GUI Design for Dummies
by Laura Arlov, IDG Books, 1997
This is not a book that I would normally have
bought. I don't consider myself a "dummy" at UI Design
and would naturally assume that it was an entry level discussion
of User Interface regurgitating much of what has been covered in
other books. It was perhaps with this in mind that Laura Arlov
asked me to review it. The book for this review was supplied FOC
from IDG. This has not affected the decision to review the book or
the content of the review.
Having read the book, if I have a single
criticism it is the title. Arlov is married to the Norwegian
translator for "Dummies" books and it is therefore no
surprise that she and IDG chose to put this title out within the
same range. I can't help feeling, that was a mistake. The book is
aimed at developers, especially UI coders who don't know a great
deal about UI Design as a discipline. However, I am not so sure
that such programmers would recognise themselves as "UI
Design Dummies" and may therefore skip over an otherwise
thoroughly worthwhile book.
Psychology and Sociology
UIDesign.net reviewer, Jeff de Luca has a
saying, "IT is 80% psychology and only 20% technology".
In fact it is known as De Luca's 1st law of IT. The gist is that
often IT practitioners spend all of their time addressing
technology issues and fail to look at the psychology and people
issues. Most books on UI Design fall into this trap. They talk
about widgets and behaviour, graphic design and visual
communication, user interviews and task analysis, MVC and
Notification, but rarely do they talk about people and how to
understand them better and how to work together with them and how
to get the job done better. They don't tell you how to get your
system delivered and meet all the necessary technology goals
together. I am pleased to report that this book does and it
repeatedly does throughout the whole text.
Arlov walks us through a process for analysing
and designing a User Interface from start to finish, pulling on
her years of real experience as a practitioner in the field. The
book has immense scope covering the topics of "in-house"
IT development and "shrink-wrap" software development or
"custom UI" and "package UI" as she calls
them. As well as this breadth, the matter is considered in depth
too. Processes for each stage are presented and explained and
alternatives given. Arlov shows us that she understands that
process, procedure and technique need to vary according to the
size of a project and the number of people involved. She presents
the alternatives and discusses them sufficiently to leave you with
the feeling that you can now go forward and tackle a specific task
or problem.
Overall I was left feeling that this is the
most thorough book about a methodology for User Interface Design
that I have read so far. It is clearly aimed at those who must be
practitioners in the field, even if they carry another job title.
Style
This book is published in a very clear and
accesible format. It uses a style which helps the reader to
clearly identify areas of interest. A series of icons are used to
help identify practical tips, specific discussion of "package
UI" or "custom UI", things to remember and that all
important non-technical stuff. There are also series of checklists
for helping the reader to assess what they need to do to get
something done, such as conducting a user interview. A number of
these checklists are printed on a handy tear out card for easy
reference. There is also a CD Rom which contains the real data for
some useful things like a "GUI Standard". Its never a
good idea to invent everything from scratch and Arlov gives us all
the benefit of her experience by including these things on the
disk.
So what's in it?
Part 1 addresses Goals for a project and the
constraints to which it must work within. It teaches you how to
ask the right questions and how to resolve conflicts when the
answers don't all match, how to identify technology and plan out
the work to be done. In Part 2 we look at the early design
decisions which must be made. Chapter 4 presents a discussion on
the different types of user interface and the pros and cons of
using them in different situations. This was one of the best
discussions on this topic that I've read. I particularly liked the
graph on page 68 which plots learning time, flexibility, admin
overhead, and effectiveness for routine work (transaction workers)
against the four identified types, Multi-window, MDI, Mutli-pane
and multi-screen. If Arlov is considering re-working this text
then Browser and Webtop styles also need to be considered in
future. Its amazing that this book is only 2 years old and yet so
much has happened to UI Design and technology in the intervening
period.
Next there is a super and clear explanation of
Mental model and Metaphor and how to make a design present the
mental model in an obvious and upfront manner. In Chapter 6 we are
introduced to Navigation Models. I use slightly different
terminology for this, either Interaction or UI Model but I
wouldn't argue with the content. Its important in all IT to focus
on delivering goals and not to get bogged down in debates over
terminology. Chatpter 7 gives us UI Standards and why its
important to have one but not to be dogmatic about it.
Part 3 gets onto designing interfaces that
work. First of all, talk to the users and don't take no for an
answer. There is some super advice on how to go about User
Interviews and User Task Analysis. No need to read weightier tombs
on this topic because this is excellent stuff. Full of all that
psychology thing that I was on about earlier. Moving logically on,
we are shown how to design system scenarios which match the Users
tasks. These sound a lot like Use Cases and perhaps advocates for
them could learn something from this approach.
Chapter 10 teaches us how to design a set of
windows for the design scenario which meets the task and hence
design a series of windows to perform a task. Neat!
Chapter 11 takes us back into well covered UI
material showing us how to improve visual communication and
usability with feedback and improved graphic design techniques.
There is some good educational stuff on affordances and how to use
them to advantage and discussion of the pros and cons of metaphor
and analogy. Chapter 12 is heavy on usability such as eliminating
waiting and reducing keystrokes.
Part 4 is simply titled Designing Windows. If
you've read another book on UI then you've probably read most of
this before. What makes GUI Design for Dummies different is that
Arlov takes 180 pages to explain why and how one should go about
it before explaining fine detail on Visual Design and
communication, layout, colour, icons, graphics, and widgets.
Finally a book which strikes the right balance between the
on-screen technology and everything else that is important in a
good design.
Part 5 gives us a fresh look at testing and
what to do to improve design and usability as well as Chapter 19
which looks at other ways (other than testing) which will help
design such as walk-through (I'm a big fan), heuristic evaluation
and site observations.
Part 6 is more like a set of appendices. It
gives us lists of useful stuff such as "Murphy's Laws of GUI
Design", "Ten things to tell whether your GUI is good"
and the really neat, "10 things a Project Leader can do".
If you don't have an enlightened boss then get him to have a read.
The book rounds off with a list of 10 resources for UI Designers
which doesn't include UIDesign.net :-) (maybe next time?)
Summary
A thorough attempt to present a methodology for
UI Design. It is well argued and detailed and written by an
experienced practitioner for the benefit of the less experienced.
I like the style of the writing which is forthright, practical,
full of "can do" language and both friendly and helpful.
It never talks down to the reader. It is a good teaching book
which shows through clearly presented examples, the dos and don'ts
of the many tasks involved in developing a good UI Design. If this
was made compulsory reading at software houses and IT shops across
the planet then the reputation of the software industry would be
the better for it.
If Laura Arlov is considering a 2nd edition
then I would urge IDG to consider repacking it and pitching it
alongside their other winner, "About Face" by Alan
Cooper. I consider this a more important and more accessible read
which only dummies would be without.
Recommendation
5/5 - Another important "must have"
book for UI Developers and Designers. |
