resource center: books

Edited by Dave Rogers

User Analysis

Since a great UX aims to help end-users achieve their goals for visiting site while providing an excellent overall experience, it has to begin with a sound understanding of our users are.

Contextual Design: Defining Customer-Centered Systems Hugh Beyer and Karen Hotlzblatt. The classic and foundational book on contextual design and creating designs that fit the requirements of end-users. It can be heavy going, but worth the effort. Absolutely required if you do user analysis as part of your work.

Observing the User Experience: A Practitioner's Guide to User Research
Mike Kuniavsky. This is the single best book available on bridging the gap between designers and users. Inside, you'll find practical guidance for 13 user experience research methods that you can put right to work. I always check this book before doing any user-related research.

User and Task Analysis for Interface Design
JoAnn Hackos and Janice Redish. OK, so this isn't the most exciting title. But if you're working on a Web site that involves a process of some kind (for example, a game or an e-store) this book is invaluable. It takes you all the way from interviewing users and observing how they set and achieve goals to the design and prototyping of interfaces. Take it from me:Although both the book and process it describes can be arduous, they pay big dividends.

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