Designing the Moment
The way that a web site interfaces with the people who visit the site is one of the key aspects to whether a given site will be a success or not. This book "forces" you to look at the site design in a way that can only lead to an improvement in this interface. A must have book for anyone looking to go that one step further with their design.
My Rating: 
Pros
- Covers many different aspects of the web/visitor interface including several that are not so obvious.
- Gets you thinking from the viewpoint of the person visiting the site.
- Covers dealing with new arrivals on the site, those trying to use the site, and those ready to leave.
- Demonstrates how small changes applied one after the other can gradually improve a design..
Cons
- Not a book on basic web design. This book assumes that you have some basic knowledge of designing web pages.
Description
- First Edition: 2008
- 236 page paperback
- Published by New Riders
- ISBN: 0-321-53508-1
- web interface design concepts in action
- Author Robert Hoekman Jr
Review
This is a book that really makes you look at web site design from the viewpoint of the people you hope will visit the site. It asks the questions "What are they visiting the site for?" as well as "How can the site be designed to better suit their needs?". The book clearly demonstrates using real web sites as examples how the most obvious things that people add into their design are not always the most useful and how a simpler approach is often a more effective one.
The book does exactly what the author intends (as specified in the introduction) and makes you start to think about how to redesign your site to make it easier for your visitors to interact with it in the way that they want to interact.
The author does have a few personal likes and dislikes that are mentioned in the book which you may or may not agree with. There are also a few things covered which may not be applicable to all sites. Most of the material covered though has at least some relevance to the design of any web site and simply looking at a web site from the viewpoint presented in the book will probably lead to ideas for how the site design can be improved.
