MEET & GREET
WORKSHOP
SPEAKER

Vitaly Friedman

Creative Lead at Smashing Media AG

About

Vitaly loves beautiful content and does not give up easily. Born in Minsk, Belarus, he studied computer science and mathematics in Germany. While writing algebra proofs and preparing for software engineering at nights in the kitchen, at the same time he discovered passion for typography, interface design and writing. After working as a freelance designer and developer for 6 years, he co-founded Smashing Magazine back in 2006, a leading online magazine for designers and developers. His curiosity drove him from interface design to front-end to performance optimization to accessibility and back to user experience over all the years.

Vitaly is the author, co-author and editor of all Smashing books (https://www.smashingmagazine.com/books), and a curator of all Smashing Conferences (https://www.smashingconf.com). He currently works as creative lead of Smashing Magazine (www.smashingmagazine.com) and front-end/UX consultant in Europe and abroad, working with European Parliament, Haufe-Lexware, Axel-Springer and a few other companies.

Vitaly Friedman

talks

No items found.
No items found.

Vitaly Friedman

's

workshops

WORKSHOP

Design Patterns For AI Interfaces In 2025

When adding AI to our products, designers often envision AI systems that can’t be built. Most ideas are not buildable as they require near-perfect AI performance to be useful in real-world scenarios. Data scientists and engineers envision AI systems that have little user’s interest. So, most AI products fail pre-deployment due to solving the wrong problem, and do so with high costs and expectationas.In this session, we’ll explore new, practical design patterns for better AI experiences, with daemons, clustering, style lenses, structured presets and templates, dynamic editing, temperature knobs and everything in-between. We’ll study real-life examples of AI usage in successful products — and how we as designers can improve input UX, output UX and refinements UX for AI products.You’ll learn:- How to avoid product-market-fit gap for AI products,

– How to help users specify their intent more precisely,

– How to turn AI’s static output in a dynamic and responsive interface,

– How to help users scope generated output based on their interests and preferences,

– Real-life case studies of how companies embed AI into their products successfully- How to adapt products for Gen-Z, from content to design,

- What to keep in mind when designing for older adults,

- How to help people minimize errors in stressful situations,

- How to design for people who are neurodivergent.

Read more
WORKSHOP

Making Complex Systems Easy To Use — State of UX 2024

How do we manage complex challenges of complex, corporate, enterprise, B2B UX in healthcare, financial systems, monitoring systems, public services, and education? How do we deal with hundreds of nested filters, customizable dashboards, multi-step forms, and sophisticated data grids — and perhaps even make it all work on mobile?

Get ready to dive deep into the world of complex UIs — the world where data density is critical, whitespace is slightly overrated, and experts need a reliable interface to get their daily work done.

In this workshop with Vitaly Friedman, a UX consultant of the European Parliament and Smashing Magazine’s creative lead, you’ll explore pragmatic and practical tactics and strategies to tackle design challenges of corporate environments — with hundreds of real-life examples and the process of how to tackle any challenge that might come your way.

What will attendees learn?

Design a better filtering experience

Boost and refine sorting UX

Manage common autocomplete and search UX issues

Organize and design multi-step forms

Design for third-party integration

Inclusive design for people with disabilities, including colorblindness, ADHD, and more

Design dashboards and data visualisation

Designing better AI experiences

Design with legacy systems and how to approach redesigns

Wade through layers of internal politics

Manage expectations and avoid late changes

Make an impact in legacy-ridden environments

Boost UX in a company with low UX maturity

‍

Read more

Become a Partner
at WaysConf 2025

Become a Speaker
at WaysConf 2025

Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.