"I love my job": a long interview with John Ayvom and Craig Federighi

Today we offer the most interesting material - a long interview with the "creators", whose vision defines the physical and software implementation of current and future mobile devices Apple. Directly presentation iPhone 5S and 5C representative of Bloomberg Businessweek managed a day thoroughly talk with Jonathan Ayvom and Craig Federighi in one of the Apple campus buildings Cupertino.

I passed about a year since, as your field of activity in the Apple greatly enhanced. How did it affect your work?

Joni: In fact, the changes affected more than Craig, rather than me.

Craig: Yes. If you look at my job in the past, you will see a man who was driving the development of OS X and a plurality of common infrastructure components hidden behind OS X and iOS. Well, you know, the graphics rendering, operating system, kernel, and so on.

My team and I have already been involved in one stage of iOS development, so that in fact I did not just come there from the outside, but only took on a different role in the team, which has worked, but in a different a.

I think John and I knew before that we want to do something big. For us it was a novelty to make a joint problem and work together to find ways to implement it in a new area for us. It was a fusion of different disciplines that have not previously interacted with each other so closely. industrial design team and the user interface is not enough time to work together, and in practice this has resulted in a very intense co-operation, along with the engineering department. These teams combine many "creative" attitude, but now it is a very close relationship in the work on iOS 7.

Joni: In my opinion, when you think about the change of roles, in fact you perceive is the goal. We never talked about our roles. We talked about how to most effectively expand the cooperation, which has always been between us.

For example, we are sitting in a minute of each other. And this has not changed. We always have available. The team working on the design of a very close-knit. And, again, Craig looks after my team and for my team. It seems to me that the important thing is that we were able to give them - the purpose and project that we wanted to work together. It completely absorbs attention.

It seems to me that with this concentration any barriers, real or virtual, just scattered. You're totally fascinated by trying to do things as best as you can, and enjoy teamwork.

Craig: I think that between these groups already there was a connection, but then when iOS 7 mission was a clear and critical, all of whom needed to participate, simply plunged headlong into the process. So we found ourselves working for the most part with those with whom we have worked in the past.

Joni: You know, the design studio is essentially a fairly self-contained place, but it is also an excellent platform for working together, and I'm talking about 15, 20 years of work. But I have always noticed (I'm sure my team too), that those discoveries that you're doing, if you're lucky to be with someone who demonstrates a completely different level of skill - these discoveries can be really significant and exciting.

Our work is intertwined with people who have knowledge in completely different areas, and I think that this is a very important feature of the work at Apple. There are a lot of smart, really smart people. Our experience in this case - it is a product, a combination of iron and software, representing a single unit. Intentionally or not, the creation of a product happens that way, and so it will continue.

As you said, you sit a minute of each other. What is the your collaboration?

Joni: This is not a regulated process, and it is difficult to describe, but it shows well in practice. Sometimes it happens that we work together in the design studio, along with dealing with brainstorming team, and sometimes we are in one of the rooms closer to Craig, where we consider and evaluate things. But all this is very unstable and depends on the kind of problem we are trying to solve, or the things that we are trying to create.

Craig: It is true, the process is informal rather. Everything is determined by what we are working, as well as the necessary level of my involvement and Joni in this matter.

For example, we look at the behavior of the main screen, or log screen, and we discuss this in the company's engineers and designers who are part of the discussion. But it was at the stage of release and is a series of semi-combined discussions that were studied various problems with the design. It could be prototypes. We can assess how they felt. Do they work the way we think about it, being already in our hands? We could get a version of the product, to get together and say, "I take it and I like it, but it does not work quite the way we wanted," and began a new iteration in the cycle of product creation. Everything was conditioned by the desire to improve the co-product.

Joni: This is an interesting point. In someone's understanding of teamwork it is that your opinion is the most valuable and became the basis for further progress. But it does not work together.

Anyway, due to the fact that our products are used by more than one person, you can not just take a phrase like, "OK, we have an opinion, Such an opinion, "because further happens that I have seen many times in other situations - the energy is spent on the debate, rather than a belief in the possibility of implementation. We have confidence that this is achievable because we have a solution.

Can you give an example of just talking about?

Craig: You can talk about the parallax. I mean, it's an interesting example of the long road we have traveled in order to make something that would be coveted by all.

Joni: Parallax - a good example. One of the goals that we pursued in the implementation, was to convince the people who called it "flat", that in fact he is very, very deep. It was built and designed as a very deep user interface, but we did not want to rely on the shade or color effects. In which direction you would have to move?

The idea of ​​creating layers not associated with aesthetics. It was an attempt to make friends with several levels of information and give the user a sense of understanding of where he is at the moment.

The idea of ​​how we could realize the depth of feeling demanded a phenomenal level Collaboration: from graphic animation and hardware, and ending with the best software algorithms.

Craig: And it was something that seemed to us promising. There were signs of performance, and there were places where the idea seems to be not working, but we were quite assertive, to say "let's continue to work on these problems and force sensors do what we necessary".

We connected people from different areas, and we have worked together, look at our work and to improve them. Our designers have worked with the engineers, setting up an infinite number of parameters, and in the end we succeeded. This is a good example, because it is the basis of iOS 7, but if you look at any other element of the system, behind it will be about the same story.

Joni: I feel all the charm of that as a user you do not realize the complexity of the system. Our job is to solve complex problems, but do not show the complexity of their solutions in the finished product. There are many examples of software products that solve real problems, but when you look at these products it becomes obvious how complex the problem was resolved.

We make every effort to solve these problems, although other development team could say that in these cases, the spent efforts would be unjustified.

It requires concentration, and it is always easier, if the work is shared with someone. There are times when a team or one of its members lose attitude. And when you start to think seriously about what you can not solve the problem, you find yourself surrounded by people who help you keep moving. It's a fantastic feeling when working in a group.

Craig: And these people are able to solve complex problems. I mean cases where for one of the graphic concepts we reached GPU optimization to realize the blur more effectively.

Joni: You know, this is a great example. At the end of the day, when you could work out a team of engineers, solving the problem at this level, or with the engineers tested a gyroscope, but we solved the problem together. The fact that we are united, focused on solutions to common problems - these are the days when you come home with a sense of what the privilege is to work at Apple.

And you're doing it, not because you like the idea of ​​working together. You do it because you like the idea of ​​trying to solve complex problems and create better products. Working together - this is just a necessity.

Craig: This unique values ​​inherent in Apple's product development, and they are taken for granted by all members of each team. We reach an extreme degree of absurdity in order to get something to work properly. Even if it will have to dig to the depths of the product architecture, we will make the required number of energy and even more, we say "it's blur should work correctly, this detail should work correctly".

Regardless of whether it is an engineer or designer, he understands and does not ask why we are putting so much effort to work on the little things. Naturally, this is the right decision, and we are investing in the product directly from the energy of the smartest people to make it work properly. We see it in every member of the team for many years.

Joni: When you use the product, which invested as much care since the beginning of the development and before the release, you can not ask, "Why do you like him." I think people already know this. To some extent, they are acquainted with the biography of the product and know the effort was worth its release.

Apple is not just a new product. It teaches people how to use new things: touch screens, downloading music. How do you teach people through their products?

Joni: When we first worked together, and this is an excellent example of working together for many, many years, we did multitouch. It was the idea, which was first used in the device, which received the name iPad.

But it seems to me that the first thing that became apparent to us - it is the need to explain a whole new way to interact, as well as the very product category. That is why we have focused on the phone. There was no need to explain the value of your phone. You know the phone market is already there, and let people know about the phones.

This is a good example of solving the problems that people were already familiar with. After all, no one likes his phone, right?

Craig: I think we understand our users. When we looked at the iOS 7, we have seen some of the physical analogy in the existing user interface, allowing people to work comfortably "on the glass", and we realized that people have gone through this is. There is no need to apply such a literal physical analogies to interact with your phone and the touchscreen.

In this sense, there was a change of awareness of what should be the mobile device interface. The world moved forward. On the other hand, if you look at the success of the iPhone and iPad, with which even kids cope, you will realize that it is not so important to think about how you teach someone to use the devices. Just create animations and overall presentation such that you do not have to teach anyone anything.

I mean an example of when to exit the element sufficiently tapnut in the area next to it.

Joni: Where was the "Close" button?

Craig: There was a button "Close". How did you learn this? You choose the correct visualization and everything becomes intuitive. People do not hesitate to do the right thing. Gestures for zoom and movement - all this did not need to learn, it is the movement of life.

The most critical was the achievement of this effect is natural for us, but we are faced with a technical problem. We have paid great attention to reduce latency and frame rate, because if you're going to interact with something under the glass and move it, it must move as if you really drag his own fingers.

Lag and delay would violate his own mental model of human perception, and suddenly we are faced with a much more complex problem of user interaction with the system. And when we solved all the problems delayed touchscreen, hardware, speed graphics - all of a sudden we no longer need to teach anyone anything, because we have created something that you will understand intuitively.

You must subjugate the complexity to make things uncomplicated

Craig: I think it's a unique talent among the people here. If you think there are so many people who are able to cope with difficulties, and therefore able to control the complex instruments that seem to forgive them, but not suitable for the average person. In spite of this, our best people have a natural craving for simplicity and intuitiveness.

Joni: More good news is that we have a team there are people who do not get along very well with the complexities. [Laughs] Just by the way.

Craig: It is an important element in the joint work.

So there is a natural balance?

Joni: I think yes. Until then, I had not thought about this issue from the perspective of Craig. The fact that these guys with incredible technical skills, able to work with very complex things, at the same time do not accept and do not want to tolerate this complexity. They have zero tolerance for it, regardless of their technical skills - it's fantastic, is not it?

Let's change the subject. What is working with Tim?

Joni: I worked with Tim since its accession to Apple, so we work with them for a long time. We were ambitious projects who wanted to create, and we have been ambitious in the extent that it would produce them.

I remember many years ago, Tim worked on some mobile products that require completely altered to how we produced materials. The whole supply chain should be reviewed and redesigned. This is the creative process of all that I know.

Together, we worked in the same vein. I think Tim is well aware of the nature of the problems we face, and it encourages cooperation and teamwork needed to solve these problems.

Craig: Here the analogy: product design often requires a change in the production of non-obvious solutions to problems. This is the same as that of the development of the user interface. Both departments are addressing these crazy challenges. But you will never hear from Tim's question "why we are working on it." Why are we not looking for an easy way to get around the problem? "Not. This is the right design, and we will do things that are not trying to make anyone else in the world, and will do so for everything to be right. "

I think Tim intuitively understands what we're doing here, and he is doing everything possible to contribute to the creation of great products.

Joni: This is an interesting question. I mean, you could spend on arguments 60% of the time as to why we do it. And I think that one of the characteristics of Apple is that if we are faced with a serious problem, and our product - the result of solving the many complex problems that we do not spend time discussing why we We do. We spend the time to solve the problems. We generally spend all their time on solving problems.

If we are talking about how to install the sensors on the display, then in any case we do not argue about the trade-offs, in which you might suffer the optical quality of the display. This is a big problem, but the result of its decision would be multitouch, and to solve it, we still solve subproblems 40-50. Initially it thought it was a bad idea. Mul is a good example of complex collaboration.

Craig: Not to mention the installation of custom security processors in our chips.

Joni: Honestly, I know only a part of it. In order to implement all of one idea to be solved so many problems. It's great when you explain it, because I could not [laughs].

Craig: Well, I mean the case when you decide you want to do something like, "it would be great to use your finger to unlock the phone and shopping." Sounds simple, but how it will be negative points if you properly implement the idea? What if someone writes a malicious application, it will penetrate into your phone and steal a fingerprint? What he can do with it? if he can it somewhere to use? It can penetrate other users phones?

Well, it would be worse than no adding such a function, if you do not consider such a thing, right? So you gather all these problems together and say "hell, we will make our chip on a small island, an enclave separated from the whole, including the main processor. It does not matter even if you have full control over the device, and you can play it on any code, you can not pull out of the phone, this imprint. Any interaction with the chip will not allow him to take out the print.

And the last question: What is the mission of Apple?

Joni: Probably, it would be awkward definition, but I think we're trying to do for people tools that will allow them to do things they could not do without these tools. But we want people were not concerned about these tools.

The irony is that a design point of view, we think our work is done when you think that you have no reasonable alternative. He is perceived as a matter of course, if it had not worked out. Then we feel that we've done our job right. And therein lies the irony. design department wants you to not feel that it was developed by them, but that's what we're trying to do.

Craig: I would hardly have said it better. I just want to say that I was heavily influenced by Apple technology while still a boy. I think it has made me and all of us are smarter it possible to achieve what we could not reach, helped to communicate with people more freely, enriching our lives, and I think that all our work contributes to improving people's lives instead of frustrating them and makes them feel stupid.

Honestly, how many times have you bought something tech, with the result that upset you? It buys something for a better life, but instead you have to fight with him.

Ok, I tehnofrik, but if someone has created a map of my brain, I found to my neurons love patterns associated with our products. I mean love in the literal sense, and I think that's true for many of our clients. I think that when we do something that we love ourselves and love others, do their job.