Don't Make Me Think:
A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability
Author: Steve Krug
Softcover: 208 pages
Publisher: Artech House Publishers; (December 1, 2003)
ISBN: 158053791X
Steve Krug's book, "Don't Make Me Think" is undoubtedly one of the best interface design books I've read. And I've read a few. Looking out over my desk I can see a good 20 odd books on usability and interface design, and "Don't Make Me Think" is the pick of the lot in the web design category.
The reason I find this book so valuable is because it's jam packed with practical hints and guidelines - unlike so many of the other interface design books you will find on the book shelves, that tend to be full of theory, and nothing you can really sink your teeth into.
I've read that Steve Krug is the guy that Amazon calls when they have a design dilemma, which elevates him to the level of guru, in my eyes at least. With the amount of traffic Amazon gets on an average day they can't afford to have a site that isn't usable.
The essence of "Don't Make Me Think" lies in its simplicity. Divided up into bite size chapters, you can jump to a section that interests you, or you can read the book in a more traditional cover-to-cover fashion. This makes it one of my most valuable reference books - I often open it up whilst working on a project just to double check a particular point.
When reading a book, you often think you understand a particular concept, but when you actually have to use it you realise that you didn't really understand it well enough. In this book, practical exercises make you actually practice what you are learning. So once you put this book down you'll really be able to get stuck in and deconstruct web sites to make them more usable.
Steve Krug has the most amazing way of making me understand abstract interface design concepts. He does this by relating the concepts to real world examples. By using analogies like street signs to Hansel and Gretel's bread crumbs, he'll make sure you understand what it is he's trying to explain.
To keep you entertained throughout the book Steve Krug employs a healthy dose of humour. With the use of cartoon strips and little animated characters he helps you see the lighter side to some of the situations we tend to take very seriously. More importantly he employs this humour to make you take a critical look at the way we are designing and how we can improve on it.
I haven't done an exact count, but I'd hazard a guess that more than half of the book's pages are taken up by images. After all, websites are in fact just large images made up of text and graphics. So if you're generally put off by large boring text books then this is just the book for you - written to be read on a short plane ride it's really designed for the so called non-reader.
Steve Krug teaches the reader how to ensure that the user doesn't spend too much time thinking about how to use the site, but rather spends his time USING it. The book provides the reader with all the tools he will need in order to do this. Disciplines covered range from Information Illustration guidelines, to an introduction to Usability Testing.
The target audience for this book would encompass those in the fields of graphical design, web development, and business analysis right through to the CEO. It's written for anyone that wants to get a basic understanding of usability. It doesn't delve into the more scientific fields of quantitative analysis, or the cognitive psychology fields, but rather keeps its target audience by using pure common sense, and therefore could be viewed more as a book on heuristics.
This book is an excellent introduction to the field of interface design, not only for web sites, but also for any user interface that relies on a heavy graphical element. This book is a must have for anyone involved in user interface design. I know I can't live without it.
Trish Müllenberg
About Trish Müllenberg:
Trish Müllenberg has been working in the field of Usability Engineering for the better part of 4 years. She is self taught, mostly from reading books and attending the odd workshop. Her interests lie predominantly in Interaction Design and the fields of cognitive psychology and quantitative analysis techniques.