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Magic Ink - Information Software and the Graphical Interface ★
Bret Victor
A 30,000-word essay that splits software into "information" and "manipulation" and shows that most products treating themselves as the second should be designed as the first.
- Most software is information software — the user is trying to learn something, not do something.
- If the user can answer her question without input, that's the right design.
I send this to anyone about to add another modal. Victor's framing — that schedules, dashboards, ticketing, transit apps, and anything else dominated by "show me what I need to know" should be designed as information graphics, not GUIs — has changed how I brief almost every screen for the last few years.
The BART and book-browser case studies still land. Read it slowly, twice.