Learning Design for UI and Website Design

Question

I'm current a computer science student with a minor in psychology. I have the programming down when it comes to software design, but not so much the design of UI. What are some good books/websites/blogs for learning design principles for user interfaces and/or websites?

Answer 1

A must read: Don't Make Me Think

Answer 2

Essentially all you need to know about UX and how to become part of it: http://whitneyhess.com/blog/2009/06/30/so-you-wanna-be-a-user-experience-designer-step-1-resources/

Answer 3

Jakob Nielsen 's Useit.com. Lot's of works there, and basically it is about the usability engineering (ie, not on aesthetic side of design), which is quite controversial to many web designers.

A List apart provides a great bunch of tips and tricks and also articles on web layout and design.

Answer 4

I'd look at A List Apart and Signals vs. Noise for good advice, but learning about design is about exposing yourself to a lot of good and bad design — look at really well designed websites (like those made by HappyCog, SimpleBits, or Airbag Industries). Look at all the people who work there, their blogs, their work, their books — be inspired but never copy.

I'd also be wary of sites dedicated exclusively to 'user experience' design or 'usability', many of the principles of design have nothing to do with user testing, studies or HCI, and focusing to much on those things can lead to development of methodologies rather than sense. I'd recommend taking a class in communication design and learning about type. Good design starts with type and hierarchy — Thinking With Type is a great introductory book. Also read about grid systems and gestalt psychology.

Good luck!

Answer 5

One of the best ways to get better at UI design is to look around. Look at the design of web sites / applications with a critical eye.

See what you like and don't like about different elements of these sites. Over time, this will make you a much better web designer.

Answer 6

One more book that would be helpful is "The Design of Everyday Things" by Donald.A. Norman. Though not about GUI design perse this book talks about design in general and how best some of the everyday things we are exposed to (say doors) can be better designed so that there isn't a need for explicit instructions to do obvious things that an object (say door) is supposed to do.

Answer 7

Designing Interfaces by Jenifer Tidwell is a good one.

Answer 8

The consummate book on UI design is Don't Make Me Think. Additionally, The Design of Everyday Things is enlightening though it is not specifically about UI design.

That said, my experience with UI design has been primarily focused on web applications. I have found the work by Dan Cederholm to be the most enlightening in designing excellent user interfaces for the web. One of the most important aspects of web design is ensuring semantically correct accessible sites and Cederholm does an excellent job describing how to do that in Web Standards Solutions which was followed by the also excellent Bulletproof Web Design.

Though the CSS Zen Garden may not be explicitly about UI design it is an outstanding example of what can be accomplished visually through CSS-based design.

Finally, an often overlooked part of UI design is delivering effective error messages. While, Defensive Design for the Web emphasizes web error design much of what is described is applicable to other mediums. Those responsible for the book 37Signals maintain an excellent blog Signal vs. Noise.

Answer 9

The principle of beautiful web design is a great book. A must read........

http://www.sitepoint.com/books/design1/

Answer 10

Smashing Magazine (new articles daily) covers many topics which include many good quality design articles. Usability Post also has some quality material, although it isn't updated all that frequently.

Answer 11

I really like Designing the Obvious. It has a lot of good, simple ideas and it's short enough to read in a day or two to get the feel and then reread later to let more sink in.

Answer 12

You'll also find some answers (including mine) at this recent Stack Overflow question.

My must-read list includes:

• The Non-Designer's Design Book
• The Elements of Typographic Style
• Designer's Color Manual ad/or Light and Color in Nature and Art
• Almost anything by Wucius Wong, particularly Principles of Form and Design
• Meggs' History of Graphic Design, and/or Graphic Design History by Steven Heller
• The works of Edward Tufte
• Information Architecture (Rosenfeld)
• Designing Interfaces (Tidwell)
• Be familiar with Jakob Nielsen's work but don't let it run your life
• Michael Angeles' website, urlgreyhot
• Khoi Vinh's website, Subtraction

Answer 13

A book that a friend of mine is reading is Elements of Design: A Graphical Style Guide. I figured I'd just mention it here.