[Sigia-l] Designers and Developers

[Listera]

Russ Unger:

> To this day, I know a multitude of designers who, by their own rights, are
> very, very good at their craft, but beyond utilzing an external tool to help
> them build out a web design, they can't work a line of HTML code (keyword:
> code).  

First of all, it's important to realize that HTML is not "code." It's
declarative markup language, not meant to be executable code. It's far
easier to pick up than a programming language, for obvious reasons. I'll say
it again, today, it would be quite difficult to get a job as a web designer
without knowing HTML, at a minimum.
 
> To say that a designer would never have to write code would be, to me,
> fairly ridiculous.

There's absolutely no reason whatsoever for Designers to write deployment
*code* (not markup) when Developers are available to do it.

>  A designer absolutely NEEDS to know enough about the
> tools that their designs are being deployed with to be dangerous.

I don't quite understand what you are saying here. I'm the one who's been
advocating that Designers fully understand the technical ramifications of
their design choices. There's a difference between knowing how something
works and actually doing it for *deployment*.

> Viewing a demo, reading a document simply is not enough to be able to grasp
> capabilities that are in play, and without some degree of knowledge as to how
> these things work, how could an IA, a designer, ever hope to direct someone
> else in what the best methods for performing an action are?

This is beginning to sound like a Bob&Ray routine. This is what I've been
advocating here for years, as you can check in the archives.

> A developer shouldn't be forced to pick colors out of the air,

He "shouldn't be forced to pick colors," period.

> but they should understand what the colors are in use in an application

Or they can just observe the prototype.

> and what underlying meaning those may have

Why should a developer even be dealing with "underlying meaning" of colors
in an app? 

> --something that should be provided to them by a designer, but should also be
> somewhat "understood" that you don't just arbitrarily create new colors.

Why? Why should a developer in Bangalore "understand" or care if #000033 is
velvet blue or plain blue, or popular in Southern California? Why is he
being asked to "create new colors"?
 
> From the developer to designer side, I'll admit it's a bit of a weaker
> argument, 

There's no argument at all for developers dealing with these issues *when*
there are designers to take care of them.

> but to think that each group is going to placed in silos would
> seem to me to only create a greater gap in communications and
> understanding.  

There's no justifiable reason to communicate design-oriented stuff to
developers, as your examples reveal. Competent designers with a prototype is
by far the best antidote mitigating ambiguity and risk.

> If nothing else, I would say that my technical knowledge and abilities have
> helped me gain notice during the interview &/or sales process.

As it should, providing further evidence that what I'm advocating works.
 
> The reality of the situation is that there are very, very few positions
> in the technology sector that are very focused these days.  There's a
> desire to have well-rounded, much like those gen ed courses in college
> were supposed to make us, developers, designers, etc.

I guess "1.  Designers have to know much more about the technical
ramifications of their design choices" in my original post  hasn't made
much of an impression on you.

> Because when work is done in a silo, communications channels break down,
> knowledge becomes proprietary and the end result is a dissatisfied
> client and potentially a fired vendor.  Certainly, not in every
> situation.

I'm still waiting for someone to explain why developers need to know a whole
range of design issues, from usability to color selection, *when* there are
competent designers to take care of them.

Ziya
Nullius in Verba