These things I believe. « Not The User’s Fault

These things I believe about software development and user-interface design.

1. Why write code?

Software is for humans, not for computers.

Software is only as good as the improvement it makes to a human being’s life.

Are we making someone’s job easier? Letting them have more fun? Helping them learn? Helping them keep in touch with friends and family?

Are we making the world a better place?

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2. What do people want?

Most people do not want a computer.

They don’t even want software.

For us software developers, this is a painful truth.

If people don’t want a computer, why do they use one?

• Email — for writing to other people.
• Instant messaging — for talking to other people.
• The web browser — for reading what other people have written.
• Word processing — for writing something you’re going to print out and show to oth ...