Privy

Recently, there was a debate held in my company about when to choose best design and when to go for an optimal design. The debate, according to me was a success, as people brought out great points for either option. One person supporting optimal design gave the classic example of the American pressure sensing pen vs Russian Pencil.

Now, I am a very opinionated person and unfortunately, I was only a part of the audience. I tried desparately to get the microphone during the audience round, to no avail. But, my blog is the best place for me to speak out my mind infront of anybody who cares to listen (read actually). Let me take one more example and then I will throw my opinion in this regard.

Somebody said iPhone has the best design and iPhone is a success. Now, this made me wonder, it is really true? Or, are people confusing the external appearance of the phone to its design? Now, one very important feature missing in iPhone is the very simple “cut”, “copy” and “paste” feature. It was missing so you would think, maybe they forgot. The original iPhone did not have it, neither does iPhone 3G.

If iPhone really were a great design, it would have been very easy to extend it, to add features like the above. However, it turns out that the current design would require a major change to implement the above feature. So, iPhone is not a best design, but today it is definitely the best product.

So, my valuable opinion goes… There is no such thing as Optimal design, but only an optimal solution. It is either a Good design, Better design, Best design or bad design for that matter. One may never choose a bad design, but it might turn out to be one. We generally aim for an optimal solution and depending upon its comparative degree, we choose either a good design, better design or best design.

It might turn out that Google’s Android has a better design than an iPhone. But under the current circumstances iPhone has a more than an optimal solution. This might change, however, in the future. Both Google and Apple are great companies.