Design is an essential component of the technology and software development process at KIS. It plays a crucial role in determining the success of any product by staying ahead of problems, and this is why it is important to work with true software development experts.

At KIS, we hold onto two types of design. User experience design and software design.

We will be introducing UX Design but will dive deeper into a few software design patterns we come across at the company.

What is UX Design?

User Experience Design is the process that involves empathizing with users, defining problems, ideating solutions, prototyping, and testing those solutions. This process helps to identify user needs and pain points, which inform the real requirements of the product.  

By understanding the user's needs and desires, we can create products that meet those needs and provide solutions to their problems. The design team can also use this process to anticipate user behavior and design products that are intuitive to use, reducing the need for extensive training or user manuals. They can design interfaces that are consistent across different devices and platforms, providing a seamless experience for users.

What about Software Design Patterns?

Software design patterns are reusable solutions to common programming problems. They provide a standard way of structuring code to achieve specific goals, such as improving code organization, reducing complexity, and making code easier to maintain.  

We will give examples of five different software design patterns we apply at KIS Solutions and why they make our work easier.

1. Model-View-Controller (MVC) Pattern:

The MVC pattern is a widely used software design pattern that separates the user interface (View) from the application logic (Model) and the controller that manages the interactions between them. The Model represents the underlying data and business logic, the View displays the data to the user, and the Controller handles user input and manages the interactions between the Model and View. The MVC pattern promotes separation of concerns and improves code organization, making it easier to maintain and extend.

2. Observer Pattern:

The Observer pattern is a behavioral pattern that defines a one-to-many relationship between objects, where a change in one object (the subject) triggers updates to all dependent objects (observers). The Observer pattern decouples the subject from its observers, allowing for more flexibility and scalability.

3. Singleton Pattern:

The Singleton pattern is a creational pattern that ensures that only one instance of a class is created and provides a global point of access to that instance. The Singleton pattern is commonly used for classes that need to maintain a single state throughout the application's lifetime.

From a holistic design perspective, the Singleton pattern can be used to ensure that design elements, such as color schemes or typography, remain consistent throughout the application.

4. Decorator Pattern:

The Decorator pattern is a structural pattern that allows behavior to be added to an object dynamically. The Decorator pattern is commonly used to add functionality to an object without modifying its underlying structure.

5. Facade Pattern:

The Facade pattern is a structural pattern that provides a simplified interface to a complex system of classes. The Facade pattern promotes loose coupling and simplifies the interface to the underlying system.

In summary, software design patterns provide a standard way of structuring code to achieve specific goals. The different patterns can be used to improve code organization, reduce complexity, and make code easier to maintain. From a design perspective, the patterns can be used to separate the visual design of the user interface from the underlying application logic, update the user interface in real-time based on changes in the underlying data or state, ensure consistency throughout the application, add visual elements to the interface, and simplify the user interface by providing a simplified interface to complex functionality.

In conclusion, design is a core component of our process of building great tech. It affects the technology we build and software development for the better by ensuring that products are user-friendly, scalable, appealing, and intuitive.  

Design plays a crucial role at KIS in building great tech and should be an integral part of the development process of any project.