About face 2.0

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1. tootieFeb 2024
   The top answer references About Face 2.0 which I read at the time and it's still probably the best book on user experience design. I think there's newer editions, but the principles it laid out were really the fundaments that I still live by.
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2. TuringTestFeb 2023
   I self-taught those principles decades ago with "About Face 2.0", "The Design of Everyday Things" and "Don't Make Me Think". Though old, I know they provide solid principles because I still find them relevant today.

   These come from an era before HCI was a professional discipline taught in schools. I suspect newer books don't teach these general principles because they take for granted that a professional will have learned them already through their formal training, so they can focus on specifics.

   https://www.amazon.com/About-Face-2-0-Essentials-Interaction...

   https://www.amazon.com/-/es/Don-Norman/dp/0465050654/ref=pd_...

   https://www.amazon.com/-/es/Steve-Krug/dp/0321965515/ref=pd_...

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3. tejcirkulateDec 2018
   1. Contextual design, holzblat How to understand and structure a user's life and environment and what to look for when they are struggling with a problem or using your product.

   2. Lean Customer Development, Cindy Alvarez Practical and immediately useful guide to interviewing and talking to users. Read after the Contextual Inquiry book above. If that book teaches what to understand about a user's workflow and environment, this one teaches how to elicit those answers from customers when talking to them.

   3. About Face 3, alan cooper If the previous two are about (a) what to look for when understanding a customer and (b) how to get the info you need to build solutions for those customers, then this book is about translating those learnings into user journeys and experiences.

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4. tejcirkulateNov 2018
   If you're willing to put in the effort for some serious study, then try these 2 books. They worked very well for me.

   a. About Face 3 by Alan Cooper

   b. Contextual Design by Karen Holtzblatt

   These two will set you up.

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5. neosatOct 2016
   If you can read only one book read About Face 2.0 You can find a somewhat better about most of the topics mentioned there that go into more depth into individual topics (except maybe the core of interaction design) but About Face 2.0 will give you a solid foundation into design applied to interfaces.
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6. shaileshJul 2013
   Assuming that you've found an interesting business problem to solve:

   1. Write a list of desired features. Next, prioritize those features.

   2. Write brief functional specifications for features of highest priority.

   3. Decide on how you want to use the software stacks for different tiers, e.g.

      Browser - Bootstrap or Zurb, AngularJS
   
      Server stack - node.js, Ruby, Python
   
      Database - MySQL, Postgres
   
      These examples are sketchy, just to give a feel of things.
   

   4. Research any libraries that automatically handle common functional units, such as authentication and authorization, analytics et al.

   5. Some functional units might be implemented more easily by gluing together services. E.g. using New Relic for deep application monitoring, Twilio for cloud communications.

   6. Design and implement all functional units.

   7. Profit!

   8. Write a Thank you HN note, :)

   One should do this exercise for a "toy" application like "To Do List" first. It helps remarkably when we go about building serious stuff.

   Books: 1. Code Complete by Steve McConnell - worth at least skimming it.

   2. Design Patterns by Erich Gamma et al http://www.c2.com/cgi/wiki?DesignPatterns

   Also, definitely have a look at Peter Norvig's slides: http://norvig.com/design-patterns

   3. About Face 3: The Essentials of Interaction Design by Alan Cooper

   4. Writing Effective Use Cases by Alistair Cockburn

   Websites: 1. Obviously, HN, :)

   2. http://highscalability.com/

   It may look like a huge undertaking, but it really isn't. A quote from Michael Abrash seems appropriate here, "Winning a hard race prepares us for the next harder one."

   This is just top of the mind; hope this helps.

   Good luck.

   Edit: formatting.

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