Objects as Metaphor

A well-designed user interface provides an understandable, consistent framework in which users can work, without being confounded by the details of the underlying technology. To help accomplish this, the design model of the Windows user interface uses the metaphor of objects. This is a natural way we interpret and interact with the world around us. In the interface, objects not only describe files or icons, but any unit of information, including cells, paragraphs, characters, and circles, and the documents in which they reside.