Hi Bob, thanks for the feedback. You are making an excellent point! “Taste” is another frequently used term that is difficult to define. Probably even more difficult than “intuition”…

First, I would like to agree with your point regarding taste in software design. The very moment a piece of software has a user interface (even a CLI), it is a cultural artefact and as such a design object. All design objects are subject to taste. So taste absolutely applies to software design.

The underlying problem that you are pointing at is the difference between professional taste and lay taste. The conflict between these two is probably one of the greatest problems we are dealing with in software design.

Modern understanding of software design is deeply rooted in the user centred design process, design thinking and and in co-creation methodologies. This is a good thing as it changed the pivot of software design from a technical perspective to a use case perspective. But in this context, designers are often understood as facilitators of the user’s needs and demands. We — as designers — are constantly told that the user is always right. Many people think that this also includes taste. So if a user demands Comic Sans as a typeface, some designers think they have to fulfil this request. Personally, I would challenge this literal understanding of user centredness.

It is probably unpopular to make a distinction between a professional, sophisticated taste and an unprofessional, unsophisticated taste. But the distinction exists and in music and art it is fully accepted. Not so in design and specially not in software design.

This will not change overnight and it probably doesn’t have to. For me, the role of a software designer is to interpret and translate the user’s needs and demands. Great software needs aesthetic integrity — on a visual and interactive level. In order to achieve that, you need someone with professional, sophisticated taste. As you mentioned above, it is possible to train this taste by studying and analysing existing apps and other software.

Long reply — I could (and should) probably write a full posting on that matter.