It is an undoubted truth that Ada Lovelace and Lillian Gilbreth both had an important impact on interaction design history. However, they contributed to different fields and levels of understanding interaction design.
Ada Lovelace was a mathematician and writer, known for her contributions to the Analytical Engine. She is an important figure in the history of computers. Even though the Analytical Engine was never built, her advanced understanding and interpretation of this engine led to the development of computer science. She first recognized the potential of this engine beyond doing math but ‘can do whatever we know how to order it to perform.’ This term overlapped with the concept of interaction design. In my understanding, interaction design, broadly defined, is a discipline that explores the ways in which people and artifacts interact with each other. As early as in the 1800s Ada made such advanced conjectures in her interpretation and extended notes of Luigi Menabrea’s article about the Analytical Engine. Thanks to Ada, now we can make engines do more than what we know how to do by creating innovations in interaction design. After all, interaction design is basically based on computers. But without Ada Lovelace, there would be no computers, computer science, and the following technologies. This is what I believe the most important and initial connection between Ada Lovelace and interaction design history.
While Ada Lovelace contributed more to the development of technology and hardware, Lillian Gilbreth made advances in the humanities for the history of interaction design and even more so for the history of design. Lilian is more considered an engineer and psychologist. She and her husband spent their life improving efficiency and productivity in the areas of motion study and human factors. These concepts have greatly influenced design thinking nowadays. In interaction design, we take human-centered design as one of the primary principles. The origin of this idea might have come from The Gilbreths. They used motion-picture to do the Time and Motion Studies, which developed into a theory of designing workspaces and tools to accommodate the physical capabilities and limitations of people. I believe this also impacted some design technologies such as Desktop Metaphor and Graphical User Interface.
Ada Lovelace and Lillian Gilbreth’s contributions to computer science, industrial and human factors engineering have had a lasting impact on various industries including interaction design. Without them, interaction design would not have been developed to such a level. They not only inspired me as a pioneer in the design world but also as powerful women who made a difference in the world.
