Author: Omar Al Faleh

The first time I heard of system design was during the supply chain problem during and after covid. I was talking to a CTO in a shipping logistics company, and he told me that the main issue in the supply chain problem was due to the finite number of containers that go back and forth…

Participatory design is a very popular topic if we are to conduct a quick google search, with articles and entries about it that range from UX design to architectural design, to a global view on the role of design in the world as laid out in the article Can Participatory Design Save the World, which…

The differentiation between practice-led research and practice-based research, as defined by Candy & Edmond, is interesting to explore from the perspective of someone who is involved in design research and HCI such as myself. They base their differentiation on the artefact: is the artefact the basis (or goal?) of the research? if yes then we…

Bourdieu’s practice theory assumes a system of dispositions that conditions how practitioners perceive, think, or act. He refers to social practices as “regulated improvisations”: Actions can never be completely deterministic due to the unfolding contingencies of the situation at hand […] Nor can actions be completely random as they are predisposed by sedimented structures and…

I have always used the term “embodied” interaction to talk about engaging with computer systems through bodily action. In that sense, anything from gaze tracking as input to full body motion tracking can be considered “embodied” interaction. Dourish says that embodiment in interactive computer systems is denoted by “being there in the world” to perform…

One interesting point in design studies, brought about in this week’s articles, the view of a designer as a craftsman: a maker of things, a skilled worker that skillfully generates artifacts to be used by others. The angle which drew my attention in this week’s readings is the idea of annotation of the design process:…

The idea of a design methodology has definitely been an item of debate, from Christopher Alexander’s very strong refusal to the concept of a methodology, preferring to keep a “mystical” aspect to how buildings are made, to Rittle’s claim that a method is there to stay, but that it takes time to find its place…

There’s a fascinating shift from the craftsman’s approach to object making into the recent methodological design process of our modern era. A craftsman’s design process is mainly based in trial and errors, and in acquired experience over time, but is also mainly centered around the process of making. John Chris Jone breaks down the account…