Cheap Don’t Make Me Think Steve Krug 2nd Edition
Buy Steve Krug’s book a common sense approach to web usability help to changes the way you think about web design. Now at 30% off in paperback.
Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, 2nd Edition (Paperback)
by Steve Krug (Author)
Textbook Details
* Paperback: 216 pages
* Publisher: New Riders Press; 2nd edition (August 28, 2005)
* Language: English
* ISBN-10: 0321344758
* ISBN-13: 978-0321344755
* Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.9 x 0.6 inches
* Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
* Rating: 
Textbook Description
Five years and more than 100,000 copies after it was first published, it’s hard to imagine anyone working in Web design who hasn’t read Steve Krug’s “instant classic” on Web usability, but people are still discovering it every day.
In this second edition, Steve adds three new chapters in the same style as the original: wry and entertaining, yet loaded with insights and practical advice for novice and veteran alike. Don’t be surprised if it completely changes the way you think about Web design.
Three New Chapters!
* Usability as common courtesy — Why people really leave Web sites
* Web Accessibility, CSS, and you — Making sites usable and accessible
* Help! My boss wants me to… — Surviving executive design whims
Don’t Make Me Think Review
As a web designer that owns my own domain, I had purchased Jakob Nielsens Wed Design Usability book and loved it. I thought nothing could top it, but then I was in a book store and picked Don’t Make Me Think up. It had some high-power reviews of the book on that back cover. When I opened this book up, I understood why. This book talks about Web Design as and ways to understand why a site needs to be design to the specific user the designer has in mind. Highly respect design expert Roger Black writes the forward. I remember buying a book of his years ago called Websites That Work. While a beautiful book, it was before its time and lacking what Krug has written into this book. I’d recommend this to anyone who has purchased Nielsen’s book. It refreshing that there is actually credible suggestion out there.
“Don’t Make Me Think” is an excellent book for those designing web sites. It’s a great title, and a great motto for designing any type of technology, not just web sites. Krug calls it “thinking” when you have to stop focusing on your task to figure out the web site, even if only for a few milliseconds. The book is very well written in an engaging, informal style that feels more like a conversation than a lecture (not easy for a book that is essentially preaching). The layout is wonderful and follows its own advice. Each page is designed to make one good point, and the gazillions of images are simple, clear, and effective in supporting the points. Although a lot shorter (by design) than Jakob Nielsen’s “Designing Web Usability,” I found it provided a lot more specific, on-target advice — both per pound and overall. Whereas Nielsen focuses mainly on page design and site design, Krug handles these as well as interaction design, which is missing from Nielsen’s book. It has some good examples that you are encouraged to work through before looking at “the answers.” It’s a good technique. He also has a terrific section that lays out exactly how you conduct a usability test, from greeting the person to interpreting their behavior.
Not much too add beyond what many of the other reviewers have said, except that it was a real pleasure to read such an approachable book, and get so many good ideas in such a short amount of time. Note: this isn’t a book about theory. It’s about what works and doesn’t work in practice and that’s it. Krug gets right to the heart of the matter on every point. If you’re looking for detailed discussions of web design techniques and why they’re good or bad, this is not the right book for that.
This book covers the real-world issues of web development. Unlike other reference books which only pin-pointing the ‘bad’ side of certain websites, this one provides you some guides in bringing up a better-than-average webpages, if not the best. Even the book itself was structured nicely in presenting its prominent content – mostly in point form. Very effective for busy individuals. Get it!
I usually don’t make time to do reviews (mainly because with kids you rarely have time just to read). But this was a great book on web design usability. I read it in about 3-4 days and it provided such a great approach to web design usability with so little effort that anybody doing any kind of web development needs to have this book on their shelf. Most of it is common sense … but you don’t realize it until after you read it. Once you read some of the chapters you kind of say to yourself … “DUH! Why didn’t I think of that before!” I wish all software development books could be written in such a fashion. You’ll do yourself good by getting this book and reading it if you’re a web developer.
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