Acceptance Checklist: Run Through This Before You Sign Off
AI ships drafts faster; your gatekeeping has to keep up. This finale delivers a 15-item acceptance checklist, then revisits the vote you cast in the opener—see whether this chapter trained your eye.
AI can ship a draft in ten minutes; you spend three minutes accepting it—that math always wins. The stubborn enemy is 'good enough': the draft looks fine at first glance, so your hand wants to click through, and the rough spots only sting after launch. This list reins in that hand: fifteen items, one action each—run through them before you sign off. Check progress lives locally; come back with a new draft and keep going. Several criteria have sources—after you check them, scroll down; each comes with the rationale and a practice drill.
Try it · Acceptance checklist: walk all 15
Handoff acceptance checklist0 / 15
Hierarchy · 3 items
Spacing · 3 items
Restraint · 4 items
Consistency · 2 items
Detail · 3 items
This browser has local storage disabled (maybe private mode). Checks still work, but progress won't survive a refresh.
New restraint criterion: existence needs a reason
The new restraint item has a source. From About Face 4, Chapter 17: every element needs a reason to exist, and every difference needs a reason too—if you can't give one, delete the element or flatten the difference. The paired move is the reduction test: strip the suspect element and see whether information took a hit. The book goes harder: keep cutting until the design breaks, then put the last piece back. Try one drill.
AI handed over a landing page with a gradient decorative line under the title. What do you do?Single choice
AKeep it—without it the page looks bald
BDelete it first and look—if information and hierarchy held, don't put it back
CSwap it for a thinner gradient line
DAsk AI to add two more for echo
Speed has three thresholds—the stopwatch decides
The detail-group response-time criterion has a source too. How comfortable a UI feels depends heavily on response speed, and the thresholds are well known. About Face 4, Chapter 17 cites Nielsen's split: under 0.1s feels instantaneous; finish within 1s and thought stays unbroken—a subtle cue is enough; near 10s you must show it's running, like a spinner plus an estimate; past 10s explain what's slow, give progress updates, and ping when done. Three buttons, one threshold each—tap them yourself and feel it.
Response-time feelerThree delay tiers
Tap from fast to slow and feel where the thresholds sit
Light ops like saving a setting should land in this tier.
Submitting a form or switching views usually lands here.
Heavy work like exporting a report or generating an image. You'll wait a real 10 seconds—the progress bar keeps you company.
Charts without numbers—send them back
Data viz is in scope for acceptance too. Tufte's principle: quantify what can be quantified—charts draw the trend, and the numbers themselves must also be present. About Face 4, Chapter 17 cites Windows disk properties: the pie gives a rough impression, and used/free bytes are still listed. AI-generated report pages love this mistake: a pretty curve, zero numbers up close, so you dig raw data again when reporting. Two weekly cards—tap the better one.
Weekly active cardPick the better version
A · Trend only
dash.weekly.cn
Weekly active
Aug 3–Aug 9
Mon
Tue
Wed
Thu
Fri
Sat
Sun
B · Trend with numbers
dash.weekly.cn
Weekly active
Aug 3–Aug 9
4,286WoW +12%
412Mon
526Tue
488Wed
654Thu
590Fri
802Sat
814Sun
Revote · The opener question, one more time
In the opener you voted by gut among three plans. After 12 lessons, same question, same three plans in miniature—vote again.
Your second voteChapter revisit
Tap a plan to vote
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A · Default AI look
shiplist.app
Shiplist
This week's ship list—one screen
Auto-roll up task progress into a release checklist
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B · Restrained & pro
tejia-mall.com
Flash sale from 50% off02:14:36
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C · Busy template
Recap · 12 lessons in three sentences
Spot beauty
Opener: vote by gut first. Lessons 2–5 break "looks good" into four handles: hierarchy, spacing, color, detail. Facing a page: find the one hero, measure spacing, count colors, then pick at the details.
Translate for AI
Lessons 6–9 write the variables you see into the chat: swap "make it premium" for primary color, radius, density—words AI can execute. Name the variable when revising so AI knows where to push.
Design rules written as moves developers can follow—many criteria in this chapter have sources here. Focus on before/after revision figures.
The Non-Designer’s Design Book (Robin Williams)
Proximity, alignment, repetition, contrast—four principles. This is the starter frame; read the case-revision parts.
About Face 4, Chapter 17 (Alan Cooper et al.)
Several criteria on this page's list come from this chapter: the squint test, two hierarchy questions, response-time thresholds, "every element needs a reason to exist." Chapter 17 alone—"Integrating Visual Design"—is enough.
A model of high information density that still keeps restraint—watch its hierarchy and gray-scale division of labor.
Key Takeaways
✓
You can see: hierarchy, spacing, color, detail—four handles, tear down in order; stop tourist gawking.
✓
You can say it: translate feel into variables and references for AI; leave adjectives for social captions.
✓
You can accept: the 15-item list guards the exit. Next AI handoff, run the list first—send back the failed item in its own words.
✓
Criteria hold only with sources: existence needs a reason, response clears three thresholds, quantify what you can—sources are in further reading, so you can answer when asked.
Source: Original to Xiaoshan Academy's Taste Engineering series; some design principles adapted from About Face 4, Chapter 17 (Alan Cooper et al.); response-time thresholds cited there from Nielsen; quantification from Tufte.