UI, UX: Profession interface designer. IT Industry Guide. Plus: Descriptions of design positions at Apple, Facebook, Google and other giants in the world of information technology. The main differences between UX and UI design

Design is a rather broad and vague term. When someone says, “I’m a designer,” it’s not immediately clear what they do on a day-to-day basis. Eat whole line various industries included in this concept.

Design related job responsibilities exist in various areas starting from industrial design (cars, furniture), printing (magazines and other publications), and ending with web design (websites, mobile applications). With the recent influx of high-tech companies focused on creating interfaces for screens, there has been a lot of new job. The position of a UX or UI designer may be incomprehensible not only to the uninitiated, but even to designers themselves who come from other industries.

“There is no one right answer to this question.”

Let's try to figure out what this actually means in the IT industry.

UX designer

UX designers are primarily concerned with how the product interacts with the user. There is no single correct answer to this question. UX designers explore different approaches to a solution specific problem user. The main job of a UX designer is to make sure that the product flows logically from one step to the next. One way a UX designer can find out is to conduct user tests in person and draw conclusions from their feelings. By identifying verbal and non-verbal stumbling blocks, it adjusts and iterates, thereby creating a “better” experience for the user. An example would be creating an amazing onboarding experience for a new user.

“Define interaction models, user task flow, and interface specifics. Develop scenarios, end-to-end interactions, interaction models, development GUI user. Working with our Creative Director and Graphic Designer to merge Twitter's visual side with its functional features. Develop and maintain wireframes, mockups and specifications as required.”

Example of an application screen designed by a UX designer
Source: Kitchenware Pro Kit Wireframe by Neway Lau on Dribbble.

Task: Screen wireframes, storyboards, site plan

Tools: Photoshop, Sketch, Illustrator, Fireworks, InVision

You most likely heard him say: “ The user should see the “Thank you” page after registration is completed.

UI designer

Unlike UX designers, who are concerned with the overall experience of a product, designers user interface what matters is what does the product look like. They are responsible for designing every screen or page that the user interacts with and providing the visual portion of the user interface that the UX designer designed. For example, a UI designer, creating an analytical panel, can bring to the top more important information, or decides whether a slider or control panel is the most intuitive to add to a chart. The UI designer is also usually responsible for creating complete guide design, which ensures a coherent design language that spans the entire product. Maintaining Consistency visual elements and determining which direction to work in. For example, how to display errors or warnings is within the scope of a UI designer.

"Conception and implementation visual language Airbnb.com. Creation of an extended style guide."

The boundaries between UI and UX designer are quite blurred, and very often companies choose to combine these roles.

UI designer determines general perception And appearance applications.
Source: Metro Style Interface 4 by Ionut Zamfir on Dribbble.

Tools: Photoshop, Sketch, Illustrator, Fireworks

“The ‘login’ and ‘register’ fields should be moved to the upper right corner.”

Graphic Designer

“Graphic designers pore over the little details that others don’t pay attention to.”

A graphic designer is someone who does graphics, which is what a non-designer would probably tell you if you asked them what a designer does. Graphic designers don't care about how screens refer to each other, nor how someone interacts with a product. Instead, their focus is on developing beautiful icons, controls and visual elements and creating a suitable design. Graphic designers are working on small parts, which others do not see, and often work in Photoshop at 4x and 8x magnification.

“Produce high quality visual projects from concept to execution, including desktop, web and mobile devices with different resolutions (icons, graphics, and marketing materials). Creating and iterating assets that reflect the brand, make the product beautiful and breathe life into it.”

UI designers also often have to do not only their own work, but also create pixel-perfect layout. Some companies choose not to have a dedicated person in the role of graphic designer.

A graphic designer designs, directs and adjusts every pixel to ensure the perfect end result.
Source: IOS 7 Guide Freebie PSD by Seevi kargwal on Dribbble.

Tools: Photoshop, Sketch

You've most likely heard him say:“Reduce kerning and move the button 1 pixel to the left!”

Motion designer

Remember the subtle movement when you drag the screen to refresh email on your iPhone? This is the job of a motion designer. Unlike graphic designers, who typically deal with static objects, motion designers create animations within the application. They deal with what the interface does after the user touches it. For example, they decide how the menu should slide, what effects to use for transitions, and how the button will be pressed. When done well, movement becomes an integral part of the interface, providing visual cues on how to use the product.

"It takes knowledge graphic design, motion design, digital art, sense of color and typography, general awareness of materials/textures and a working understanding of animation. Knowledge iOS firmware, OS X, Photoshop and Illustrator, as well as familiarity with Director (or equivalent), Quartz Composer (or equivalent), 3D computer modelling, motion graphics".

Tools: AfterEffects, Core Composer, Flash, Origami

You've most likely heard him say:“The menu should pop up on the left after 800ms.”

UX researcher

A UX researcher knows everything about user needs.

A UX researcher knows everything about user needs. The goal of the researcher is to answer two main questions: “Who are our users?” and “What do our users want?” As a rule, this involves user surveys, market research, and data analysis. Design is a process of constant iteration. Researchers can help in this process by conducting A/B tests to find out which design option best meets user needs. UX researchers are usually the main support large companies, where is access to a large number data reveals to them ample opportunities for statistically significant findings.

“Work closely with development teams to identify research topics. Research design related to both user actions and user perceptions. Conducting research using and applying a variety of methods such as surveys.”

The time to reach the goal is a function of the distance to the goal and its size. In 1954, psychologist Paul Fitts, studying the human motor system, showed that the time required to hit a target depends on the distance to the target, and is also inversely related to the size of the target. According to this law, fast movements and small targets lead to more errors. Fitts' Law is widely used in UI and UX. For example, according to this law, interactive buttons should be made large, because small buttons are more difficult to click and take longer.

Hick's law

Decision time increases with the number and complexity of choices. The greater the number of stimuli, the longer it will take the user to choose which one to interact with. If users are bombarded with choices, they will have to take time to interpret and decide what they don't want to do.

Jacob's law

Users spend large quantity time on other sites. This means that users prefer your site to work the same as sites they already know. Jacob's Law was coined by Jakob Nielsen, co-founder of the Nielsen Norman Group, who has made huge contributions to UX, such as inventing the heuristic evaluation method.

Law of Pregnancy

People will perceive and interpret ambiguous or complex images in the simplest form because this interpretation requires the least amount of cognitive effort on our part. This law was discovered in 1910 by psychologist Max Wertheimer when he saw lights near a railroad crossing. It was like turning the lights around the stage on and off. To the observer, it appears to be the same light that moves from light bulb to light bulb, when in fact it is just a series of light bulbs that turn on and off in turn.

Law of Proximity

Objects close to each other are perceived in a group. This law is also one of the main ones in Gestalt psychology and was discovered by Wertheimer. He noticed that a rapid series of events creates the illusion of movement. For example, films are fast moving frames that are perceived as a continuous visual experience.

Miller's Law

On average, a person can retain 7 ± 2 elements in his memory. working memory. In 1956, George Miller argued that the range of immediate memory and absolute judgment was limited to about 7 pieces of information. The basic unit of information is the bit, the amount of data required to choose between two equally likely alternatives. That is, 4 bits of information is a decision between 16 paired alternatives (4 consecutive binary solutions). The point at which confusion causes poor judgment is throughput channel.

Parkinson's Law

Any task takes up all the time allotted for it. According to this law, restrictions in time, space or budget lead to increased productivity and efficiency.

Serial arrangement effect

Users remember best the first and last objects in a series. Manipulating serial placement to create a better user experience is used in many popular designs from successful companies like Apple, Electronic Arts and Nike.

Tesler's Law

Tesler's Law, or the law of conservation of complexity, states that for any system there is a certain amount of complexity that cannot be reduced. In the mid-1980s, Larry Tesler realized that how users interact with applications is as important as the applications themselves. He says that in many cases an engineer should spend an extra week simplifying an application rather than forcing millions of users to spend an extra minute using complex program. However, Bruce Tognazzini argues that people resist simplifying their lives. Therefore, if the application is simple, users begin to strive for more complex tasks.

Von Restorff effect

The Von Restorff effect, or isolation effect, predicts that when there is large number similar objects, the one that is different from the rest is most likely to be remembered. This effect was discovered in 1933 by German psychiatrist and pediatrician Hedwig von Restorff, who found that when study participants were shown a list of similar objects, among which one was different, that object was remembered better.

Introducing new article series. In this part of the series, we will consider the position of a UX/UI designer - a specialist responsible for matching the appearance and logic of a product.

UX/UI designer- a specialist who designs user interfaces.

Typical work day includes:

• work on priority tasks (design, drawing);
• communication with the customer;
• making edits.

Advantages and disadvantages

The profession attracts designers with the opportunity to make the world a better place, as well as with its promise and demand in the market:

“I like to think that you are able to solve a problem for a large audience, or at least make the process of perceiving content more enjoyable and interesting. It’s interesting to poke around people and try to understand what they really need, and then figure out how to implement it.”

“The area is very interesting because right decisions designers can significantly simplify and improve the quality of life of the group of people for whom a certain product or project is being developed. You can also learn a lot about different types of businesses in the world, which can be useful for starting your own business and taking a more global view of the world.”

“Personally, I'm annoyed by stupid apps, awkward button placements in elevators, ill-designed car interiors - I like to do something that can improve this. This world is so imperfect (not nature - everything is perfect and balanced there) that there is always work for a smart designer.”

“I studied to be a system administrator programmer, but it was always interesting to do something in Photoshop. Previously, there weren’t as many tutorials, video lessons and articles as there are now, so I learned most of the functions and features at random. Later I decided to try Illustrator, it was much better more difficult than Photoshop, but great for creating a vector. I like to create something new, something useful and beautiful, I like to improve and see the result achieved. The design field allows you to do all this. It’s also interesting how trends change, new programs and features appear, you always need to follow all this and constantly develop.”

“I like UX/UI design because it is a very promising direction. Technologies are developing very quickly, some interfaces are being replaced by new ones, and all of them need to be designed. Here you can not only think about whether the interface looks beautiful, but also about how convenient it is and how much it can solve a person’s problem (either quickly find the right cafe, or book a ticket to a concert, or help prepare your favorite dish) . Interfaces are everywhere: from medical equipment to cars. When cars fly, it will be necessary for someone to think through the interaction of their interface with a person. And it will be us - UX/UI designers."

Another plus is the ability to work remotely (20% of all designers), big choice freelance projects.

Among the minuses Designers call their profession communication with customers who don’t know what they want, as well as being underestimated by IT colleagues:

“In 80-90% of cases, you have to work without technical specifications with requirements like: “Make it mega-beautiful and mega-configurable.”

“I consider the attitude towards design and designers in Ukraine to be a disadvantage of the profession. For some reason, everyone thinks that if they once opened Photoshop, then they can automatically be designers and independently decide how much time will be spent on the design. Inexperienced managers and programmers are especially guilty of this (one newbie manager claimed that he could complete the task in 30 minutes in Paint, but he doesn’t have time for creativity).”

“The disadvantages are the lack of any serious training and lack of understanding of competent processes and methodologies in the market. In outsourcing, it is impossible to track the results and increase your own best practices. The product is somewhat monotonous for mature people and complete chaos for startups.”

“The downsides - as in all IT - are sedentary work, painful eyes and sometimes a customer who needs to make the white #ffffff even whiter :)”

How to become and where to move next

The first and main skill in UI is to master graphics editor. The most popular toolkit - Adobe Photoshop, Sketch, Principle, Adobe Illustrator,After Effects. To begin with, you can try redrawing screenshots of any mobile application or website. But don’t just copy (although you need to be able to do that too), but notice some inconvenience and offer a solution on how to do it better.

It is also important to understand color theory, typography, composition, website ergonomics (principles of interface usability), as well as the basics of marketing, business analysis, and psychology. For more effective communication with developers, layout skills (HTML/CSS) and basic JavaScript knowledge and frameworks.

You can start studying UX by becoming familiar with the methodology by reading books by Nielsen Norman, Alan Cooper, Jeff Raskin, Steve Krug, Alistair Coburn. More applied literature - “The User Experience Team of One: A Research and Design Survival Guide" Leah Buley.

"IN modern world There are many possibilities for implementation. I have purchased and continue to purchase online courses on platforms such as Coursera, Udemy, Edx. I watch online conferences from Adobe, Google, read technical literature, analyze work on Dribbble, Behance, Awwwards.”

“A UX/UI designer needs to study the classics of the user interface: “Don’t Make Me Think” by Steve Krug, “The Design of Common Things” by Norman, read Luke Wroblewski. You need to constantly practice, put yourself in the user’s shoes. Find a mentor who will point out mistakes, give advice and encourage growth.”

You can start your career by freelancing on various English-language platforms; it will also be useful to test your skills at championships, for example, Dev Challenge. This will help you build your portfolio.

UX and UI skills and competencies ()

Personal qualities that are important are:

• perseverance;
• perseverance;
• creative thinking;
• perfectionism;
• desire to learn and develop;
• ability to hear criticism.

“The person who designs interfaces is an engineer, he must have strong analytical thinking, highly developed empathy skills and the ability to penetrate into the essence of things. Of course, there are also practical skills - this is possession various technologies and tools, but this, as a rule, comes in second place; a person must be an engineer by nature. And it’s not difficult to become one if you work hard at it, read books and articles on design (composition, color science, typography) and psychology (you need to understand how a person makes choices and how his brain works), go to lectures and workshops and a lot to practice".

Possible career paths UX/UI designer:

• improve as a designer, increase your rate (if you are a freelancer);
• master related areas, developing as a product designer, VR designer, VFX designer, Game designer;
• grow to the position of Art Director (Head of Design);
• develop as if you want to switch from design to product management in general;
• become if you are interested in coordinating people;
• do if you are more interested in the technical aspect;
• master programming and become a UI developer;
• try yourself in marketing or .

“Technology is developing very quickly and something new appears all the time, everything requires its own specific design, has its own requirements and features. And we, designers, will help it all become better, more beautiful and more convenient :)"

I thank Yulia Bondarenko, Maxim Palivoda, Marina Popovichenko and 25 other Ukrainian designers who told DOU about their position for their help in writing the article. The quotes given in the article are taken from their stories.

| 18.08.2015

Many designers (including newbies) use the phrase “UI/UX design” in their resumes. This combination of the terms UI and UX is not entirely correct. Why this is so, read below.

What is UI

Translated from English, UI (user interface) is a user interface. Using such an interface, the user can interact, i.e., conduct a dialogue with devices, machines, and programs. A good example user interface is mobile phone with display and keys for various functions, dashboard car with control buttons, etc.

UI is what the user sees and interacts with on the screen. When designing a high-quality UI, attention is paid not only to the appearance of the interface, but also to its logical structure so that the user can without extra effort, quickly and easily interact with it and achieve required result. In the computer field, a UI developer is faced with the task of creating an interface that provides simple, understandable and convenient user interaction with a product (program, website, etc.).

But in order to clearly understand how to create a high-quality user interface for a specific product, it is necessary to study the behavior, emotions and reactions of users when interacting with this product, conduct testing, and collect data. A person, interacting with any system, experiences sensations and reacts in a certain way during its use. This is called user experience, or UX.

What is UX

The sensations and reactions that a user experiences when interacting with a product (in our case this is computer programs, sites, applications, etc.) are called interaction experience (UX, user experience). UX is what the user feels and remembers as a result of using a program, application or website. UX is taken into account when developing UI, creating information architecture, usability testing. Having determined the target audience and the characteristics of the main user, you can create a list of requirements for the project.

The first step is to find out what expectations and desires potential users and the customer of the product (program, website, etc.) have. In the second step, we determine functionality, available to users. Next step- website (or other product) design, structure and navigation development, intuitive understandable to users, as well as a thoughtful layout of all user interface elements. Last step- appearance, design of the product, which will be convenient and pleasant to use.

conclusions

As you can see, UI is part of UX. The goal of both is to improve, simplify, make it more convenient. But, although these terms are closely related, they are by no means synonymous. You can have a great UI but terrible UX, and vice versa. Designers mainly deal with UI. The UX industry is studied by other specialists - designers, analysts, marketers. To achieve maximum results, you need professional work specialists from both fields.

The term “design” can seem deceptively simple. At the same time, it is quite vague, and if you ask different people explain to you this concept, their answers will be very different.

For example, when someone says, “Oh, I work as a designer,” most people may not understand what they mean. And all because behind this, it would seem, in a simple word lies great amount meanings.

Today the market is experiencing growth in the sector technical enterprises, which tend to focus on producing a variety of screen interfaces, which in turn leads to new design features.

A profession such as a UX designer may seem strange and even a little complicated at first glance, for those who have not encountered it before - moreover, some experienced developers do not understand what is meant by it and may wonder: Who are UX designers and what do they do? Do they even work?

However, the UX industry is growing rapidly now. Just look at how much the number of UX (or “User Experience”) specialists has grown.

Not all of them are new experts, if only because the job market in the field ranges from complete beginners to people who have always been UX specialists but never knew it.

The above circumstances can create certain problems, for example, not everyone who calls themselves a UX designer is actually a UX specialist. Because this is a special kind of profession that cannot be clearly defined, as if we were talking about dentists or nurses, moreover, in UX it is quite difficult to distinguish good specialist from bad.

Who is a UX designer?

The work of a UX designer, as a rule, is related to the perception of a product or service, so design problems in in this case are not always obvious.

They are subjective and may have more than one solution. Essentially, it is the UX designer's responsibility to ensure that each step of the product design process flows from the previous one.

The above can be achieved through the use of face-to-face user testing, in order to evaluate the actions taken. If users can complete both verbal and nonverbal tests, then the conditions for effective UX have been created. For example, creating a convenient onboarding experience for new users would be a good solution.

What does a UX designer do?

A good UX specialist can combine all aspects of a great user experience into one product.

This can only be done if you are convinced that the above aspects work well together and not separately. The professional we are considering bears full responsibility for future results and in particular for the ux itself.

But still, this is only the beginning of a career for a qualified UX specialist, because in the future they can be used various methods that allow you to do this job well.

To be a truly good UX designer, you will need excellent communication skills, passion, a love of innovation, a flair for creativity, and the initiative to know when to experiment and when to stick with it established framework. However, all UX professionals should start at the lower levels of their career if they want to be marketable in the future.

In order to become a successful UX designer, you must be able not only to describe, but also to competently use communication mechanisms, algorithms for performing tasks, and requirements for interfaces.

You must be able to explain to investors the user experience from start to finish, as well as the features and context involved. With the support of a strong team, a UX designer can transform the characteristics of any well-known platform, such as Facebook, into a valuable and accessible toolkit.

Wireframes and sketches are just a small part of the work

Wireframes and visual plans are the result of the extensive preparation that goes into creating a product. It is really important to present the preparation process in a visual form, such as PowerPoint presentations, For further use similar materials by designers and programmers.

It is quite easy to obtain data on product prototypes during usability tests, or even create screencasts. These tools can be just as important as wireframes.

UX designers can also be recognized by the way they focus on a carefully crafted plan to improve a product's design to make it more effective.

However, there is no proven method for choosing a good UX specialist because their responsibilities may vary. The latter have a very large spread, and cover interaction with individuals, legal entities, as well as with new technical developments.

Conducting user testing

There's a lot more to UX design than just sitting down with your customers at your online platform or app, periodically asking them for their opinion on a feature.

In fact, the assessment process should include observation of the client's ability to carry out the activities that have been designed for them. This way they can give you their unedited answer about their own user experience.

For this type of assessment, the number of client assessments, individual assessments, and the selection of test participants largely depends on how much money you are willing to invest in conducting it at the early stages product creation.

Luckily, customer-centric testing is actually as reliable and simple as observing how users interact with your product online.

Defining and Creating Personas

The term "person" is used to refer to fictional character, which represents one of the categories of users for whom you are developing the product. This type of personality assessment can be the subject of careful research, if of course it is appropriate.

Although it may seem very tempting to do this - to completely invent a character, however, if your “persona” is not based on statistical data about your real users, then, unfortunately, it will be useless. Creating a character will also have no meaning if it has nothing to do with your business.

The best way to create a character is to use various types research, e.g. user tests, surveys, questionnaires, focus groups, as well as other methods.

When You Can't Call Yourself a UX Designer

You can't become a truly skilled UX designer unless you learn how to interact with the people who are supposed to help you shape your strategies.

The name of this profession includes the phrase “ user experience", but if the user doesn't exist, then your activity has no value whatsoever. If you're creating a design based on little more than interesting idea, but do not take into account data about the actual needs of users, then you are definitely not a UX designer.

The same can be said for those UX specialists who cannot define their target audience. If you think that your online platform perfect for anyone and everyone, you are not only making your job impossible, you are also neglecting the true principles of web design - there should always be a target audience.

Another disadvantage is trying to solve the problem immediately, rather than making sure it actually exists and then finding the cause.

If your boss asks you to design an online platform, and you don’t even ask why it needs to be done, then you are most likely an ordinary (and not necessarily talented) web designer, and not a UX specialist.

Make decisions based only on personal experience, also a bad idea. If your boss asks, “Why did you decide to use label fields instead of another alternative option feedback in your last survey?”, you should answer something better than simply: “I chose them because I like them.” This definitely doesn't work in UX design.

If you want to become a successful and qualified UX designer, it is very important to use all design tools - from interviewing clients, ending with usability tests, creating personas, contextual assessments, conceptual models, sitemaps, product prototypes, wireframes, A/B assessments and much more.

For qualified UX designers, it is necessary not only to understand the specifics of their target audience, but also have the ability to demonstrate this information to your team.

The product must always evolve

The first thing to accept is that your product will never actually be finished. Moreover, a product should not be considered only in terms of its intrinsic value, for the methods required to develop it are also important.

Many UX professionals may find it difficult to stay within strict boundaries or follow a plan, however, most companies stick to this path. However, the only thing that remains constant is change, and it will always be that way.

If you are trying to design a product, you must strive to improve the methods needed to produce it, as well as continually improve the end result.

In fact, it can be helpful for UX designers to periodically look back on their past projects (successes and failures) to figure out what they learned and how it can be applied to their future work.