Recipes for Innovation

User Interface December 17, 2007

When it comes to computing, our goals are always to complete some task. We have some idea of how to do it, but we need help. That's why we've developed so many new tools to help us accomplish our tasks better, faster and more efficiently.

But which is the real innovation? How we accomplish our goals? Or our goals themselves?

As I've said before, people don't want something new. They want something they've seen before, just different. I think that same rule applies to interface design for applications. In this case, we know what our goal is and we know how to accomplish it. We just want interfaces to help us accomplish the task better.

Let's talk about recipes.

All recipes are simply a combination of ingredients paired with a series of directions to produce something. These ingredients are nothing new or special - they're things we've seen before. You're not going to find many recipes that call for a specific type of newly-discovered sugar found only in the jungles of Madagascar. No, most everything that requires sugar will call for any old regular sugar. Now, the innovation in these recipes is not only in what ingredients they contain, but the step-by-step instructions that lead to the end product. It's all about HOW you use these ingredients that makes something cool.

Applying This To Interfaces: A Recipe for Success

Your ingredients are your interface elements and standard design practices. These are all handed to you before you create your product. You have this great functionality/food you want everyone to know about and you have to let them know by using a recipe. Combine all the visual, textual and interface elements you need and write out the step-by-step instructions on how to use your product, given these ingredients.

Your innovation comes in which elements you use and how you use them together. Maybe most applications call for simply flour and sugar. Maybe yours adds a little vanilla extract. Don't overcomplicate your recipe though - people don't want to take time to run out to the store for ingredients they don't have and they certainly won't want your recipe if it calls for things that are confusing. Pick something simple that everyone already knows and go with a twist. Then you can spice things up from there.

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