Edapta Philosophy and Adaptive User Interfaces
by Kynn Bartlett <kynn-hwg(at)idyllmtn.com>
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Apologies in advance to anyone who feels this is off-topic,
too much of a "plug" for Edapta, or better suited to another
list (such as hwg-theory); if the conversation continues we
can move it elsewhere...
At 02:59 PM 9/24/2000 , KathyW wrote:
>** Reply to message from Kynn Bartlett <kynn-hwg(at)idyllmtn.com> on Sat, 23 Sep
>2000 14:23:27 -0700
>
>About the comment following, I'd like to start a friendly debate, as this issue
>intrigues, amuses and at times frustrates me ...
> > In truth, one of the strengths of the Web is the ability to
> > express the _same_ information (content) in a way that is most
> > useful to the _user_.
>[snip]
> > Edapta (the company I work for) is developing; adaptive user
> > interfaces that fit the user (not the designer).
>OK.
>Many users "down at the coal-face" aren't equipped to make intelligent choices.
>Quite frankly, many never have been. That is frequently what makes the
>difference between a successful product and a failure - not the quality of the product, but how it has been presented to the user, packaged and marketed (just ask microsoft).
>It is the designers (rightly or wrongly) role to shape that presentation.
>Adaptive user interfaces are fine, but leaving the designer out of the equation is a big mistake.
You are exactly right -- and I think I didn't explain about Edapta
and our philosophy well enough.
One of the _worst_ mistakes that anyone can make with adaptive
(or as we like to say "edaptive") user interfaces is _letting the
user design the interface_. That is very wrong. That is broken.
That is why a number of "personalization" ventures fail -- users are
not UI designers and should not be expected to design _their own_
user interfaces. Allowing for personalization does not abrogate
the responsibility of the _user interface designer_ to provide
workable user experiences to the user.
At Edapta, we accomplish this by embracing, not discarding, the
idea of "good design" as expressed by a number of graphic artists,
information architects, and user interface designers. Our vision
is one in which we start with the core content and then envision
a number of different ways in which the user can receive that
information -- each one going through its own parallel design
process.
We want to automate as much of the -assembly- as possible -- and
we have identified specific "components" which can be used to
build up solid UIs. Our core team includes not only programmers
but also designers, UI experts, and more -- a multidisciplined
approach is vital to doing this right! It's sorta scary -- in a
way it's like trying to assemble a puzzle in mid-air by juggling
all the pieces and then letting it fall down in place, but I am
excited because I know what the picture on the box of the puzzle
looks like, and I think it's worth doing. :)
If anyone is interested in further info I'll try to keep you
up to date on what progress Edapta is making with the various
pieces of the puzzle -- as best I can, of course, because
naturally we are a for-profit venture and we want to be the
first company with a unified solution to adaptive user
experiences. So have to respect our patents and intellectual
property, but I think it would be okay to share with some of
you the "open concepts" which are behind what we're developing,
and besides, I can always talk about XSLT.
I think XSLT is really cool. Have I mentioned that yet in
this letter?
--Kynn
--
Kynn Bartlett mailto:kynn(at)hwg.org
Board Member, HTML Writers Guild http://www.hwg.org/
AWARE Center Director http://www.awarecenter.org/
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