User Interface design books/resources for programmers

Question

Hi,

I'm going to make my monthly trip to the bookstore soon and I'm kind of interested in learning some user interface and/or design stuff - mostly web related, what are some good books I should look at? One that I've seen come up frequently in the past is Don't Make Me Think, which looks promising.

I'm aware of the fact that programmers often don't make great designers, and as such this is more of a potential hobby thing than a move to be a professional designer.

I'm also looking for any good web resources on this topic. I subscribed to Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox newsletter, for instance, although it seems to come only once a month or so.

Thanks!

Somewhat related questions:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/75863/what-are-the-best-resources-for-designing-user-interfaces http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7973/user-interface-design

Answer 1

Don't Make Me Think is the one!

Also check out Steve Krug's website for tips and sample forms for usability testing.

Answer 2

The design of everyday things ? An "old" classic, but useful if you plan anything that requires human interaction.

Answer 3

The Apple Human Interface Guidlines are great!

Answer 4

Tufte, Visual Display of Quantitative Information http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/

Don Norman, Design of Everyday Things http://www.jnd.org/

Answer 5

This is not directly related to GUI design or programming, but The Psychology of Everyday Things is a good book to read.

It is a general look at how things are designed and how they fail. The concepts in this book, although not directly applicable to GUI's, do apply. In fact you could say they apply to all instances of user centered design.

http://www.amazon.com/Psychology-Everyday-Things-Donald-Norman/dp/0465067093

Answer 6

Although completely independent of web and programming, The Design of Everyday Things by Donald Norman taught me a lot!

For a less in-depth, more cook-book approach (if you don't want to think), try Robin Williams' The Non-Designer's Design Book: Design and Typographic Principles for the Visual Novice.

Presonally I much prefer The Design of Everyday Things.

Answer 7

Also take a look at Alan Cooper's About Face.

Answer 8

AboutFace.3.0 The Essentials of Interaction Design would be good Idea to read

Answer 9

"Don't Make Me Think" is great. After sitting in on several usability studies I can safely say that several of his biggest points are the kinds of things drilled in your head over and over.

Joel Spolsky's book on user interfaces is also decent.

http://www.amazon.com/User-Interface-Design-Programmers-Spolsky/dp/1893115941

Answer 10

Joel Spolsky's User Interface Design for Programmers is at least entertaining, and a recommended read.

Answer 11

Asked recently on another question. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/158769/best-books-to-learn-about-design

Good list there.

Answer 12

Additionally to the great hints given so far, also see the Windows User Experience Interaction Guidelines, as described in this interesting blog post by Kirill Osenkov.