User Interface Design for Programmers

ellenf contributes this review of User Interface Design for Programmers. "Aimed at programmers who don't know much about user interface design and think it is something to fear, Joel Spolsky provides a great primer, with some entertaining and informative examples of good and bad design implementations, including some of the thought process behind the decisions. Spolsky feels that programmers fear design because they consider it a creative process rather than a logical one; he shows that the basic principles of good user interface design are logical and not based on some mysterious, indefinable magic." Read on for the rest of ellenf's review. User Interface Design for Programmers author Joel Spolsky pages 144 publisher Apress rating 8 reviewer Ellen ISBN 1893115941 summary Aimed at programmers who don't know much about user interface design and think it is something to fear, Joel provides a great primer, with some entertaining and informative examples of good and bad design implementations, including some of the thought process behind the decisions. He feels that programmers fear design because it is a creative process rather than a logical one and shows that the basic principles of good user interface design are logical and not based on some mysterious indefinable magic.

Spolsky's light writing style makes this book an easy read, and his personal stories and anecdotes help make his thoughts on user interface stick in your mind when you're done reading. He provides programmers with a few simple guidelines to follow, such as "People Can't Read," and "People Can't Control the Mouse."

His focus on the logic of good user interfaces and his push to develop a good user model is bound to resonate and get programmers to think about making their interfaces logical from the user's perspective, rather than the perspective of the inner architecture, which the user could typically care less about.

The reminder to focus on the tasks the user is trying to accomplish rather than the long feature list that usually gets attached to product specifications should be read by product managers as well, of course. In fact, the absence of specific platform details makes the book a good read for anyone involved in software design -- with the caveat that it is not aimed at people with much design experience. This is a great starter book and makes the process understandable, friendly, and fun-sounding. (One of the things I appreciated was how much fun it sounds like Spolsky has when he's working.)

Spolsky encourages showing the in-progress software to users and watching them use it. I think one of his best points about usability testing is that if the programmers and designers cannot bother to watch the users during the testing, they're unlikely to gain much from a thick report by a testing lab. He encourages simple, quick, and casual usability testing, something even the smallest firm could afford and from which they would could draw useful improvements.

If you have much design experience, you'll find this book a bit basic, but even then the examples are worthwhile to read and remind yourself how a good idea can be poorly implemented sometimes -- usually by taking it too far! I was personally hoping for some richer comments about designing web applications, but if more people start paying attention to the basic guidelines he's covered here, web users will benefit.

In summary, the book is aimed at programmers without much design experience and Spolsky does a great job of hitting his mark. I think product managers without much design experience would benefit as well, as it provides a good basis for thinking about user interface design.

You can purchase User Interface Design for Programmers from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

Comments

Re:$9 cheaper

[SoCalChris]

Bookpool has it $2 cheaper than Amazon, and you're not giving business to someone who is abusing the patent system.

http://www.bookpool.com/.x/ejmrmq9fa6/sm/189311594 1

try before you buy

[Henry_Doors]

You can read nine(!) sample chapters on Joels website

Re:programmers think they know UI

[Sigma 7]

any (non-browser) program that opens a URL thorugh the OS, be it the start menu, should OPEN UP A NEW FRICKIN' BROWSER WINDOW rather than highjacking an existing one.

Actually, it's the browser that makes that decision. If you find that these third party applications hose whatever background content you were holding regardless of the available, you might want to switch browsers.

I can tell you how to fix that in IE: Goto Tools -> Internet Options -> Advanced. Look for an item called "Reuse windows for launching shortcuts". Uncheck it.

Re:What if grandma isn't the target?

[nachoboy]

It seems as if you are only familiar with the GUI method of setting network properties. While it's easy to make fun of Windows XP for all its gaudiness, Microsoft finally added a whole slew of great command line tools which are often overlooked. netsh for example is a great command line, hierarchical interface to network adapter properties and settings. Spend a little time with it and you'll never go fishing through those silly dialogs again. diskpart is another great addition that should have been there long ago. sc for service configuration and bootcfg for making changes to your boot.ini - the list is pretty extensive. More info in %systemroot%\help\ntcmds.chm.