Book recommendations for UX, Design & User Research
A fine selection of books, recommended by our mentors and mentees. Probably the best you can find. And the best is: You can support us by buying books directly from the library.
Why High-tech Products Drive Us Crazy and how to Restore the Sanity
Alan Cooper
Alan Cooper calls for a Software Revolution - his best-selling book now in trade paperback with new foreword and afterword.
ViewInformation Architecture for the World Wide Web
Louis Rosenfeld, Peter Morville
Today's web sites have moved far beyond "brochureware." They are larger and more complex, have great strategic value to their sponsors, and their users are busier and less forgiving. Designers, information architects, and web site managers are required to juggle vast amounts of information, frequent changes, new technologies, and sometimes even multiple objectives, making some web sites look like a fast-growing but poorly planned city-roads everywhere, but impossible to navigate. Well-planned information architecture has never been as essential as it is now. Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, 2nd Edition, shows you how to blend aesthetics and mechanics for distinctive, cohesive web sites that work. Most books on web development concentrate on either the graphics or the technical issues of a site. This book focuses on the framework that holds the two together. This edition contains more than 75% new material. You'll find updated chapters on organization, labeling, navigation, and searching; and a new chapter on thesauri, controlled vocabularies and metadata will help you understand the interconnectedness of these systems. The authors have expanded the methodology chapters to include a more interdisciplinary collection of tools and techniques. They've also complemented the top-down strategies of the first edition with bottom-up approaches that enable distributed, emergent solutions. A whole new section addresses the opportunities and challenges of practicing information architecture, while another section discusses how that work impacts and is influenced by the broader organizational context. New case studies provide models for creating enterprise intranet portals and online communities. Finally, you'll find pointers to a wealth of essential information architecture resources, many of which did not exist a few years ago. By applying the principles outlined in this completely updated classic, you'll build web sites and intranets that are easier to navigate and appealing to your users, as well as scalable and simple to maintain. Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, 2nd Edition is a treasure trove of ideas and practical advice for anyone involved in building or maintaining a large, complex web site or intranet.
ViewSystem Design Interview - An Insider's Guide
Alex Xu
The system design interview is considered to be the most complex and most difficult technical job interview by many. Those questions are intimidating, but don't worry. It's just that nobody has taken the time to prepare you systematically. We take the time. We go slow. We draw lots of diagrams and use lots of examples. You'll learn step-by-step, one question at a time. Don't miss out.What's inside? - An insider's take on what interviewers really look for and why. - A 4-step framework for solving any system design interview question. - 16 real system design interview questions with detailed solutions. - 188 diagrams to visually explain how different systems work.
ViewDesigning for Interaction - Creating Innovative Applications and Devices
Dan Saffer
Building products and services that people interact with is the big challenge of the 21st century. Dan Saffer has done an amazing job synthesizing the chaos into an understandable, ordered reference that is a bookshelf must-have for anyone thinking of creating new designs.” — Jared Spool, CEO of User Interface Engineering Interaction design is all around us. If you've ever wondered why your mobile phone looks pretty but doesn't work well, you've confronted bad interaction design. But if you've ever marveled at the joy of using an iPhone, shared your photos on Flickr, used an ATM machine, recorded a television show on TiVo, or ordered a movie off Netflix, you've encountered good interaction design: products that work as well as they look. Interaction design is the new field that defines how our interactive products behave. Between the technology that powers our devices and the visual and industrial design that creates the products' aesthetics lies the practice that figures out how to make our products useful, usable, and desirable. This thought-provoking new edition of Designing for Interaction offers the perspective of one of the most respected experts in the field, Dan Saffer. This book will help you learn to create a design strategy that differentiates your product from the competition use design research to uncover people's behaviors, motivations, and goals in order to design for them employ brainstorming best practices to create innovativenew products and solutions understand the process and methods used to define product behavior It also offers interviews and case studies from industry leaders on prototyping, designing in an Agile environment, service design, ubicomp, robots, and more.
ViewUX for Lean Startups - Faster, Smarter User Experience Research and Design
Laura Klein
p>Great user experiences (UX) are essential for products today, but designing one can be a lengthy and expensive process. With this practical, hands-on book, you’ll learn how to do it faster and smarter using Lean UX techniques. UX expert Laura Klein shows you what it takes to gather valuable input from customers, build something they’ll truly love, and reduce the time it takes to get your product to market. No prior experience in UX or design is necessary to get started. If you’re an entrepreneur or an innovator, this book puts you right to work with proven tips and tools for researching, identifying, and designing an intuitive, easy-to-use product. Determine whether people will buy your product before you build it Listen to your customers throughout the product’s lifecycle Understand why you should design a test before you design a product Get nine tools that are critical to designing your product Discern the difference between necessary features and nice-to-haves Learn how a Minimum Viable Product affects your UX decisions Use A/B testing in conjunction with good UX practices Speed up your product development process without sacrificing quality
ViewLean Vs. Agile Vs. Design Thinking - What You Really Need to Know to Build High-Performing Digital Product Teams
Jeff Gothelf
As companies evolve to adopt, integrate, and leverage software as the defining element of their success in the 21st century, a rash of processes and methodologies are vying for their product teams' attention. In the worst of cases, each discipline on these teams -- product management, design, and software engineering -- learns a different model. This short, tactical book reconciles the perceived differences in Lean Startup, Design Thinking, and Agile software development by focusing not on rituals and practices but on the values that underpin all three methods. Written by Jeff Gothelf, the co-author of the award-winning Lean UX and Sense & Respond, the tactics in this book draw on Jeff's years of practice as a team leader and coach in companies ranging from small high-growth startups to large enterprises. Whether you're a product manager, software engineer, designer, or team leader, you'll find practical tools in this book immediately applicable to your team's daily methods.
ViewLean UX
Jeff Gothelf, Josh Seiden
Lean UX is synonymous with modern product design and development. By combining human-centric design, agile ways of working, and a strong business sense, designers, product managers, developers, and scrum masters around the world are making Lean UX the leading approach for digital product teams today. In the third edition of this award-winning book, authors Jeff Gothelf and Josh Seiden help you focus on the product experience rather than deliverables. You'll learn tactics for integrating user experience design, product discovery, agile methods, and product management. And you'll discover how to drive your design in short, iterative cycles to assess what works best for businesses and users. Lean UX guides you through this change--for the better. Facilitate the Lean UX process with your team with the Lean UX Canvas Ensure every project starts with clear customer-centric success criteria Understand the role of designer on a agile team Write and contribute design and experiment stories to the backlog Ensure that design work takes place in every sprint Build product discovery into your team's "velocity"
ViewUX Simplified: Models & Methodologies
Samir Dash
"UX Simplified: Models & Methodologies" covers basic models and methodologies that are revolved around User Experience (UX). The discussed topics include User Experience, Information Architecture, User Interface, Usability models, User Centered Design (UCD), User Centered Software Design (UCSD), different Software Lifecycles (SDLC) and how usability models fit into SDLC models. The following topics are covered: The Diverse Disciplines: The ABCs of UX User Experience(UX) Information Architecture(IA) Interaction Design (IxD) User Interface Design (UI) Usability and Mental Models: Foundations of UX What is Usability? System Models What is a "Mental Model" exactly? Most-likely Mental Model Conceptual Model Challenges in Usability Measurement and Metrics A List of Factors for Generic and Consolidated Usability Model Heuristics: Measuring Usability Engineering and Design Processes: Usability and User Centric Approach Usability Engineering User-Centered Systems Design (UCSD) Usability Design User-Centered Design (UCD) Don't get Confused: UCD vs UCSD UCD Models and Process Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC): Where and How User Experience Models fit in? Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) Waterfall model Spiral model Iterative Development Model Agile development Challenges in UX Integration tDifferent SDLC Models Usability Designing Process How Usability Design Process Fits in Different Phases of SDLC? How UX Fits in Different Models of SDLC? Challenges with Agile model of SDLC implement UX Lean UX and Agile Model Agile in Usability Design: Without Reference tSDLC Usability Designing Process Lean UX: Another Agile UX? The Beauty of Lean UX: Everything is familiar Foundation Stones of Lean UX: Lean Startup method: The concept of "Build-Measure-Learn" Minimum Viable Product (MVP) - Prototyping at it's best in Lean Startup Method Principles of Lean UX
ViewThe User Experience Team of One - A Research and Design Survival Guide
Leah Buley
The User Experience Team of One prescribes a range of approaches that have big impact and take less time and fewer resources than the standard lineup of UX deliverables. Whether you want to cross over into user experience or you're a seasoned practitioner trying to drag your organization forward, this book gives you tools and insight for doing more with less.
ViewThe UX Book - Agile UX Design for a Quality User Experience
Rex Hartson, Pardha S. Pyla
The discipline of user experience (UX) design has matured into a confident practice and this edition reflects, and in some areas accelerates, that evolution. Technically this is the second edition of The UX Book, but so much of it is new, it is more like a sequel. One of the major positive trends in UX is the continued emphasis on design—a kind of design that highlights the designer’s creative skills and insights and embodies a synthesis of technology with usability, usefulness, aesthetics, and meaningfulness to the user. In this edition a new conceptual top-down design framework is introduced to help readers with this evolution. This entire edition is oriented toward an agile UX lifecycle process, explained in the funnel model of agile UX, as a better match to the now de facto standard agile approach to software engineering. To reflect these trends, even the subtitle of the book is changed to “Agile UX design for a quality user experience . Designed as a how-to-do-it handbook and field guide for UX professionals and a textbook for aspiring students, the book is accompanied by in-class exercises and team projects. The approach is practical rather than formal or theoretical. The primary goal is still to imbue an understanding of what a good user experience is and how to achieve it. To better serve this, processes, methods, and techniques are introduced early to establish process-related concepts as context for discussion in later chapters. Winner of a 2020 Textbook Excellence Award (College) (Texty) from the Textbook and Academic Authors Association A comprehensive textbook for UX/HCI/Interaction Design students readymade for the classroom, complete with instructors’ manual, dedicated web site, sample syllabus, examples, exercises, and lecture slides Features HCI theory, process, practice, and a host of real world stories and contributions from industry luminaries to prepare students for working in the field The only HCI textbook to cover agile methodology, design approaches, and a full, modern suite of classroom material (stemming from tried and tested classroom use by the authors)
ViewValidating Product Ideas - Through Lean User Research
Tomer Sharon
Want to know what your users are thinking? If you’re a product manager or developer, this book will help you learn the techniques for finding the answers to your most burning questions about your customers. With step-by-step guidance, Validating Product Ideas shows you how to tackle the research to build the best possible product.
ViewOrchestrating Human-Centered Design
Guy Boy
The time has come to move into a more humanistic approach of technology and to understand where our world is moving to in the early twenty-first century. The design and development of our future products needs to be orchestrated, whether they be conceptual, technical or organizational. Orchestrating Human-Centered Design presents an Orchestra model that attempts to articulate technology, organizations and people. Human-centered design (HCD) should not be limited to local/short-term/linear engineering, but actively focus on global/long-term/non-linear design, and constantly identify emergent properties from the use of artifacts. Orchestrating Human-Centered Design results from incremental syntheses of courses the author has given at the Florida Institute of Technology in the HCD PhD program. It is focused on technological and philosophical concepts that high-level managers, technicians and all those interested in the design of artifacts should consider. Our growing software -intensive world imposes better knowledge on cognitive engineering, life-critical systems, complexity analysis, organizational design and management, modeling and simulation, and advanced interaction media, and this well-constructed and informative book provides a road map for this.
ViewUser-Centered Design - A Developer's Guide to Building User-Friendly Applications
Travis Lowdermilk
How do you design engaging applications that people love to use? This book shows you ways to include valuable input from potential clients and customers throughout the process. With practical guidelines and insights from his own experience, author Travis Lowdermilk shows you how usability and user-centered design will dramatically change the way your application interacts with people. You’ll learn valuable strategies for conducting each stage of the design process, from interviewing likely users and discovering your application’s purpose to creating a rich user experience with sound design principles. User-Centered Design is invaluable no matter what platform you use or audience you target. Explore usability and how it relates to user-centered design Learn how to deal with users and their unique personalities Clarify your application’s purpose, using a simple narrative to describe its use Plan your project’s development with a software development life cycle Be creative within the context of your user experience goals Use visibility, consistency, and other design principles to enhance user experience Gain user feedback of your prototype with surveys, interviews, and usability studies
ViewNoSQL Distilled - A Brief Guide to the Emerging World of Polyglot Persistence
Pramod J. Sadalage, Martin Fowler
The need to handle increasingly larger data volumes is one factor driving the adoption of a new class of nonrelational “NoSQL” databases. Advocates of NoSQL databases claim they can be used to build systems that are more performant, scale better, and are easier to program. NoSQL Distilled is a concise but thorough introduction to this rapidly emerging technology. Pramod J. Sadalage and Martin Fowler explain how NoSQL databases work and the ways that they may be a superior alternative to a traditional RDBMS. The authors provide a fast-paced guide to the concepts you need to know in order to evaluate whether NoSQL databases are right for your needs and, if so, which technologies you should explore further. The first part of the book concentrates on core concepts, including schemaless data models, aggregates, new distribution models, the CAP theorem, and map-reduce. In the second part, the authors explore architectural and design issues associated with implementing NoSQL. They also present realistic use cases that demonstrate NoSQL databases at work and feature representative examples using Riak, MongoDB, Cassandra, and Neo4j. In addition, by drawing on Pramod Sadalage’s pioneering work, NoSQL Distilled shows how to implement evolutionary design with schema migration: an essential technique for applying NoSQL databases. The book concludes by describing how NoSQL is ushering in a new age of Polyglot Persistence, where multiple data-storage worlds coexist, and architects can choose the technology best optimized for each type of data access.
ViewThe Best Interface Is No Interface - The simple path to brilliant technology
Golden Krishna
Our love affair with the digital interface is out of control. We’ve embraced it in the boardroom, the bedroom, and the bathroom. Screens have taken over our lives. Most people spend over eight hours a day staring at a screen, and some “technological innovators” are hoping to grab even more of your eyeball time. You have screens in your pocket, in your car, on your appliances, and maybe even on your face. Average smartphone users check their phones 150 times a day, responding to the addictive buzz of Facebook or emails or Twitter. Are you sick? There’s an app for that! Need to pray? There’s an app for that! Dead? Well, there’s an app for that, too! And most apps are intentionally addictive distractions that end up taking our attention away from things like family, friends, sleep, and oncoming traffic. There’s a better way. In this book, innovator Golden Krishna challenges our world of nagging, screen-based bondage, and shows how we can build a technologically advanced world without digital interfaces. In his insightful, raw, and often hilarious criticism, Golden reveals fascinating ways to think beyond screens using three principles that lead to more meaningful innovation. Whether you’re working in technology, or just wary of a gadget-filled future, you’ll be enlighted and entertained while discovering that the best interface is no interface.
ViewAbout Face - The Essentials of Interaction Design
Alan Cooper, Robert Reimann, David Cronin, Christopher Noessel
The essential interaction design guide, fully revised and updated for the mobile age About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design, Fourth Edition is the latest update to the book that shaped and evolved the landscape of interaction design. This comprehensive guide takes the worldwide shift to smartphones and tablets into account. New information includes discussions on mobile apps, touch interfaces, screen size considerations, and more. The new full-color interior and unique layout better illustrate modern design concepts. The interaction design profession is blooming with the success of design-intensive companies, priming customers to expect "design" as a critical ingredient of marketplace success. Consumers have little tolerance for websites, apps, and devices that don't live up to their expectations, and the responding shift in business philosophy has become widespread. About Face is the book that brought interaction design out of the research labs and into the everyday lexicon, and the updated Fourth Edition continues to lead the way with ideas and methods relevant to today's design practitioners and developers. Updated information includes: Contemporary interface, interaction, and product design methods Design for mobile platforms and consumer electronics State-of-the-art interface recommendations and up-to-date examples Updated Goal-Directed Design methodology Designers and developers looking to remain relevant through the current shift in consumer technology habits will find About Face to be a comprehensive, essential resource.
ViewThe Elements of User Experience - User-centered Design for the Web and Beyond
Jesse James Garrett
From the moment it was published almost ten years ago, The Elements of User Experience became a vital reference for Web and interaction designers the world over, and has come to define the core principles of the practice. Now, in this updated, and full-color new edition, Jesse James Garrett has refined his thinking about product design, going beyond the desktop to include insight that applies to the proliferation of mobile devices and applications Successful interactive product design requires more than just clean code and sharp graphics. You must also fulfill strategic objectives while meeting users' needs. Even the best content and the most sophisticated technology won't help you balance those goals without a cohesive, consistent user experience to support it With so many issues involved---usability, brand identity, information architecture, interaction design---creating the user experience can be overwhelmingly complex. This new edition cuts through that complexity with clear explanations and vivid illustrations that focus on ideas rather than tools or techniques. Garrett gives readers the big picture of user experience development, from strategy and requirements to information architecture and visual design "Jesse James Garrett's book remains essential reading because it elegantly brings together the ideas that define user experience. This book continues to help novices design with confidence and to give experienced practitioners a structure that enables them to reach further." Giles Colborne author of Simple and Usable Web, Mobile and Interaction Design "Still, pound-for-pound, the most useful introduction to user experience there is." Louis Rosenfeld publisher, Rosenfeld Media and co-author of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web "Jesse James Garrett clarifies the entire jumbled field of user experience design. And because he's a very smart fellow, he's kept it very short so there's a useful insight on almost every page." Steve Krug author of Don't Make Me Think and Rocket Surgery Made Easy "Deconstructing and modeling both the human and conceptual issues, Garrett exposes the essence of a problem usually obscured by thick layers of technical camouflage." Alan Cooper author of About Face and The Inmates Are Running the Asylum
View100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People
Susan Weinschenk
We design to elicit responses from people. We want them to buy something, read more, or take action of some kind. Designing without understanding what makes people act the way they do is like exploring a new city without a map: results will be haphazard, confusing, and inefficient. This book combines real science and research with practical examples to deliver a guide every designer needs. With it you’ll be able to design more intuitive and engaging work for print, websites, applications, and products that matches the way people think, work, and play. Learn to increase the effectiveness, conversion rates, and usability of your own design projects by finding the answers to questions such as: What grabs and holds attention on a page or screen? What makes memories stick? What is more important, peripheral or central vision? How can you predict the types of errors that people will make? What is the limit to someone’s social circle? How do you motivate people to continue on to (the next step? What line length for text is best? Are some fonts better than others? These are just a few of the questions that the book answers in its deep-dive exploration of what makes people tick.
ViewChange by Design - How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires Innovation
Tim Brown
In Change by Design, Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO, the celebrated innovation and design firm, shows how the techniques and strategies of design belong at every level of business. Change by Design is not a book by designers for designers; this is a book for creative leaders who seek to infuse design thinking into every level of an organization, product, or service to drive new alternatives for business and society.
ViewUser Friendly - How the Hidden Rules of Design Are Changing the Way We Live, Work, and Play
Cliff Kuang, Robert Fabricant
AMAZON BEST BOOKS OF 2019 PICK FORTUNE WRITERS AND EDITORS' RECOMMENDED BOOKS OF 2019 PICK "User Friendly is a tour de force, an engrossing fusion of scholarly research, professional experience and revelations from intrepid firsthand reporting." —EDWARD TENNER, The New York Times Book Review In User Friendly, Cliff Kuang and Robert Fabricant reveal the untold story of a paradigm that quietly rules our modern lives: the assumption that machines should anticipate what we need. Spanning over a century of sweeping changes, from women’s rights to the Great Depression to World War II to the rise of the digital era, this book unpacks the ways in which the world has been—and continues to be—remade according to the principles of the once-obscure discipline of user-experience design. In this essential text, Kuang and Fabricant map the hidden rules of the designed world and shed light on how those rules have caused our world to change—an underappreciated but essential history that’s pieced together for the first time. Combining the expertise and insight of a leading journalist and a pioneering designer, User Friendly provides a definitive, thoughtful, and practical perspective on a topic that has rapidly gone from arcane to urgent to inescapable. In User Friendly, Kuang and Fabricant tell the whole story for the first time—and you’ll never interact with technology the same way again.
ViewUniversal Principles of Design, Revised and Updated - 125 Ways to Enhance Usability, Influence Perception, Increase Appeal, Make Better Design Decisions, and Teach Through Design
William Lidwell, Kritina Holden, Jill Butler
Universal Principles of Design, Revised and Updated is a comprehensive, cross-disciplinary encyclopedia covering 125 laws, guidelines, human biases, and general considerations important to successful design. Richly illustrated and easy to navigate, it pairs clear explanations of every design concept with visual examples of the ideas applied in practice. From the 80/20 Rule to the Weakest Link, every major design concept is defined and illustrated. Whether a marketing campaign or a museum exhibit, a video game or a complex control system, the design we see is the culmination of many concepts and practices brought together from a variety of disciplines. Because no one can be an expert on everything, designers have always had to scramble to find the information and know-how required to make a design work—until now. Just a few of the principles that will broaden your design knowledge, promote brainstorming, and help you check the quality of your work: Baby-Face Bias Expectation Effect Golden Ration Ockham's Razor Proximity Scaling Fallacy The book is organized alphabetically so that principles can be easily and quickly referenced by name. For those interested in addressing a specific problem of design, the principles havealso been indexed by questions commonly confronting designers (How can I help people learn from my design? How can I enhance the usability of a design? How can I make better design decisions? ...). Each principle is presented in a two-page format. The left-hand page contains a succinct definition, a full description of the principle, examples of its use, and guidelines for use. Side notes appear to the right of the text, and provide elaborations and references. The right-hand page contains visual examples and related graphics to support a deeper understanding of the principle. This landmark reference is the standard for designers, engineers, architects, and students who seek to broaden and improve their design expertise.
ViewBadass: Making Users Awesome
Kathy Sierra
Note for ebook customers: The design and layout of this book play a key role in conveying the author's message. When creating the ebooks, we've tried to keep the look and feel of the print edition, but this means that not all e-reading devices will support the files. The EPUB format is optimized for iPad. The Mobi files are optimized for Kindle Fire tablets and phones and for Kindle reading apps. Imagine you’re in a game with one objective: a bestselling product or service. The rules? No marketing budget, no PR stunts, and it must be sustainably successful. No short-term fads. This is not a game of chance. It is a game of skill and strategy. And it begins with a single question: given competing products of equal pricing, promotion, and perceived quality, why does one outsell the others? The answer doesn’t live in the sustainably successful products or services. The answer lives in those who use them. Our goal is to craft a strategy for creating successful users. And that strategy is full of surprising, counter-intuitive, and astonishingly simple techniques that don’t depend on a massive marketing or development budget. Techniques typically overlooked by even the most well-funded, well-staffed product teams. Every role is a key player in this game. Product development, engineering, marketing, user experience, support—everyone on the team. Even if that team is a start-up of one. Armed with a surprisingly overlooked science and a unique POV, we can can reduce the role of luck. We can build sustainably successful products and services that rely not on unethical persuasive marketing tricks but on helping our users have deeper, richer experiences. Not just in the moments while they’re using our product but, more importantly, in the moments when they aren’t.
ViewThe Non-Designer's Design Book
Robin Williams
For nearly 20 years, designers and non-designers alike have been introduced to the fundamental principles of great design by author Robin Williams. Through her straightforward and light-hearted style, Robin has taught hundreds of thousands of people how to make their designs look professional using four surprisingly simple principles. Now in its fourth edition, The Non-Designer’s Design Book offers even more practical design advice, including a new chapter on the fundamentals of typography, more quizzes and exercises to train your Designer Eye, updated projects for you to try, and new visual and typographic examples to inspire your creativity. Whether you’re a Mac user or a Windows user, a type novice, or an aspiring graphic designer, you will find the instruction and inspiration to approach any design project with confidence. THIS ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO DESIGN WILL TEACH YOU The four principles of design that underlie every design project How to design with color How to design with type How to combine typefaces for maximum effect How to see and think like a professional designer Specific tips on designing newsletters, brochures, flyers, and other projects
ViewStop Stealing Sheep & Find Out how Type Works
Erik Spiekermann, E. M. Ginger
This classic typography book, first published in 1993, is now updated with brand-new typefaces, fonts, and illustrations. Internationally renowned graphic designer Erik Spiekermann explains in everyday terms what typography is and offers design guidance in choosing type for legibility, meaning, and aesthetic appeal. Stop Stealing Sheep and Find Out How Type Works, 2nd Edition guides the reader through all aspects of typography, from the history and mechanics of type, to training the eye to recognize and choose typefaces. Uncover type's roots and placement within society and learn how to use space and layout to improve overall communication. This elegant guide for readers of all levels is revised and updated to discuss the particular design challenges of type on the Internet. Note: This title was originally announced in the October 2000 Pearson Technology Group catalog.
ViewRocket Surgery Made Easy - The Do-It-Yourself Guide to Finding and Fixing Usability Problems
Steve Krug
It's been known for years that usability testing can dramatically improve products. But with a typical price tag of $5,000 to $10,000 for a usability consultant to conduct each round of tests, it rarely happens. In this how-to companion to Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, Steve Krug spells out a streamlined approach to usability testing that anyone can easily apply to their own Web site, application, or other product. (As he said in Don't Make Me Think, "It's not rocket surgery".) Using practical advice, plenty of illustrations, and his trademark humor, Steve explains how to: Test any design, from a sketch on a napkin to a fully-functioning Web site or application Keep your focus on finding the most important problems (because no one has the time or resources to fix them all) Fix the problems that you find, using his "The least you can do" approach By paring the process of testing and fixing products down to its essentials ("A morning a month, that's all we ask"), Rocket Surgery makes it realistic for teams to test early and often, catching problems while it's still easy to fix them. Rocket Surgery Made Easy adds demonstration videos to the proven mix of clear writing, before-and-after examples, witty illustrations, and practical advice that made Don't Make Me Think so popular.
ViewDon't Make Me Think - A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability
Steve Krug
Five years and more than 100,000 copies after it was first published, it's hard to imagine anyone working in Web design who hasn't read Steve Krug's "instant classic" on Web usability, but people are still discovering it every day. In this second edition, Steve adds three new chapters in the same style as the original: wry and entertaining, yet loaded with insights and practical advice for novice and veteran alike. Don't be surprised if it completely changes the way you think about Web design. Three New Chapters! Usability as common courtesy -- Why people really leave Web sites Web Accessibility, CSS, and you -- Making sites usable and accessible Help! My boss wants me to ______. -- Surviving executive design whims "I thought usability was the enemy of design until I read the first edition of this book. Don't Make Me Think! showed me how to put myself in the position of the person who uses my site. After reading it over a couple of hours and putting its ideas to work for the past five years, I can say it has done more to improve my abilities as a Web designer than any other book. In this second edition, Steve Krug adds essential ammunition for those whose bosses, clients, stakeholders, and marketing managers insist on doing the wrong thing. If you design, write, program, own, or manage Web sites, you must read this book." -- Jeffrey Zeldman, author of Designing with Web Standards
ViewMismatch - How Inclusion Shapes Design
Kat Holmes
How inclusive methods can build elegant design solutions that work for all. Sometimes designed objects reject their users: a computer mouse that doesn't work for left-handed people, for example, or a touchscreen payment system that only works for people who read English phrases, have 20/20 vision, and use a credit card. Something as simple as color choices can render a product unusable for millions. These mismatches are the building blocks of exclusion. In Mismatch, Kat Holmes describes how design can lead to exclusion, and how design can also remedy exclusion. Inclusive design methods—designing objects with rather than for excluded users—can create elegant solutions that work well and benefit all. Holmes tells stories of pioneers of inclusive design, many of whom were drawn to work on inclusion because of their own experiences of exclusion. A gamer and designer who depends on voice recognition shows Holmes his “Wall of Exclusion,” which displays dozens of game controllers that require two hands to operate; an architect shares her firsthand knowledge of how design can fail communities, gleaned from growing up in Detroit's housing projects; an astronomer who began to lose her eyesight adapts a technique called “sonification” so she can “listen” to the stars. Designing for inclusion is not a feel-good sideline. Holmes shows how inclusion can be a source of innovation and growth, especially for digital technologies. It can be a catalyst for creativity and a boost for the bottom line as a customer base expands. And each time we remedy a mismatched interaction, we create an opportunity for more people to contribute to society in meaningful ways.
ViewStrategic Writing for UX - Drive Engagement, Conversion, and Retention with Every Word
Torrey Podmajersky
When you depend on users to perform specific actions—like buying tickets, playing a game, or riding public transit—well-placed words are most effective. But how do you choose the right words? And how do you know if they work? With this practical book, you’ll learn how to write strategically for UX, using tools to build foundational pieces for UI text and UX voice strategy. UX content strategist Torrey Podmajersky provides strategies for converting, engaging, supporting, and re-attracting users. You’ll use frameworks and patterns for content, methods to measure the content’s effectiveness, and processes to create the collaboration necessary for success. You’ll also structure your voice throughout so that the brand is easily recognizable to its audience. Learn how UX content works with the software development lifecycle Use a framework to align the UX content with product principles Explore content-first design to root UX text in conversation Learn how UX text patterns work with different voices Produce text that’s purposeful, concise, conversational, and clear
ViewWriting Is Designing - Words and the User Experience
Michael J. Metts, Andy Welfle
Without words, apps would be an unusable jumble of shapes and icons, while voice interfaces and chatbots wouldn't even exist. Words make software human–centered, and require just as much thought as the branding and code. This book will show you how to give your users clarity, test your words, and collaborate with your team. You'll see that writing is designing.
ViewNicely Said - Writing for the Web with Style and Purpose
Nicole Fenton, Kate Kiefer Lee
Whether you’re new to web writing, or you’re a professional writer looking to deepen your skills, this book is for you. You’ll learn how to write web copy that addresses your readers’ needs and supports your business goals. Learn from real-world examples and interviews with people who put these ideas into action every day: Kristina Halvorson of Brain Traffic, Tiffani Jones Brown of Pinterest, Randy J. Hunt of Etsy, Gabrielle Blair of Design Mom, Mandy Brown of Editorially, Sarah Richards of GOV.UK, and more. Topics include: • Write marketing copy, interface flows, blog posts, legal policies, and emails • Develop behind-the-scenes documents like mission statements, survey questions, and project briefs • Find your voice and adapt your tone for the situation • Build trust and foster relationships with readers • Make a simple style guide “Writing is a skill that will hugely benefit anyone’s career, and luckily, it’s a skill that anyone can learn. Nicely Said is a wonderful guide to writing clearly and concisely for the audience you’re trying to reach. Whether you’re a professional or just getting started, you’ll find a ton to steal from here.” (—Austin Kleon, author of Steal Like An Artist and Show Your Work! "Between them, Kate and Nicole have written for many of the web's most valuable and respected companies. Their commitment to clarity and kindness is the result of their experience, and it makes them extraordinary teachers." - Erin Kissane, author of The Elements of Content Strategy
ViewStorytelling in Design - Defining, Designing, and Selling Multidevice Products
Anna Dahlström
With the wide variety of devices, touch points, and channels in use, your ability to control how people navigate your well-crafted experiences is fading. Yet it’s still important to understand where people are in their journey if you’re to deliver the right content and interactions atthe right time and on the right device. This practical guide shows you how storytelling can make a powerful difference in product design. Author Anna Dahlström details the many ways you can use storytelling in your projects and throughout your organization. By applying tried-and-tested principles from film and fiction to the context of design and business, you’ll learn to create great product experiences. Learn how the anatomy of a great story can make a difference in product design Explore how traditional storytelling principles, tools, and methods relate to key product design aspects Understand how purposeful storytelling helps tell the right story and move people into action Use storytelling principles to tell, sell, and present your work
ViewTrustworthy Online Controlled Experiments - A Practical Guide to A/B Testing
Ron Kohavi, Diane Tang, Ya Xu
Getting numbers is easy; getting numbers you can trust is hard. This practical guide by experimentation leaders at Google, LinkedIn, and Microsoft will teach you how to accelerate innovation using trustworthy online controlled experiments, or A/B tests. Based on practical experiences at companies that each run more than 20,000 controlled experiments a year, the authors share examples, pitfalls, and advice for students and industry professionals getting started with experiments, plus deeper dives into advanced topics for practitioners who want to improve the way they make data-driven decisions. Learn how to • Use the scientific method to evaluate hypotheses using controlled experiments • Define key metrics and ideally an Overall Evaluation Criterion • Test for trustworthiness of the results and alert experimenters to violated assumptions • Build a scalable platform that lowers the marginal cost of experiments close to zero • Avoid pitfalls like carryover effects and Twyman's law • Understand how statistical issues play out in practice.
ViewA Project Guide to UX Design - For user experience designers in the field or in the making
Russ Unger, Carolyn Chandler
“If you are a young designer entering or contemplating entering the UX field this is a canonical book. If you are an organization that really needs to start grokking UX this book is also for you. " -- Chris Bernard, User Experience Evangelist, Microsoft User experience design is the discipline of creating a useful and usable Web site or application—one that’s easily navigated and meets the needs of both the site owner and its users. But there’s a lot more to successful UX design than knowing the latest Web technologies or design trends: It takes diplomacy, project management skills, and business savvy. That’s where this book comes in. Authors Russ Unger and Carolyn Chandler show you how to integrate UX principles into your project from start to finish. • Understand the various roles in UX design, identify stakeholders, and enlist their support • Obtain consensus from your team on project objectives • Define the scope of your project and avoid mission creep • Conduct user research and document your findings • Understand and communicate user behavior with personas • Design and prototype your application or site • Make your product findable with search engine optimization • Plan for development, product rollout, and ongoing quality assurance
ViewValue Proposition Design - How to Create Products and Services Customers Want
Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur, Gregory Bernarda, Alan Smith
The authors of the international bestseller Business Model Generation explain how to create value propositions customers can’t resist Value Proposition Design helps you tackle the core challenge of every business — creating compelling products and services customers want to buy. This highly practical book, paired with its online companion, will teach you the processes and tools you need to create products that sell. Using the same stunning visual format as the authors’ global bestseller, Business Model Generation, this sequel explains how to use the “Value Proposition Canvas” to design, test, create, and manage products and services customers actually want. Value Proposition Design is for anyone who has been frustrated by new product meetings based on hunches and intuitions; it’s for anyone who has watched an expensive new product launch fail in the market. The book will help you understand the patterns of great value propositions, get closer to customers, and avoid wasting time with ideas that won’t work. You’ll learn the simple process of designing and testing value propositions, that perfectly match customers’ needs and desires. In addition the book gives you exclusive access to an online companion on Strategyzer.com. You will be able to assess your work, learn from peers, and download pdfs, checklists, and more. Value Proposition Design is an essential companion to the ”Business Model Canvas” from Business Model Generation, a tool embraced globally by startups and large corporations such as MasterCard, 3M, Coca Cola, GE, Fujitsu, LEGO, Colgate-Palmolive, and many more. Value Proposition Design gives you a proven methodology for success, with value propositions that sell, embedded in profitable business models."
ViewDon't Make Me Think, Revisited - A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability
Steve Krug
Since Don’t Make Me Think was first published in 2000, hundreds of thousands of Web designers and developers have relied on usability guru Steve Krug’s guide to help them understand the principles of intuitive navigation and information design. Witty, commonsensical, and eminently practical, it’s one of the best-loved and most recommended books on the subject. Now Steve returns with fresh perspective to reexamine the principles that made Don’t Make Me Think a classic–with updated examples and a new chapter on mobile usability. And it’s still short, profusely illustrated…and best of all–fun to read. If you’ve read it before, you’ll rediscover what made Don’t Make Me Think so essential to Web designers and developers around the world. If you’ve never read it, you’ll see why so many people have said it should be required reading for anyone working on Web sites. “After reading it over a couple of hours and putting its ideas to work for the past five years, I can say it has done more to improve my abilities as a Web designer than any other book.” –Jeffrey Zeldman, author of Designing with Web Standards
ViewThe War of Art - Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles
Steven Pressfield
What keeps so many of us from doing what we long to do? Why is there a naysayer within? How can we avoid the roadblocks of any creative endeavor—be it starting up a dream business venture, writing a novel, or painting a masterpiece? The War of Art identifies the enemy that every one of us must face, outlines a battle plan to conquer this internal foe, then pinpoints just how to achieve the greatest success. The War of Art emphasizes the resolve needed to recognize and overcome the obstacles of ambition and then effectively shows how to reach the highest level of creative discipline. Think of it as tough love . . . for yourself.
ViewThe Practice
Seth Godin
From the bestselling author of Purple Cow and This is Marketing comes a book that will inspire artists, writers, and entrepreneurs to stretch and commit to putting their best work out into the world. Creative work doesn't come with a guarantee. But there is a pattern to who succeeds and who doesn't. And engaging in the consistent practice of its pursuit is the best way forward. Based on the breakthrough Akimbo workshop pioneered by legendary author Seth Godin, The Practice will help you get unstuck and find the courage to make and share creative work. Godin insists that: - Writer's block is a myth - Consistency is far more important than authenticity - Experiencing the imposter syndrome is a sign that you're a well-adjusted human. Most of all, he shows you what it takes to turn your passion from a private distraction to a productive contribution, the one you've been seeking to share all along.
ViewHow to Photograph Food - Compose, Shoot, and Edit Appetizing Images
Beata Lubas
Learn to create stunning images of food with this mouth-watering guide to culinary photography from expert author and instagram sensation Beata Lubas. Food photography is a rapidly-growing genre, and whether you're a food blogger looking to take your presentation to the next level, or a professional photographer keen to expand into this lucrative market, this book has everything you need to make it all a piece of cake. Using the techniques she has developed through years of professional success, Beata Lubas will teach you how to anticipate your clients' needs, articulate your own style, and skillfully manufacture sumptuous shots that leap from the page. Learn how to tell food stories using light, colour and shape to evoke atmosphere. Discover methods for shaping natural light to produce magical images in any environment. Combine styling tricks and camera skills to create sensational compositions. With clear, concise and comprehensive instruction to suite every skill level, this book takes you through all the stages involved in creating incredible food photography. So much more than just a guide to photographing food, this is a must-read manual for every photographer working with natural light.
ViewImagine - How Creativity Works
Jonah Lehrer
The profound mysteries of creative thought have long intimidated the world's finest brains. How do you measure the imagination? How do you quantify an epiphany? These daunting questions led researchers to neglect the subject for hundreds of years. In Jonah Lehrer's ambitious and enthralling new book, we go in search of the epiphany. Shattering the myth of creative 'types', Lehrer shows how new research is deepening our understanding of the human imagination. Creativity is not a 'gift' that only some possess. It's a term for a variety of distinct thought processes that we can all learn to use more effectively. Some acts of imagination are best done sipping espresso in a crowded cafe, while others require long walks in a quiet park. Lehrer helps us fit our creative strategies to the task at hand. The journey begins with the fluttering of neurons in the prefrontal cortex, before moving out to consider how this new science can also make neighbourhoods more vibrant, companies more productive and schools more effective. We'll learn about Bob Dylan's writing habits and the drug addiction of poets. We'll see why Elizabethan England experienced a creative explosion, and how Pixar designed its office space to get the most out of its talent. Collapsing the layers separating the neuron from the finished symphony, Imagine reveals the deep inventiveness of the human mind and its essential role in our increasingly complex world.
ViewEmotional Design - Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things
Don Norman
Why attractive things work better and other crucial insights into human-centered design Emotions are inseparable from how we humans think, choose, and act. In Emotional Design, cognitive scientist Don Norman shows how the principles of human psychology apply to the invention and design of new technologies and products. In The Design of Everyday Things, Norman made the definitive case for human-centered design, showing that good design demanded that the user's must take precedence over a designer's aesthetic if anything, from light switches to airplanes, was going to work as the user needed. In this book, he takes his thinking several steps farther, showing that successful design must incorporate not just what users need, but must address our minds by attending to our visceral reactions, to our behavioral choices, and to the stories we want the things in our lives to tell others about ourselves. Good human-centered design isn't just about making effective tools that are straightforward to use; it's about making affective tools that mesh well with our emotions and help us express our identities and support our social lives. From roller coasters to robots, sports cars to smart phones, attractive things work better. Whether designer or consumer, user or inventor, this book is the definitive guide to making Norman's insights work for you.
ViewThe Brand Gap - How to Bridge the Distance Between Business Strategy and Design : a Whiteboard Overview
Marty Neumeier
THE BRAND GAP is the first book to present a unified theory of brand-building. Whereas most books on branding are weighted toward either a strategic or creative approach, this book shows how both ways of thinking can unite to produce a "charismatic brand"--a brand that customers feel is essential to their lives. In an entertaining two-hour read you'll learn: * the new definition of brand * the five essential disciplines of brand-building * how branding is changing the dynamics of competition * the three most powerful questions to ask about any brand * why collaboration is the key to brand-building * how design determines a customer's experience * how to test brand concepts quickly and cheaply * the importance of managing brands from the inside * 220-word brand glossary From the back cover: Not since McLuhan's THE MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE has a book compressed so many ideas into so few pages. Using the visual language of the boardroom, Neumeier presents the first unified theory of branding--a set of five disciplines to help companies bridge the gap between brand strategy and customer experience. Those with a grasp of branding will be inspired by the new perspectives they find here, and those who would like to understand it better will suddenly "get it." This deceptively simple book offers everyone in the company access to "the most powerful business tool since the spreadsheet."
ViewThink Like a UX Researcher - How to Observe Users, Influence Design, and Shape Business Strategy
David Travis, Philip Hodgson
Think Like a UX Researcher will challenge your preconceptions about user experience (UX) research and encourage you to think beyond the obvious. You’ll discover how to plan and conduct UX research, analyze data, persuade teams to take action on the results and build a career in UX. The book will help you take a more strategic view of product design so you can focus on optimizing the user’s experience. UX Researchers, Designers, Project Managers, Scrum Masters, Business Analysts and Marketing Managers will find tools, inspiration and ideas to rejuvenate their thinking, inspire their team and improve their craft. Key Features A dive-in-anywhere book that offers practical advice and topical examples. Thought triggers, exercises and scenarios to test your knowledge of UX research. Workshop ideas to build a development team’s UX maturity. War stories from seasoned researchers to show you how UX research methods can be tailored to your own organization.
ViewUX Research - Practical Techniques for Designing Better Products
Brad Nunnally, David Farkas
One key responsibility of product designers and UX practitioners is to conduct formal and informal research to clarify design decisions and business needs. But there’s often mystery around product research, with the feeling that you need to be a research Zen master to gather anything useful. Fact is, anyone can conduct product research. With this quick reference guide, you’ll learn a common language and set of tools to help you carry out research in an informed and productive manner. This book contains four sections, including a brief introduction to UX research, planning and preparation, facilitating research, and analysis and reporting. Each chapter includes a short exercise so you can quickly apply what you’ve learned. Learn what it takes to ask good research questions Know when to use quantitative and qualitative research methods Explore the logistics and details of coordinating a research session Use softer skills to make research seem natural to participants Learn tools and approaches to uncover meaning in your raw data Communicate your findings with a framework and structure
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