The Design of Design: Essays from a Computer Scientist
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Product Description
Building Sense of Design
Effective design is at the heart of everything from software development to engineering to architecture. But what do we really know about the design process? What leads to effective, elegant designs? The Design of Design addresses these questions.
These new essays by Fred Brooks contain extraordinary insights for designers in every discipline. Brooks pinpoints constants inherent in all design projects and uncovers processes and patterns likely to lead to excellence. Drawing on conversations with dozens of exceptional designers, as well as his own experiences in several design domains, Brooks observes that bold design decisions lead to better outcomes.
The leader tracks the evolution of the design process, treats collaborative and distributed design, and illuminates what makes a truly fantastic designer. He examines the nuts and bolts of design processes, including budget constraints of many kinds, aesthetics, design empiricism, and tools, and grounds this discussion in his own real-world examples—case studies ranging from home construction to IBM’s Operating System/360. Throughout, Brooks reveals keys to success that every designer, design project manager, and design researcher should know.
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When I first heard about Frederick Brooks new book, several questions came to mind. At the top of the list was, will it be a worthy successor to The Mythical Man-Month? The Mythical Man-Month is a fantastic and vital book. How does The Design of Design stack up?
Very well. It has the same readability of The Mythical Man-Month and takes Mr. Brooks insights and expands them beyond computer science to all aspects of design.
This leads to the second question, how accessible is it to people beyond the realm of computer science? Perhaps I’m not the best person to answer this since my background is as a computer scientist. Nonetheless, I judge it is a book that designers in many fields should read. In fact, I would like an opportunity to chat about The Design of Design with additional types of designers, such as fashion designers.
This high level look at the design process is valuable to any designer.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
In this book Brooks talk about the concept of design and the design process.
Although there is plenty literature on these theme Brooks feels there are several excellent reason to write another book on the theme.
The first reason that he mentions is that the design process has changed a lot since World War II and the new challenges have rarely been discussed. The new challenges that he mentions is that design is now a **team activity** rather than an individual one. Another challenge is that unlike designers of previous generations nowadays **designers cannot longer built with their own hands what they design**. As a replacement for designs are captured in computer models and erect by somebody else [p. xi]
The second reason why Brooks considers worthwhile writing a book on design is that “much mystery remains” on the theme and that this becomes “evident when we try to teach students how to design well” [p. xi] In this book Brooks uses his six decades of design experience to help expand the knowledge of how the design process works and how we teach it. In his book Brooks does not attempt to find or clarify “a science of design” in fact he considers such a goal both impossible and misleading. As a replacement for, the tone of the book is in the form of a few opinionated essays [p. xii]
I establish the first three sections of the book incredibly well thought out where I was not as impressed with the last three. But the first three sections make the book worthwhile.
In the first section Brooks’ starts by describing design and the design process. The he describes the “rational process of design” (aka the Waterfall process in software development,) what’s incorrect with it, and additional better design processes that are iterative and incremental. Although the Waterfall model felt out of fashion in software development I establish Brooks’ description of what’s incorrect with it and what a better design process needs reasonably insightful.
On the second section Brook’s tackles the question of team design (collaboration) and tele-collaboration, both topics rather timely.
On the third section Brooks’ talks about the need for explicit models in design which are especially vital when the design is done as a team effort. He also talks about the resources and how to go about scarce resources in the design process: “If a design, particularly a team design, is to have conceptual integrity, one should name the scare resource explicitly, track it publicly, control it firmly.” [p. 119]
I’ve posted a more comprehensive review on my blog: [...]
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5
Brook’s new book is a worthy successor to the classic Mythical Man-Month. It starts by discussion of the well known waterfall model of design and why this model remains seductive to this day. It then shows its flaws, pragmatic problems with design in the real world and alternative models. Many readers may be familiar with these issues (as I was ) but Brooks digs into a lot of history that you may not know about.
The next sections talk about design as a collaborative process , different perspectives for thinking about design, visions for crafty houses, the role of individual design talent (process can’t replace greatness!), and how fantastic designers can be nurtured. This part of the book is superb.
The last section is a series of case studies including buildings, a System/360 (naturally), computer architecture, and the design of a joint research facility. This is the one area where the book could have been improved and the reason I did not give it 5 stars. Understandably, Brooks draws on his own experience in alternative cases studies but I personally would have liked a bunch of cases studies of application software. I imagine most designers who read this book will be software developers and few will be involved in OS design or design of physical structures. Brooks would argue that there are universal thoughts that really make design transcend particular design domains, and in that sense the cases studies he provides are certainly useful. But, it is permanently simpler to learn form a case study that is close to what you really do yourself.
Overall, Brook’s writing style is brilliant, entertaining and painstakingly researched so you will not be disappointed.
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5