Customer Reviews

The Design of Sites: Patterns for Creating Winning Web Sites (2nd Edition)

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This is a book that shows how far website designing has come, since the early days of the mid 90s. Back then, texts on the subject often focused on the technical mechanics. Heavy on HTML, explaining what all those tags did. Plus much details on how to run the web servers. Those were texts for programmers.

Duyne and his co-authors give a higher level discourse. One better attuned to a true design approach. And germane to people of different skill sets than programmers. While there is still some discussion at the HTML level, nowadays you can safely assume that much of that degree of detail can be safely handed off, after the design (or a first cut of it) is done.

The text spans many aspects of a website. Like having a consistent visual style across all the pages. Or perhaps distinct styles, but each within a clear subset of pages. And the developer should always try to keep in mind what a visitor might expect. For this, a logical and easy to understand layout of the pages relative to each other is key. Along with an accompanying site map. Granted, if you are just starting out with a small site, the map may be unnecessary. But if you have ambitions for more, then designing a logical subdivision of the pages is advised.

You probably want search engines to list your site. And list it prominently. Where this applies whether you have a corporate site or a non-profit site. So a chapter offers several hints for search engine optimisation. For one thing, try having meaningful titles for each page. But perhaps the best thing you can do, if you want other websites to link to yours, is simply to write the text as fluently and interestingly as you can. Make visitors WANT to read your pages. All the technical SEO steps are important, but ultimately secondary compared to this.

The book also warns of phishing attacks against your site. Perhaps inevitable if you will be doing ecommerce, and if your site becomes popular. One key piece of advice is NOT to outsource your email subscriptions to a third party site. Not only can it make some subscribers suspicious, but it increases their vulnerability to phishing messages.

The amount of web site design knowledge presented in this text is almost unbelievable. Almost every aspect of website design is covered. If you're looking for a 'implementation how-to' book, look elsewhere. This text is more of a 'design how-to' text, and it does an unparalleled job of that.

I was hoping this book would have more fundamental design insights that could be applied to various situations. However, I found it to be a bit too obvious with samples and ideas based on common websites. The design points were ones anyone who browses the web could have figured out on their own. Essentially the book would use popular websites as models and say do your sites like this. There was no obvious indicator that these were even patterns per se. Just that these sites are popular so they must be the best way of doing it. That didn't seem particularly convincing when most sites design changes every 2-3 years. It also didn't highlight the shortcomings and tradeoffs you must make when choosing a particular pattern. Essentially this book wasn't much use to me since the websites I work on don't fit any of their models. I was hoping for a book where you can apply *fundamental* design patterns to all types of situations not just the specific ones mentioned (e.g. The best way to format entry fields, when to use a pop up versus show everything at once, how mnay items to show in a list, when to use pagination versus list scrolling, and the why's and hows and tradeoffs and all that stuff we consider when designing a web site.) I was hoping for something along the lines of the Microsoft style guide I read several years ago, but catered for the web.

The second updated edition of THE DESIGN OF SITES offers a foundation survey of the principles and best practices underlying outstanding Web design, making it a recommended pick not just for computer collections, but for college-level classroom use. Web designers receive a tutorial on the basics of good web site design, with coverage of AJAX, the latest new design patterns, updated patterns, and more accompanied by color screen shots, diagrams, and discussions of site elements. From the basics of accessibility to direct manipulation and website values, all aspects of web design are surveyed. A top pick for classroom assignment and discussion, especially.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

I am getting through the book and it is a treasure trove of knowledge about good design. The patterns discussed in the book can be implemented almost immediately. I like how they included AJAX in the book as an enhancement not a distraction to websites. They even emphasized mobile web applications and patterns for those. If you are building any type of web-based/network-based application, this book should be on your shelf.

This book tells me exactly what to do to design a website.

I'm a researcher in a government lab working on a large aeronautics and data mining research project. We'd like our work to be more open to the public, and I'm responsible for designing a website to engage the public in active collaboration. I've got less than a year, I have a small inexperienced team (me included), and I'm trying to teach them customer-centered methods as we go along. This book is like a godsend! It puts everything in one place! It gives me hope that I can actually pull this off!

I am not a User Interface developer. I actually am not good at it at all. But this book gives me the knowledge I need to do UI development, planning, and make them very usable.

This is a great book. They are very thorough with all the patterns they present.

The color adds a nice touch.

It is also very up to date. They include when and where to consider using AJAX.

This book is a must have. It covers all the best pratices for designing web sites.

This book was highly recommended in a presentation on UI design patterns that I attended. Until I bought my copy I didn't realize how extremely useful it was.

Unlike other UI design pattern books, it covers more than basic page/widget level items. These include types of sites (eCommerce, news, etc.), sections and pages (message boards, help systems, newsletters), as well as lower level items.

Less obvious, but more practical for those with little or no background in UI design, is that it distills a huge amount of research, best ideas/practices and general usability guidelines. This can be invaluable when creating new and unfamiliar web sites/pages/interface elements quickly.

This new edition ensures that it's more current in response though they make clear that for all the hype about new technologies, most of the basic patterns have not changed. Where something HAS changed, they note it.

Beyond the patterns are well written explanations of user (or their preferred term "consumer") centered design practices. Though there are many other books on that subject, it does make this almost a singular "one-book" resource.

I bought the Design of Sites book about three months ago and have read about 250 pages of it so far. The book has full-color pages and is a great reference for design decisions. It covers topics for so many different types of web projects. It talks about design, usability, information architecture, and almost all aspects of the web. It isn't meant to be read cover-to-cover, but the amount of great ideas and design solutions it presents make it hard to only read it when you have an issue. Over 800 pages and a great appendix with sample usability evaluations and how to conduct online research will without question make you a better web designer/developer. I can't wait to finish reading it.

I am taking college courses for web design and I keep thinking to myself why they don't make this book a standard for the courses I am taking. This book is a wealth of information on any subject or problem that you might run into in designing a site for the client as well as the user. I may be quite selfish and want to keep the information about this book a secret, that is how good it is. I keep returning to the book over and over again to answer questions for my courses (that the required books) don't explain in detail. I think that says alot about this wonderful book. If you have any hesitations about buying it DON'T.