Skip to content

Design Philosophy

BigScreen recreates the feel of a modern console on your TV. These are the rules every screen follows.

One Focus

Exactly one thing is highlighted at all times. Move and the highlight moves. Confirm and it acts. Back and it steps out. Focus is never lost: closing anything returns you to where you came from.

Design Philosophy - Xbox Reference, Game Selected
Xbox Series - Game Selected
Dashboard - Game Selected
Big Screen - Game Selected

The selected card grows while its neighbours settle. Nothing else on the row changes size or position. Same moment with nothing selected:

Design Philosophy - Xbox Reference, No Selection
Xbox Series - No Game Selected
Dashboard - No Game Selected
Big Screen - No Game Selected

Readable From the Sofa

One headline, one focused row, generous spacing. Body text never competes with artwork. If a screen needs a paragraph to explain itself, the layout is wrong.

No Waiting

Anything already on disk responds instantly. Opening a screen, sorting a list, or previewing a pane never shows a loader for local data. The slow work happens once at boot behind the splash screen. See Boot Sequence.

Gamepad First

Every action is reachable on a controller through a fixed vocabulary: move, confirm, back, start, sort, details, switch view. Mouse and keyboard mirror all of it but never unlock anything extra. Typing in a text field pauses keyboard routing, except Escape, which always exits; gamepad input still routes.

Forgiving by Default

Deleting anything always confirms first. Editors snapshot the original value on entry: confirming keeps it, backing out drops it without side effects. Leaving with unsaved edits asks to save, discard, or stay. No flow destroys data on a misclick.