My six-year-old presented this picture to me of a treasure map. She had created a linear map of our house, the neighbor’s house, their basement door, the playroom door, and the treasure box. Her unique concept from a child’s perspective of a time-line based map made me pause and think of my approach to standard features, such as navigation. Are there unique ways that could provide a better layout in our designs? My daughter had a long roll of paper, rather than an 8×11” piece of paper, that might have inspired or influenced her map. Do system constraints or old business processes determine our designs and can we see pass them to provide a better user experience?

posted by Emmy Southworth on Saturday, Sep 01, 2007