Guest article by Daniel O’Neill.
I am writing this article for the benefit of people considering doing a PhD. This article is written for a general audience, regardless of profession or discipline. It is an account of undertaking postgraduate research, and all views expressed are based on my experience. It should be noted that this is a general brief overview.
By Gordon Rugg
This article is the last in a short series about finding out what people really want. I’ve explored that topic via discussion of idealised dream buildings, to see what regularities emerge and what insights they provide into people’s dreams and desires.
In today’s article, I’ll pull together strands from those discussions, and see what patterns emerge.
Detail from: “Neuschwanstein Castle above the clouds” by Arto Teräs – Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons – https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Neuschwanstein_Castle_above_the_clouds.jpg#/media/File:Neuschwanstein_Castle_above_the_clouds.jpg
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By Gordon Rugg
In a previous article, I looked at ways of systematically recording indicators of problems and successes with a design. In that article, I focused on the indicators, with only a brief description of how you could record them.
Today’s article gives a more detailed description of ways of recording those indicators, using the worked example of a building entrance.
The worked example is, ironically, the Humanitarian Building. Here’s the Wikipedia image for its entrance.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MSU_III_Humanitarian_Building_Entrance.jpg
By Gordon Rugg
If you’re designing something that’s going to be used, as opposed to something decorative, then it’s a really good idea to make it fit for its purpose.
How can you do that? Observing the users is a good start.
“Observing” is a broad term that includes various specialised forms of observation and analysis. In this article, I’ll describe a simple way of doing basic observation of users, which involves watching out for four key alliteratively-named actions:
It’s simple, but it’s powerful, and it usually catches most of the main problems, and it gives you a good start towards designing something that the users will like.
Not great art, but useful: Four things to watch for in task analysis
Sources of original images are given at the end of this article
By Gordon Rugg
This article is the fifth in a short series about finding out what people would really like in life, using architectural drawings and fantasy buildings as a starting point.
The first article discussed how this gives you insights that you wouldn’t get from an interview or questionnaire. The next articles looked at regularities in people’s preferences; at changes in preferences over time and at obsolescence; and at complicating factors that you need to keep in mind when using this approach.
In today’s article, I’ll look at ways of identifying common user activities and requirements that should be incorporated into the design process, and that can be handled cheaply and simply, producing significantly better designs as a result.
This article gives a brief overview. I’ll re-visit this topic in some later articles, which will work through some specific cases in detail.
A thing of beauty is a joy forever: Waiting rooms, however, usually aren’t…
Sources of original images are given at the end of this article
hyde and rugg 
