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UI is Communication
How to Design Intuitive, User Centered Interfaces by Focusing on Effective Communication
- 1st Edition - May 24, 2013
- Author: Everett N McKay
- Language: English
- Paperback ISBN:9 7 8 - 0 - 1 2 - 3 9 6 9 8 0 - 4
- eBook ISBN:9 7 8 - 0 - 1 2 - 3 9 7 2 8 7 - 3
User interface design is a challenging, multi-disciplinary activity that requires understanding a wide range of concepts and techniques that are often subjective and even co… Read more
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Request a sales quoteUser interface design is a challenging, multi-disciplinary activity that requires understanding a wide range of concepts and techniques that are often subjective and even conflicting. Imagine how much it would help if there were a single perspective that you could use to simplify these complex issues down to a small set of objective principles. In UI is Communication, Everett McKay explains how to design intuitive user interfaces by focusing on effective human communication. A user interface is ultimately a conversation between users and technology. Well-designed user interfaces use the language of UI to communicate to users efficiently and naturally. They also recognize that there is an emotional human being at the other end of the interaction, so good user interfaces strive to make an emotional connection. Applying what you learn from UI is Communication will remove much of the mystic, subjectiveness, and complexity from user interface design, and help you make better design decisions with confidence. It’s the perfect introduction to user interface design.
- Approachable, practical communication-based guide to interaction and visual design that you can immediately apply to projects to make solid design decisions quickly and confidently
- Includes design makeovers so you can see the concepts in practice with real examples
- Communication-based design process ties everything from interaction to visual design together
Primary: non-designer software professionals, especially software developers, managers, and business analysts.
Secondary: Designers interested in usability, as well as college students taking courses on UX design.
Introduction
Chapter 1: Communication Design Principles
- Imagine this typical UI design situation
- Core principles of UI is Communication
- Effective communication
- Intuitive UI
- Necessary (and unnecessary) consistency
- Strategically unintuitive UI
- Levels of intuitiveness
- Inductive UI
- Strategically deductive UI
- Asking intuitive questions
- A model for users
- Summary
- Exercises
Chapter 2: Interaction Design
- Interactions
- Controls (words)
- Commands (verbs)
- Labels and instructions
- Feedback
- Grouping (sentences)
- Task steps (paragraphs, monologues, and dialogues)
- Task navigation
- Surfaces (documents)
- Errors, warnings, confirmations, and notifications (interruptions)
- Dynamic elements
- Summary
- Exercises
Chapter 3: Visual Design
- The importance of effective visual design
- Working with graphic designers
- Layout
- Designing for scanning
- Typography and text
- Color
- Affordances
- Icons and glyphs
- Animations and transitions
- Demanding attention
- Summary
- Exercises
Chapter 4: Communicating to People
- The importance of making an emotional connection
- Having a personality
- Personality attributes
- Having a good tone
- Motivating users by providing obvious value
- Minimizing effort
- Having forgiveness
- Building trustworthiness
- Being smart without looking stupid
- Not being annoying
- Using courageous design
- Why be dull? Make it fun!
- Summary
- Exercises
Chapter 5: A Communication-driven Design Process
- A communication-driven design process
- Don’t design like a programmer
- What exactly is design?
- A basic design process
- The classic process mistakes
- The planning phase
- The design phase
- The refinement phase
- Giving and receiving feedback
- What about Agile development?
- Summary
- Exercises
Chapter 6: UI Design Case Studies
- An overview of common alternative design approaches
- Design challenge 1: An airline travel desktop site
- Design challenge 2: An airline travel mobile app
- Summary
- Exercises
Conclusion
- No. of pages: 378
- Language: English
- Edition: 1
- Published: May 24, 2013
- Imprint: Morgan Kaufmann
- Paperback ISBN: 9780123969804
- eBook ISBN: 9780123972873
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Everett N McKay
Everett McKay is Principal of UX Design Edge (uxdesignedge.com), a user experience design training and consulting company for mobile, web, and desktop applications based in Vermont. Everett’s specialty is UX design training for software professionals who aren’t experienced designers through onsite and public courses and workshops. He also runs AskAUXExpert.com, a web-based UX design consulting service.
Previously, Everett was a Senior Program Manager at Microsoft Corporation on the Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows Server teams. While there, he was responsible for the writing of and consulting on the Windows User Experience Interaction Guidelines. While at Microsoft, he was also responsible for teaching their in-house introductory UI design course. Before joining Microsoft, Everett was a programmer, specializing in designing and developing Windows and Macintosh user interfaces. He holds master’s and bachelor’s degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT.
Affiliations and expertise
is principal of UX Design Edge, a user experience design training and consulting firm specializing in helping non-designers, based in St. Albans, Vermont.Read UI is Communication on ScienceDirect