Great Design: the ultimate GTD.

Joel Spolsky is at it again. Every so often, Joel decides the programming community needs a collective kick in the assumptions and we get, like today, something that will benefit just about everybody.

Six long years after writing a great user interface book, Joel has started a series of major posts at Joel on Software on design writ large. Think is is mundane stuff of interest to programmers with too much time on their hands? Think again. We live in a designed world, from the cell phones we can't figure out to health care systems that kill at least 50,000 people a year accidentally.

Design is the ultimate Getting Things Done hack. And good design, be it software, a micro-ISV or a traditional business (or a cell phone, a gadget or a country's health care system) is hard.

You see? There are two requirements: lots of features and few features. Ah! And that is where the zen-like mystery of design comes in.

Joel's first draft of the first installment is up - I'm eagerly looking forward to the next installment!

Technorati Tags: Joel Spolsky, micro-ISV, GTD