When I saw Douglass Englebart’s prototype of the keyboard and mouse concept about 50 years ago, I realized why it was called “the mother of all demos”. Before that, designers did not present concepts in a visual, physical and interactive way. The concept of prototyping really opened a new door for later design, especially interaction design. In the demo, his step-by-step explanation of serial numbers, indexes and the following errands map are impressive.
The audience could see that Douglass himself will make some small mistakes, such as dealing with blank space and alignment, but he has also been trying to get better results. Similarly, as a people living today, I noticed that the steps in the demo were all unidirectional, which made me want to add a return key to Doug, or apply the “Ctrl + Z” key combination on the keyboard. All of these show how the prototype can help designers innovate and upgrade equipment and information. This is also an essential link for IBM to achieve continuous innovation success.
Today, the IT industry under the leadership of IBM is still in revolution, and it is developing at a rapid speed. Bluetooth mouse, laptop, touchable screen, and electronic pen, etc. One concept after another has become possible and popular, and these optimization designs must be inseparable from the original prototype that may have problems. The task for future interaction designers will be to continue to study user experience, explore new forms, prototype and innovate.
I agree with your idea! Thank you for sharing!
It’s so funny that you mention wishing he could “ctrl + z” because I also found it so painful how he’d have to delete entire blocks of text. Great summary!
An excellent summary of the importance of prototype innovation! Speaking of making mistakes, I personally think a good prototype should predict and help users avoid making mistakes or help them save their mistakes or the users would become frustrated.
I also thought it was pretty cool how Douglas and the research team he was in were able to created what I that was their version of the Memex.
sorry, I meant to say, “what I thought was…”