The Elements of User Interface Design (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

A total introduction to user interface (UI) design, Elements of User Interface Design covers theory and application with easy language and real world examples. Author Theo Mandel achieves an effective blend of theoretical consideration and practical utilization without leaving the less experienced user by the wayside. At the same time, even the most hardened applications developer will find abundant value in the discussions of user psychology and the analyses of popular UIs of the past and present.

Chapter topics include UI models, computer standards and UI guidelines, usability testing, command-line and menu driven interfaces, and graphical user interfaces (GUIs). The book also discusses intelligent agents and Internet interfaces at length. Each chapter contains examples from some of the most popular applications and operating systems complete with analysis and historical background.

The book itself has a fairly friendly UI; Mandel's writing is conversational and easy to follow, even when discussing complex topics. Throughout each chapter, "Key Ideas," such as tool tips, are broken out for clarification and quick reference on the current topic. Quotes at the beginning of each group of chapters are both topical and entertaining.

Product Description

". . . a book that should be forced on every developer working today.

If only half the rules in this book were followed, the quality of most programs would increase tenfold." -Kevin Bachus, praising Theo Mandel's The GUI-OOUI War

A total guide to mastering the art and science of user interface design

For most computer users, the user interface is the software, and in today's ultracompetitive software markets, developers can't afford to provide users and clients with anything less than optimal software ease, usability, and appeal.

The Elements of User Interface Design is written by a cognitive psychologist and interface design specialist with more than a decade's research and design experience. Writing for novices and veteran developers and designers alike, Dr. Mandel takes you from command-line interfaces and graphical-user interfaces (GUIs) to object-oriented user interfaces (OOUIs) and cutting-edge interface technologies and techniques. Throughout, coverage is liberally supplemented with screen shots, real-life case studies, and vignettes that bring interface design principles to life.

Destined to become the bible for a new generation of designers and developers, The Elements of User Interface Design

Arms you with a "tested-in-the-trenches," four-phase, iterative design process
* Analyzes well-known interfaces, including Windows 95, Windows NT, OS/2 Warp, Microsoft Bob, Visual Basic, Macintosh, and the World Wide Web
* Schools you in object-oriented interface (OOUI) design principles and techniques
* Offers practical coverage of interface agents, wizards, voice interaction, social user interfaces, Web design, and other new and emerging technologies

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Product Details

• Paperback: 464 pages
• Publisher: Wiley (February 21, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471162671
• ISBN-13: 978-0471162674
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.5 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #301,659 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Focuses on "Desktop", not "Web" UIs, November 13, 2000

By	Broto Chakrabarti (Providence, RI) - See all my reviews

Mandel's book was one of several UI books I got when I was trying to implement a process for designing Web user interfaces at my workplace. Mandel has an entire chapter on it, "The User Interface Design Process", which on flipping through the pages seems quite comprehensive.

It turns out, however, that Mandel's intention in this book is to introduce the theory and practice of Object Oriented User Interfaces (OOUIs), through a brilliant "foundations" part that covers the concepts and evolution of user interfaces, two OOUI parts that profile and detail OOUIs, and an "Advanced" part that looks at evolving user interface concepts and issues.

Unfortunately, not only are Web interfaces covered in but a single chapter in the last part of the book, but the chapter merely explores, without a conclusion, how the Web interface is strikingly different from the traditional PC desktop interface. OOUI principles are in no way applicable to building Web applications (Consider what impact the OOUI tenet "Users must Understand Direct Manipulation (Drag and Drop)" would have on download time and cross-browser development costs in a Web project).

Overall, the book is a great read, a necessary reference for any UI designer, but avoid it if you're looking for solutions, especially for Web-based applications.

19 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Read it to look busy on a lazy day, October 27, 1998

By A Customer

This book will not tell you how to create an intuitive and loyalty-inspiring interface for your company's applications. It won't help you create technologically cutting edge interfaces. It doesn't tell you how to design software or plan for change. It offers essentially no applicable guidelines for style or component choice. It doesn't have much to offer when it comes to the graphic design of icons or splash pages. And it won't tell you how to write the code to make a good UI happen.

What will it do? At best, it will open your mind to the field of human interface design, if you don't know it already. But there are no revelations and no surprises here.

If you have no previous knowledge of user interface design and/or have little knack for such things, Elements will break you in easily and comprehensively to the concepts. But with a little experience or common sense, you could gleam as much from a good twenty page tract as from this verbose tome. Skim it in an hour, or use it to feel vaguely productive during a lazy day at work, while you stare out the window. But don't count on much in the way of concrete benefits.

31 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Not what the world needs, February 2, 2000

By A Customer

On page 7: "[UI] must have complexity, be interesting, have intensity, depth and richness, and be distinctive. It must have length, in its finish and in our memory, engage our minds, make us think about it."

If all my software had a user interface as defined by the term above, I would get no work done. And with the number of software titles available, if they all tried to be complex and deep, and distinctive, surely users will suffer. This is just one example, but I strongly believe that this book starts off on the wrong foot. And it even says to come back to that chapter so to remind yourself which foot you are suppose to be starting from. This book is NOT going to improve interfaces.