The first time I used Google was in 1999 or 2000. I had heard about the quirky new search engine whose home page contained not much more than a text box and a submit button. I was immediately struck by the contrast with Yahoo!, whose home page had (and still has) hundreds of links to choose from.

When my first search came back almost instantly, I thought, “Cool, they must be showing pre-generated results for the most common queries.” I began searching on increasingly obscure terms, trying to find out how deep those pre-generated results were. When I got to “purple kangaroo suitcase” I realized the results weren’t pre-generated at all – Google was just that fast.  I was agog.

I dug around on their website and found a short description of their principles. Two in particular explained what I’d witnessed: Google’s reverence for simplicity and speed. The principles are still there today, and are still a great articulation of two crucial principles of web-based software design. I’m posting them here, where I hope they’ll serve as a frequent reality check against what we do at TrackVia.

Every millisecond counts.

Nothing is more valuable than people’s time. Google pages load quickly, thanks to slim code and carefully selected image files. The most essential features and text are placed in the easiest-to-find locations. Unnecessary clicks, typing, steps, and other actions are eliminated. Google products ask for information only once and include smart defaults. Tasks are streamlined.

Speed is a boon to users. It is also a competitive advantage that Google doesn’t sacrifice without good reason.

Simplicity is powerful.

Simplicity fuels many elements of good design, including ease of use, speed, visual appeal, and accessibility. But simplicity starts with the design of a product’s fundamental functions. Google doesn’t set out to create feature-rich products; our best designs include only the features that people need to accomplish their goals. Ideally, even products that require large feature sets and complex visual designs appear to be simple as well as powerful.

Google teams think twice before sacrificing simplicity in pursuit of a less important feature. Our hope is to evolve products in new directions instead of just adding more features.