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Ask HN: How to learn UI/UX as a data/BE engineer?

39 points thenaturalist | 1 comments | 21 Oct 24 15:22 UTC | HN request time: 0.302s | source

Hi HN,

coming from a data/ BE background I feel extremely familiar with reasoning about systems and performance from the cloud-infra to the pipeline stack level. Or I'm super familiar with data visualization.

I feel like falling off a cliff when trying to extrapolate that knowledge to the more customer-facing world.

Despite having some tool ideas in the past, I realized I shy away from going towards the front end because I really lack any conecptual frame of how to think about and subsequently implement UI or UX.

I don't mean that in a nitty-gritty-designer focussed way but more like first-principle understanding:

What makes a good color scheme?

What makes a great wording and why?

What's a good form of presenting information?

I feel like I can recognize good UI/UX when I see it (as is often the case with HN company LPs), but I'd totally fail at distilling check boxes that such good examples tick.

Any pointers to how I can learn about these worlds and develop an understanding of what principles UI/UX should follow?

1. mattkevan ◴[21 Oct 24 21:58 UTC] No.41908949[source]▶
UX and UI are quite different, and are different again to visual design.

UX is about understanding who your users are and what the problems they’re trying to solve are, then organising flows, content and layouts to help them achieve it.

I’d recommend reading Lean UX by Jeff Gothelf as it’s a good introduction to a flexible, user-centred approach to product design.

I’ve heard good things about the Google UX course on Coursera if you want to go into more detail. Interaction Design Foundation and Baymard Institute have a lot of great information.