November 2006 Archives

A list of books and essays that anyone involved in the software/web development industry should read, understand and learn from.

Books

• The Art of project Management (Scott Berkun)
• The Best Software Writing I: Selected and Introduced (Joel Spolsky)
• Joel on Software: And on Diverse and Occasionally Related Matters That Will Prove of Interest to Software Developers, Designers, and Managers, and to Those Who, Whether by Good Fortune or Ill-Luck, Work with Them in Some Capacity (by Joel Spolsky)
• User Interface Design for Programmers (Joel Spolsky and Dave Winer)
• Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web (Christina Wodtke)
• Getting Real (37 Signals) Free Download
• Defensive Design for the Web: How to Improve Error Messages, Help, Forms, and Other Online Crisis Points (37signals)
• The Tipping Point (Malcolm Gladwell)
• Blink (Malcolm Gladwell)
• Understanding Comics (Scott McCloud)
• Coder to developer (Mike Gunderloy)
• Design of everyday things (Don Norman)
• Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things (Don Norman)
• The Inmates Are Running the Asylum: Why High-tech Products Drive Us Crazy and How to Restore the Sanity (Alan Cooper)
• About Face 2.0: The Essentials of Interaction Design (Alan Cooper)
• Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams (Tom DeMarco, Timothy Lister)
• Code Complete: A Practical Handbook of Software Construction (Steve McConnell)
• Rapid Development (Steve McConnell)
• The Mythical Man Month and Other Essays on Software Engineering (Frederick P. Brooks)
• How Buildings Learn: What Happens After They're Built (Stewart Brand)
• The facts and fallacies of software engineering (Robert Glass)
• Don't make me think (Steve Krug)
• Utopian Entrepreneur (Brenda Laurel)
• The Elements of User Experience - User-Centered Design for the Web (Jessy James Garrett)

Anything to add, recommend, Email me. In addition take a look at:

• Don Norman's reading list
• Joel Spolsky's reading list
• Donna Maurer's reading list

Essays

Don Norman

• Human-Centered Design Considered Harmful
• Ad-Hoc Personas & Empathetic Focus
• Cautions Cars & Cantankerous Kitchens

Joel Spolsky

• Getting Things Done When You're Only a Grunt
• The Joel Test: 12 Steps to Better Code
• Painless Bug Tracking
• The Development Abstraction Layer
• The Guerrilla Guide to Interviewing
• Human Task Switches Considered Harmful

Scott Berkun

• Advice for new managers: part 1 & part 2
• How to make a difference
• How to survive a bad manager
• Why smart people defend bad ideas
• Why you must lead or follow
• Why smart people defend bad ideas

Ivan Towlson

• The parable of the managers
• Passion in the workplace

 As it is my website I'd like to suggest a couple of my articles too. :)

• User Experience in a software development team (Read Ivan's reply to this article)
• Personal Development
• Is being a generalist really a good thing?
• Wear sunscreen! (Advice for aspiring developers)

As is normal - I'm the last the hear!

The Windows Live team have released a rather fantastic tool called Windows Live Write. It's fantastic - you can write as if in word and have it publish directly to your blog (in my case MT blog)! I've been waiting years for something like this.

I've had my suspicions but now I'm really starting to think that Microsoft are starting to get thier act together! Microsoft a force to be recond with again!

14th November - World Usability day.

To celebrate I'm going to wear Velcro shoes and hire out an automatic car, perhaps with variable cruise control. I may even get a Velcro jump suit just to top the out fit off.

I suggest we UX (UE) professional adopt this as our uniform of choice :)

If you like what you've read here, and would like me to come to talk to your development team, class, or gathering about:

• User Experience
• Usability
• Accessibility
• User Experience in a Software Development Team
• Software development best practice

Dear new developer

"If i could give you one tip for the future..."

• Passion - This is the most important. Skills can be learnt, Knowledge can be gained
• Be able to cross transfer skills and ideas from other industries, our industry especially web development is too young to have all the answers.
• Don't be afraid to ask help from those more experienced,
• Try to understand the underlying causes of problems, not just the symptoms.
• Understand the jobs of those around you: user experience, support, testing, marketing. Know how to talk to them, it'll make your job a whole lot easier.

Thank you

Matt Goddard

After two years of working with Don Norman on jnd.org I actually got the opportunity to meet him in person on Monday (6/11/06).

The double pleasure for me was that our meeting coincided with NNG User Experience 2006 Conference which meant I also got to attend a rather wonderful seminar on managing the user experience team delivered by Janice Rohn of the World Savings Bank and I had the great pleasure to meet, talk to and have lunch with Jakob Nielsen and most of the other speakers - not Scott McCloud unfortunately!

To top it all off Don delivered a truly passionate keynote speech on the future of design where he described his guidelines for future design:

• Task Centered not Human Centered
• Users? People not Users
• Personas for applications
• Separate design from study
• no more error messages
• Take the business point of view

and gave an outline of his forthcoming book "The future of everyday things" due out in 2007; which incidentally you can read the first chapter, Cautions Cars & Cantankerous Kitchens, at Don's website jnd.org. Don also described a future for User Experience professionals moving away from application design to integrated product design, as there is further convergence of computer systems and appliances into a fully connected environment. I personally can't wait for the toilet to analyse my stool and send a report off to the doctor perhaps by then the NHS Connecting for health project will actually be finished!

Oh and if you want to find out more, consider man+car, man+fridge as one entity - the horse metaphor is the new black!