GUI Designer

Definition

Graphical User Interface (GUI) Designer
(a.k.a., User Interface Designer and Visual Designer)

the role that is played when a person designs Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs)

Classification

As illustrated in the preceding figure, GUI Designer is part of the following inheritance hierarchy:

• Type: Concrete
• Superclass: Designer
• Subclasses:
  • None

Responsibilities

The typical role-specific responsibilities of a GUI Designer are to:

• Determine when, where, and how to use:
  • Audio files (e.g., sounds when certain buttons are pressed, music, voice recordings).
  • Graphics (e.g., static and animated GIF and JPEG files). Determine whether and how graphics should be partitioned to properly fit into any tables that are used for placement.
  • Textual information.
  • Videos (e.g., film clips, Shockwave animations).
• Request the required new content from the content creators (i.e., the audio, graphic, and video artists as well as the content authors).
• Design GUIs that:
  • Fulfill their associated requirements (e.g., operational requirements, browser interoperability requirements, usability requirements).
  • Conform to the system and software architectures.
  • Are appropriate for their target user profiles and user organizations.
  • Look good and are highly engaging with professional page layout and design.
  • Enable the user to efficiently perform user tasks by optimizing:
    • Navigation.
    • Information and widget layout.
    • Widget selection (e.g., choosing existing widgets to reuse or initiate in-house development of custom widgets).
  • Are highly user-friendly, intuitive, and easy to both learn and use.
  • Effectively build, communicate, and reinforce the customer’s digital brand.
• Document the graphical user interfaces.

GUI Designer typically inherits the general role responsibilities from the Role method component.

Expertise

To fulfill these responsibilities, GUI designers typically should have the following expertise, training, and knowledge:

• Understanding of the application’s functional and usability requirements.
• Capable of quickly producing storyboards and wireframe prototypes
• Design skills:
  • Graphic (visual) design
  • User Centered Design (UCD)
  • Typography
  • Human factors
• Proficiency in the use of interactive user interface prototyping tools:
  • Digital photography tools (e.g., PhotoShop, Illustrator, FreeHand, and DeBabelizer)
  • Multimedia tools (e.g., Director and Flash)
  • HTML editors and debuggers
• Technology skills:
  • GUI design patterns
  • GUI modeling techniques
  • Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), Dynamic HTML (DHTML), and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
  • Extensible Markup Language (XML)
  • Java, C++, and Perl
  • CGI Scripts, JavaScript, and VBScript
  • Active Server Pages (ASP) and JSP
• A bachelor’s degree in graphic design, industrial design, product design, graphic arts, visual communications, human factors, or human-computer interactions.

Tasks

GUI designers typically perform the following role-specific tasks in an iterative, incremental, parallel, and time-boxed manner:

• Website Design and Webpage Design:
  • Design Reuse
  • Design Production
  • Design Documentation

GUI designers typically inherit common role tasks from the role method component.

Teams

GUI designers typically perform these tasks as members of the following teams:

• Requirements Team
• User Interface Team
• Architecture Inspection Team

Work Products

As members of these teams, GUI designers typically produce the following work products:

• Navigation Diagrams (i.e., storyboards and site maps).
• Human Interface Design Document
• Human Interface Prototype (paper wireframe)

Guidelines

• This role is typically required if there will be significant user interfaces.
• The roles of GUI designer and information architect are often played by the same person because the design of the GUI is strongly influenced by the architecture of the information (especially the content of informational websites).
• Although most GUI designers concentrate on graphical user interfaces, they may also be called on to create textual interfaces and voice interfaces.
• This role typically inherits the common team guidelines from the roles method component.