Guide to Buttons. The History of User Interfaces from the First Computers to Virtual Reality. In Search of a Universal Design System

A cohesive history of the logic of interfaces: from the first Xerox Alto and Apple Lisa to macOS/Windows, from Newton to iPhone/Android and beyond — to mixed reality (Meta Quest, Apple Vision). Through specific examples and hundreds of illustrations, the author systematically examines the origins of standard components (buttons, checkboxes, lists, menus, input fields, tabs), their anatomy and all states — and how to build your own universal design system based on them instead of mindlessly copying templates. The author analyzes each element both "up close" (anatomy, variations, states, application context) and "from above" (the evolution of solutions from hardware to the digital world, transfer between platforms, the influence of tools — from Photoshop/Sketch to Figma). History turns into a system, and the system becomes an accelerator for your product solutions. You will see why in OS X the primary button was first separated from secondary ones, how Windows introduced "hovering", why iOS abandoned skeuomorphism — and how these historical turns have become today’s rules that genuinely enhance usability and speed up development.