Design and use as plans: an action-theoretical account

In this paper, we present an action-theoretical account of use and design. Central to this account is the notion of a user plan, which leads us to distinguish a cycle of plan design from one of artefact design. We comment on the nature and scope of our account from the perspective of design methodology in general, and we show that it can be employed to analyse the shortcomings of one design method in particular, namely quality function deployment. Finally, we examine some consequences for a philosophy of artefacts and their functions.