Constructing the User Interface with Statecharts [Paperback]

Ian Horrocks (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 17, 1999

Behind most non-trivial user interface screens lie complex webs of code that many practitioners in the software industry find difficult to control. Despite the obvious power and sophistication of user interface development tools, the majority of user interface software is difficult to understand because it is coded without an overall design. In this book, Ian Horrocks presents a proven technique for designing event-driven software using the UCM architecture and the statechart notation. The statechart approach to constructing user interface software results in code that can be: - written quickly and easily, - tested using white box techniques, - repeatedly enhanced over the lifetime of a system - modified with a minimal risk of introducing unwanted side-effects, - regression tested without the need for full re-tests. This book provides a practical guide to constructing real user interfaces for real projects. It is primarily written for practicing software engineers, but will also be invaluable to students wishing to gain an insight into user interface construction. In the book, a simple calculator is used to illustrate how user interface software is typically constructed. The book shows how a statechart can be used to improve the quality of the software.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

• written quickly and easily,
• tested using white box techniques,
• repeatedly enhanced over the lifetime of a system, * modified with a minimal risk of introducing unwanted side-effects,
• regression tested without the need for full re-tests.

This book provides a practical guide to constructing real user interfaces for real projects. It is primarily written for practicing software engineers, but will also be invaluable to students wishing to gain an insight into user interface construction.

0201342782B04062001

About the Author

Ian Horrocks is a professional software engineer working for BT, where he heads a team of developers designing user interface software.

0201342782AB04062001

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional; 1st edition (January 17, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0201342782
• ISBN-13: 978-0201342789
• Product Dimensions: 9.7 x 6.8 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,575,930 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Note the CONSTRUCTING and not Designing, August 8, 2001

By 

RA Botha (Summerstrand, Port Elizabeth South Africa) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Constructing the User Interface with Statecharts (Paperback)

It is important to realize that this book is not about designing user interfaces. It states that quite clearly in the beginning and with a title like this it is not suppose to be. The book assumes that you know some user interface design principles and are applying them in the general screen designs.

Although it is fine that the book assumes you have the design skills, it is unfortunate that it in its examples does not use better design skills. Some of the screens/forms that are constructed in the book could also serve as good examples of how not to apply design knowledge - although there probably are worse. The author makes it clear that the book is not about the design of screens, but using well-designed screens as examples wouldn't hurt. It is however not big enough of a problem to degrade the star rating.

From a practical point of view the approach suggested in this book is very usable. Although one may design a complete system in this way, it will also serve useful in sub-systems and even individual screens. In essence this book deals with the problem that programmers started to face when event-driven programming became the norm. Before event-driven programming could predict the order in which pieces of program code are going to run. With event-driven program the events may happen in any unpredictable order. For the user interface designer this presents challenging problems regarding the currency and consistency of the user interface. This is the main problem addressed in this book.

The approach is based on splitting the presentation issues in two layers: user interface objects and control objects that manages the behavior of the user interface objects. In essence the modeling of the control objects are done using state charts.

A clear description of the approach is given. The handling of state charts is pretty much inline with state charts in UML although certain "customisations" are being introduced to cater for specific requirements. These are, however, fundamentally sound. The nicest aspect I suppose is that the book doesn't get stuck on the semantic aspects of state charts but provides very practical examples of how it can be used to model the behavioural dynamics of systems.

I found the book easy to read, especially as far as the basics are concerned. It is divided into four parts. Part 1, represented by chapters 1 - 5 (57 pages) deals with motivating the need for such an approach. Chapters 6 - 9 (Part 2) introduces the notational aspects of the approach in a reasonably condensed 50 pages. Part 3 consist of three chapters that provides the state chart designs for three case studies. Part 4 (Chapters 13 - 15) deals with how to take this from state chart notation to physical code - in my opinion the crux of the problem. Several appendices are used to give more detail on the case studies presented in the book - a fact that certainly helps with the readability of the book.

I managed to convert the "code examples" given with reasonable ease to a product such as Visual Basic. I believe that it is written in such a way that the technique could easily be applied to any event-driven programming environment.

The book certainly fills a gap in the body of literature surrounding user interfaces and event-driven programming. It is one of those books that I believe is worthwhile reading just because of the ideas behind it. To which extent you will want to apply the techniques depends on circumstances, in particular the complexity of the user interface, but the book will make you think about formalizing the user interface construction process. If you are constructing complex user interfaces regularly this book is a must read.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Worth reading, May 27, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Constructing the User Interface with Statecharts (Paperback)

The book is essentially advocating a modfied model-view-controller architecture, and using statecharts to design the controller objects. The statecharts are being used to coordinate the behaviour of user interface components in the system. If you use the method described in this book then what you will get is a precise picture of the behaviour of your controller objects. The book is good because it actually shows you how statecharts can be used to model the dynamic aspects of your system rather than just describing the syntax of statecharts. It provides useful advice on how to code and test statecharts. It also makes some useful extentions to statecharts such as prioritised events, parametised states, and transient states. The book would be better if it emphasised the use of components more - but don't let this put you off.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A great guide to designing rigorous View Controller layers, July 22, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Constructing the User Interface with Statecharts (Paperback)

The first real attempt to demonstrate how to construct a rigourous controller layer using UML Statecharts. Adopting the principles in this book will lead to much better quality software with fewer bugs and improved interaction. The only pity is the psuedo code examples. Some real Java or VB would have been better.