Author: Amanda Yu

Impact of iPhone and iPods

The arrival of the iPod and later the iPhone fundamentally shifted the nature of our relationship to technology by making digital devices deeply personal, emotionally meaningful and always present. Before these products,...

field trips

CHM Field Trip

The visit to the Computer History Museum was actually surprisingly fun to me. I thought it would be mainly about the previous generations of computer engines and early calculators, but I discovered a bunch of very interesting...

xerox star

The Lead of a Star

The Xerox Star, released in 1981, changed the direction of computing by introducing ideas that made computers more personal, visual, and easy to use. Before the Star, computers were mainly used by programmers, but the star...

mid-century innovations

“Mother of All Demos”

The 1968 "Mother of All Demos" by Douglas Engelbart and his team at the Stanford Research Institute (SRI) was so important because it fundamentally transformed how people thought about computers and their purpose. Before this...

fitts law

Blending Gestalt Principles and Fitts’s Law in Design

Reading and learning about Gestalt Principles and the Fitts's Law allow me to view, design and think about an interactive piece in different perspectives; I’ll be thinking more about both how users see and how they move....

manifestos

When Art Becomes Interface: How 20th-Century Art Moves Through Modern UI/UX

The 20th century completely changed up the way people view and thought about art. As an illustrator, the shift from traditional, realistic classic painting to expressive work that focus on emotions and movements was dramatic. As...

lovelace & gilbreth

Imagination shapes future: Ada Lovelace and Lillian Gilbreth

Ada Lovelace and Lillian Gilbreth both served as pioneers in shaping the fields of human- centred design and computer programming; although they lived in different centuries and worked on various focus, they both made remarkable...