Making good GUIs is hard

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2021-06-05 21:00:03

After spending a lot of time building this blog, I decided to explore why I think it's hard to build good UIs. Also, I try not to sound discouraging.

I’ve been working on graphical user interfaces (GUIs) on the web, mobile, and desktop for over a decade now. Over time, one thing that really stood out to me is this notion that building UIs is somehow easy. I disagree.

But first, I'd like to separate the overall discipline of "building GUIs" from the tools and frameworks used to build them. While the tools can make the building process enjoyable, I don't want to discuss them in this post. Instead, I want to focus on what the core of building UIs is.

The thing is, the more I work on and with GUIs, the more I’m convinced that the opposite is true — GUIs are inherently hard to build. Let me explain why.

GUIs are graphical user interfaces. They’re the primary point of contact with an actual person. And the thing about people is that they’re way more complicated than computers.