About Face 2.0: The Essentials of Interaction Design, 2/e

First published seven years ago-just before the World Wide Web exploded into dominance in the software world-About Face rapidly became a bestseller. While the ideas and principles in the original book remain as relevant as ever, the examples in About Face 2.0 are updated to reflect the evolution of the Web.

Interaction Design professionals are constantly seeking to ensure that software and software-enabled products are developed with the end-user's goals in mind, that is, to make them more powerful and enjoyable for people who use them. About Face 2.0 ensures that these objectives are met with the utmost ease and efficiency.

Alan Cooper (Palo Alto, CA) has spent a decade making high-tech products easier to use and less expensive to build-a practice known as "Interaction Design." Cooper is now the leader in this growing field. Mr. Cooper is also the author of two bestselling books that are widely considered indispensable texts. About Face: The Essentials of User Interface Design, intro-duced the first comprehensive set of practical design principles. The Inmates Are Running the Asylum explains how talented people and companies continually create aggravating high-tech products that fail to meet customer expectations.

Robert Reimann has spent the past 15 years pushing the boundaries of digital products as a designer, writer, lecturer, and consultant. He has led dozens of interaction design projects in domains including e-commerce, portals, desktop productivity, authoring environments, medical and scientific instrumentation, wireless, and handheld devices for startups and Fortune 500 clients alike. Joining Cooper in 1996, Reimann led the development and refinement of many goal-directed design methods described in About Face 2.0. He has lectured on these methods at major universities and to international industry audiences. He is a member of the advisory board of the UC Berkeley Institute of Design.

Table of Contents

Foreword.

Acknowledgments.

Introduction.

Section One: Know Thy User.

Part I: Bridging the Gap.

  Chapter 1: Goal-Directed Design.

  Chapter 2: Implementation Models and Mental Models.

  Chapter 3: Beginners, Experts, and Intermediates.

  Chapter 4: Understanding Users: Qualitative Research.

  Chapter 5: Modeling Users: Personas and Goals.

  Chapter 6: Scenarios: Translating Goals into Design.

  Chapter 7: Synthesizing Good Design: Principles and Patterns.

Section Two: Designing Behavior and Form.

Part II: Achieving Goals and Removing Barriers.

  Chapter 8: Software Posture.

  Chapter 9: Orchestration and Flow.

  Chapter 10: Eliminating Excise.

  Chapter 11: Navigation and Inflection.

  Chapter 12: Understanding Undo.

  Chapter 13: Rethinking Files and Save.

Part III: Providing Power and Pleasure.

  Chapter 14: Making Software Considerate.

  Chapter 15: Making Software Smart.

  Chapter 16: Improving Data Ret rieval.

  Chapter 17: Improving Data Entry.

  Chapter 18: Designing for Different Needs.

Part IV: Applying Visual Design Principles.

  Chapter 19: Designing Look and Feel.

  Chapter 20: Metaphors, Idioms, and Affordances.

Section Three: Interaction Details.

Part V: Mice and Manipulation.

  Chapter 21: Direct Manipulation and Pointing Devices.

  Chapter 22: Selection.

  Chapter 23: Drag and Drop.

  Chapter 24: Manipulating Controls, Objects, and Connections.

Part VI: Controls and Their Behaviors.

  Chapter 25: Window Behaviors.

  Chapter 26: Using Controls.

  Chapter 27: Menus: The Pedagogic Vector.

  Chapter 28: Using Menus.

  Chapter 29: Using Toolbars and ToolTips.

  Chapter 30: Using Dialogs.

  Chapter 31: Dialog Etiquette.

  Chapter 32: Creating Better Controls.

Part VII: Communicating with Users.

  Chapter 33: Eliminating Errors.

  Chapter 34: Notifying and Confirming.

  Chapter 35: Other Communication with Users.

  Chapter 36: The Installation Process.

Part VIII: Designing Beyond the Desktop.

  Chapter 37: Designing for the Web.

  Chapter 38: Designing for Embedded Systems.

  Afterword: Dealing with the Inmates.

  Appendix A: Axioms.

  Appendix B: Design Tips.

  Appendix C: Bibliography

  Index.