the documentation mini conference, so I'm going to spend the first part of this presentation trying to convince you that you shouldn't need to write documentation. And when you fail, and have to write doco anyway, we'll look at how to not make that a waste of time. --- # “Technology is stuff that doesn’t work yet.” ##– Bran Ferren (via Douglas Adams) ??? This is a quote that went dirt ages viral when Douglas Adams used it in a newspaper column 21 years ago. Douglas was paraphrasing Artist and Technologist Bran Ferren, when he wrote that Technology is stuff that doesn't work yet. Bran was making the point that when things just work, we stop calling them technology. Nobody calls chairs technology, despite the amount of engineering sophistication that goes into them, becuase they almost never go rogue for no visible reason. Rather unlike computers. --- # “Technology is stuff that doesn’t *make sense* yet.” ##– Me, just now. ??? Technology, to propose another definition, is stuff that needs documentation, because it doesn't make sense. And a lot of the time that's because of inadequate design. So lets look at how the awful design of everyday things is one of the wellsprings from which our need for documentation flows. --- layout: true template: callout .crumb[ # Welcome # Past? ] --- class: center, middle template: inverse # Living in the future? ??? Can you believe it's 2020. We are now PAST the years in which many of those science fiction futures that we grew up on, were set. Blade runner? That's so last year. Same for the running man and Akira. Remember Snow Crash, the post-cyberpunk bible? That was FIVE YEARS AGO. We're living, and I say this often with with unrestrained glee, in the future. --- ## [FX: Record Scratch] # We're really not ??? But really, what we're literally living in, by which I mean our homes and workplaces, is largely the same funny looking caves we lived in a century ago. Welcome to the roaring twenties. Again. --- .fig100[ ] ??? Take a look at this office scene. Open plan, tall windows, big flat desks, so modern. That's from 1919. --- .fig100[ ] ??? Here we are in the present day. It's barely different. --- .fig100[ ] ??? Take a look at this stainless steel marvel of moden kitchen design. --- .fig100[ ] ??? Not really all that unlike this scene from 1915. --- layout: true template: callout .crumb[ # Welcome # Past? # Present? ] --- # "A house is a machine to live in" ## - Le Courbusier (Charles-Édouard Jeanneret) **1923** ??? We are just a couple of years short of the centenary of the publication of Modern Architecture pioneer Le Corbusier's maxim, that a house, as he put it, is a machine to live in. In the last century industry has moved from steam to silicon, household lighting from gas to LED, personal transport from horsedrawn tram to the tesla, yet our living machines are horseless carriages at best. --- .fig30l[ ] ??? Thirty years after its publication, Donald Norman's seminal book "The Design of Everyday Things", which examined how the tiny usability touches in everyday items matter so much, remains relevant and important. In fact, Don wrote in 2018 that the technology industry badly needs to re-focus on the true meaning of Human Centered Design, observing that despite his decades of advocacy, the same kinds of design flaws continually recur. --- .fig30l[ ] ??? This is a book that as an IT student in the 90s I was encouraged to track down and read, which I did, and I re read the 2013 expanded edition when I was planning this talk a year ago. Dipping into it again last week made me realise that I probably ought to read it every year. --- .fig80[ ] ??? Don spends most of the first chapter talking about difficulty opening doors and the concept of affordances. Even without the sign we would undertand from the shape and position of the handle that this is a door that should be pulled to open, not pushed. Here we are, thirty years in the future still seeing apologetic signs on doors explaining how to use them. --- .fig30l[ ] .fig30r[ ] ??? This is the oven in my office. It's a benchtop unit with two hotplates on top, and dual element oven. It has four simple dials. Yet they contain multitudes of fail. --- .fig30l[ ] .fig70r[ ] ??? Here we see the function dial, there's a symbol that denotes the large hotplate on top. Only one of those two positions actually activates that hotplate. The other one on the right is referring to the red light above it, which lights up when the hotplate is on. The other symbols around the function dial are for various combinations of roasting, grilling and rotisserie. Don't ask me which one is which, I have to keep the manual for this oven on the bench right next to it because I can't remember. --- .fig60l[ ] .fig30r[ ] ??? Take a look at the temperature dial, can you tell what temperature it's indicating. It does have a pointer. It's very sleek, and black on black. Even by feel it's hard to work out what temperature you've set. I cook by feel. Sometimes when I'm adjusting an oven I lower the temperature until the heating light goes out to determine the actual current temperature in the oven. But that light near the temperature dial is not a heating indicator. It indicates that the right hand hotplate is on. The right hand hotplate has its own dial, unlike the left hand one, which shares with the oven mode. Now there is a reason why these controls probably made sense to the designer, but it's hardly obvious to the user. --- # Touch that dial .fig50l[ ] ??? And that's something we all to often forget. Most of the time the user is meeting a product with more intelligence, but with far less familiarity and context than designers imagine. For those of you who have blissfully forgotten, this is what televisions looked like once upon a time. I think if you wheeled oen of these down to the fabulous LCA child care service and consulted a six year old child, they would understand how to adjust volume and change channels. That is once you explained that a channel is a bit like a youtube playlist with the auto advance stuck on, and they got over their horror that there were only a handful of these channels to choose from. --- # Touch that dial .fig50l[ ] .fig50r[ ] ??? Research with actual children however indicates that this avocado terror is entirely inscrutable to modern children. My youngest child is 12, starting high school in a few weeks, and she just got her first iphone handed down through a chain of siblings. She adores facetime and will spend hours chatting to her friends; but she would have no idea what to do with this. Grown ups were the same too, it took a detailed campaign of advertisements, demonstrations and user guides to teach the first owners of dial telephones how to dial. Documentation. --- .fig50l[ ] ??? Here's a ten year old dishwasher from my kitchen. It's practically identical to the 20 year old unit it replaced, and if you want you can buy a new model with the exact same control arrangement. DO NOT WANT. Its tiny little three digit display dispenses gems like F11 which is short for fault number 11 which the documentation tells me means water pressure is too low becuase some cities not mentioning any names brisbane, are rumoured to turn the water pressure down rather htan fix their aging pipes. --- .fig50l[ ] .fig50r[ ] ??? There is another model in the range that has a whole 20 characters or so of screen that it can use to give a little more info, but when people say psssh why would you want an IoT dishwasher, THIS IS WHY. Explain whats wrong. Message me when you're done. Give me records of water pressure that I can take to the council. Remind me to clean the filters every so often. I've worked in appliance companies. I know every company has an engineer whose job it is to work out how to save 5 cents on build cost by removing a component. Just stop. Its not ethical. You're harming people. You're killing the planet by producing rubbish products that barely work. --- .fig40l[ ] ??? If you really want to see me cry, ask about light switches. I know you have that one switch bank in your house that you can't fathom. I've lived in the same house for twenty two years and still can't work out the light switches. --- .fig40l[ ] .fig40 ] ??? So what do we do? Documentation. Sometimes documentation is the wrong answer. The underlying problem here is a failure to practice human centered design. This is electrician centered design. It was cheaper to run the wiring for four lights to one place than to do what would work best for the resident over the next century. Once again Don Norman goes on a tear here too. He talks about how over 75% of industrial accidents are ruled human error. He tells of a fatal air force jet crash ruled human error. A second investigation found that the first investigation had arrived at the verdict of human error because the pilot failed to pull out of a dive. True, except they glossed over the fact that the pilot neglected to pull up due to being unconscious from hypoxia due to the design of the helmet. This makes me wonder what really happened in Iran last week with that tragic airliner missile strike. Was it really and solely human error. We'll come back to light switches in a bit, after I calm down. --- layout: true template: callout .crumb[ # Welcome # Past # Present # Future ] --- template: inverse # The future ??? OK breathe. Drink some water. It's gonna be the future soon. The things that make us weak and strange can be engineered away. --- .fig50[ ] .spacedown[ # The Future] ??? I want you to go out of this talk and look at the world with fresh eyes. Pay attention to the frustrating interactions you have with technology and imagine a different future. --- # But *which* Future? A, or B? .fig50l[ ]] .fig50r[ ] ??? I think a lot about what kind of future I want to live in. On the left we have Star Trek, which says that in the future whenever we want to do anything we have to poke at a menu on a screen or command a disembodied computer "Tea, Earl Grey, Hot." In the Star Trek future, the computer becomes an unavoidable presence in our lives. Everything we do is mediated through it. On the right we have a still from the 1984 production of Frank Herbert's Dune, directed by David Lynch. A problematic book, and widely regarded as a terrible movie, neverthless it is spectacularly beautiful film to look at. You can turn the sound down if you like. --- # The Internet of Things ## silly name. Let's call it Human-Centered Technology ??? I'm sure you've heard of IoT the Internet of Things. It's on my business card, and the front of my building. But the name faces the wrong way. Yes, the things talk to the internet. But they exist to talk to us, to carry us into the future. The internet is just one of the resources they use to do that. So I'm going to do a quick search and replace on the rest of this talk and use the tern human centered technology. --- # My Three Laws of human-centered technology * **First Law:** Machines must cooperate for the benefit of humans * **Second Law:** Machines must communicate, and obey instructions * **Third Law:** Machines must be as simple and reliable as possible ??? So I give you my three laws of human-centered technology * Machines must cooperate for the benefit of humans * Machines must communicate, and obey instructions * Machines must be as simple and reliable as possible If you squint a bit they look like Asimov's laws of robotics. That's not really profound, it's just a bit of fun. --- # My Three* Laws of human centered technology * **Zeroth Law:** Machines must be beautiful (or invisible). * **First Law:** Machines must cooperate for the benefit of humans * **Second Law:** Machines must communicate, and obey instructions * **Third Law:** Machines must be as simple and reliable as possible .footnote[-ish] ??? But Asimov got to retcon in a Zeroth law, so I can too. Machines must be beautiful, or invisible. If we invite machines into our living rooms, bedrooms and bathrooms they can't look like truck parts. --- # "A House is a computer to live in" ## Me, again ??? 60 years ago we imagined flying cars and robot cleaners and robot butlers. We didn't get that but we got a relationship with machines that is even closer. Rosie the jetsons mechanical housekeeper is here but she's the roomba, she's alexa, she's in your TV and your air conditioner. We live inside of machines now. And when I say machines, I really mean computers. And when I say computers I really mean the software that is eating the world. And when I say software I really the thought that goes into the software, which is to say design. And whenever design fails, there is documentation. --- .fig40r[ ] .spacedn[ # Future Tech ] ??? So lets look at how we're doing about up-skilling the robots we inhabit now. --- .fig40r[ ] .spacedn[ # "Wrong! Wrong! Absolutely brimming over with Wrongability" ## - Arnold J Rimmer (BSc SSc), ### 2 Million Years in the future ] ??? Apparently we're taking the only good peice of design in the traditional light switch, its tactile nature, and replacing it with a smooth featureless plate. --- .fig40l[ ] ??? Here's a better way, leave the light switches where they are and add intelligence to the bulbs. They can still be controlled from switch points, but also from household panels, remote controls, voice assistances and personal smartphones. --- .fig50l[ ] ??? But bulbs. Bulbs are so last century. Bulbs are so the century before that. Bulbs are a thing because of the need to protect filaments within a vacuum or an inert gas. Filaments which aren't there any more. --- .fig50l[ ] .fig60r[ ] ??? Becuase light emitting diodes are awesome. We cram them into bulbs where they heat up and fail because of obsolete designs. They're much happier spread out and much more pleasant to live with that way too. And we can do so much more with them. Which can be complex. Which can lead to documentation and other crimes. --- # There's An* App For That .fig30l[ ] .fig30r[ ] .footnote[100 apps] ??? Here's the page of my phone for controlling my home appliances. Oh, make that two pages. Because I bought some smart lightbulbs, and they were great so I went back to the same store and bought some more of the same brand. Which use a different app. The current state of our inside out home robots is full on dumpster fire. Nothing can interoperate, because nothings documented. Painstaking reverse engineering has managed to alleviate some of the misery. --- .fig60[ ] .spacedown[ # Don't be this] ??? Our shining future is at the level of usability of an alarm panel. Which is basically zero. Look they've crammed some documentation inside the cover because design failed so hard. There's a 300 page manual somewhere, but don't let the resident see it, or they might not pay for technician callouts. This is poor design and documentaiton used as a weapon of oppression. Don't do that. Put a link to the documentation on the device. Put the documentation IN the device if that makes sense. --- layout: true template: toply .crumb[ # Welcome # Past # Present # Future ] --- # Imagine a less awful security panel* .footnote[we built it] * Disarm from your phone while still outside -- * Messages you a picture when intrusion is detected -- * Starts recording in High Def from thirty seconds ago -- * Forgot to arm? It's the future, you have an iPhone. -- * Documentation? Ditto. --- .fig30[  ] # Imagine your future* home .footnote[now, if you want it] * Oven has remote timer, camera, temperature alert -- * All your appliances message you (or announce via house audio) when done -- * Your washing line warns you when it rains -- * Did I remember to shut the front door? -- *   (nevermind, because your house locks up if nobody's home) --- # Imagine your Future* office .footnote[also now] * Elevator plans the fastest route to desired floors -- * Reception-bot welcomes you and pages the person that you're here to see -- * Meeting rooms know when they're next booked -- * Climate control that actually works -- * Deliveries announced --- class: sealed, middle # < Sealed Section > ## Open only if panic-talking --- layout: true template: toplypink .crumb[ # Welcome # Past # Present # Future # Sealed ] --- # Three things to take away --- ## Three things to take away .spacedown[ # 1. The law of the three seashells (discoverability) ] ??? A last month I was at DDD Brisbane, and watched my friend Enrique sketching on his iPad. He mentioned he's using a particular drawing program, I wont name names, and I commented that had I heard they had just added animations as a feature. Yes, he said, and in about twenty second he sketched out six frames of an animation, and activated it. When i got home I was excited to try it out on my own iPad. I couldn't find the feature. Had I misremembered which program he'd used? No. I checked the app description, yes it's announced as a new feature. How do I access it. I couldn't work it out. I checked the publisher's website. No information on how to use their program, besides a series of blog posts announcing releases. This is the first thing, people the very first thing you need to consider. How does a new user discover your interface. --- ## Three things to take away .spacedown[ # 2. Could you explain it to Queen Victoria] ??? Your users are not stupid. They're intelligent and perceptive, after all they chose your product. But they don't necessarily have context, nor experience, nor the domain knowledge that you have. Your product must be understandable. It must help people understand it. Now in the mobile age, this becomes much more difficult to do inside your software. Documentation has a role here. Write a tutorial. Not just a video, I dont want to scrobble through a 40 minute video to find out how to use the one feature I can't fathom. Test your product on beginners. Documentors, we need to cultivate beginner's mind, to set aside our privieged context and ask ourselves will this make sense to a newbie. Create an imaginary friend who is a time traveller from a previous century, perhaps Bennelong or Queen Victoria or your great great great grandmother. --- ## Three things to take away .spacedown[ # 3. The principle of least surprise] ??? Do what people expect. If you don't know, watch them. Thinking back to my oven apparently designed by someone who has never cooked, ovens have a design language that oven users will know, even if they don't know YOUR oven. You must know those expectations, you can flaunt them but you have to make it obvious when you do it. This is why I say never shake hands with an architect. If you've ever struggled to understand an unusual sink in a hotel or convention centre you might share my convictions that architects never wash their hands. --- class: left .spacedn[ # Questions to support the seven stages of action] 1. What do I want to accomplish? (discoverability) -- 2. What are the alternative action sequences (feedback) -- 3. What action can i do now? (conceptual model) -- 4. How do i do it? (affordances) -- 5. What happened? (signifiers) -- 6. What does it mean? (mappings) -- 7. Is it okay, have I accomplished my goal? (constraints) ??? Our documentation needs to support these seven stages. And more so, something that only became clear to me when I was talking to Sven a former tech writer in the registration line, the act of writing documentation is the act of UX review, to confirm that a product supports these needs. Documentation, or rather the thought process that leads to documentation, whether or not you personally write it, is part of design, it is QA for your design, and I want you to think about whether your documentation happens in the part of your development where it can deliver this benefit. --- layout: true template: callout .crumb[ # Welcome # Past # Present # Future # Sealed # Coda ] --- class: sealed # < / Sealed Section > --- .fig30[  ] # Recap .nolm[ * A House is a Machine to Live In. * Imagine Technology that's easy to use, not just easy to build * There is more to design than just blue LEDs * "The Future is here, it's just not evenly distributed yet"* ] .footnote[ Wm. Gibson, probably] --- # Thank You, I'm Here All Week ### (Try the hallway track) ## Related talks - [http://christopher.biggs.id.au/#talks](http://christopher.biggs.id.au/#talks) - Twitter: .blue[@unixbigot] of .blue[@accelerando_au] - Email: .blue[christopher@biggs.id.au] - Accelerando Consulting - Human Centered Design - https://accelerando.com.au/