Simple Truths on Simplicity

I've been banging the drum for simplicity for some time, and a couple of posts caught my attention this week. Ryan at 37signals was discussing the suckage-to-usage ratio with the Kindle keyboard as an example of a feature that might be inadequate on its own but infrequently used and thus unimportant in the reading experience. The post speaks to nailing the important requirements first, leaving the nice-to-haves for later (if ever). Users are willing to put up with missing features in exchange for (1) getting a product in their hands faster and (2) nailing the requirements that are truly important to them.

Over at Wired there’s a story on Duke Nukem Forever (NSFW), what is (was) supposed to be the sequel to the legendary videogame Duke Nukem 3D. After a decade of development, the game still hasn’t shipped. What held it up? The developers couldn’t lock the design down, constantly adding/changing features. Compounding matters, they had an unheard-of budget that let them get away with feature creep for years. Constraints can be your friend, forcing you to work on the important stuff first and to actually deliver.

I always think about the 80% solution when I'm confronted with something new. Chances are it’s going to take a lot more time and resources to get that last 20% of features/requirements added, so deliver the important stuff first and challenge that last 20%. Steve Jobs said “real artists ship”—keep it as simple as you can and don’t let feature creep get in the way of delivery.

Posted by Quintin Sykes on Jan 01, 2010 with tags Simplicity, Project Management