Don’t Make Me Think! A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability
Reviewed by Jim Owens
In this short and entertaining book, Steve Krug draws us into the world of our own half-conscious thoughts as we navigate various actual web pages. These thoughts can slow us down, confuse and discourage us, and eventually cause us go somewhere else. Krug’s most important contribution is to help us notice these inarticulate reactions. He also offers design tips for avoiding these reactions, but ultimately, as the book’s subtitle suggests, the answer is just common sense.
The ample and well-designed illustrations are themselves a lesson in usability. With side-by-side screen shots, Krug shows us the crisp and handsome web page we think we’re designing, and the pared-down “eyeball” view of the user, with most of the page blurred out of direct consciousness. From the big headings above the screen shots (”What we design for” and “What users see”), the meaning of the illustration is transparent. Probably one could absorb most of the book’s lessons just by looking at the pictures. But Krug’s informal, friendly prose, dotted generously with humor, makes this book a pleasure to read.
For web design, Krug identifies and recommends some common practices that users now expect; for example, putting the company logo at top left and using it as a link to the home page. If you’re new to web design, this may save you from re-inventing the wheel (or inventing something that doesn’t work as well). As Krug points out, “Conventions are your friend.” He also provides advice for writing effectively, some of it refreshingly unorthodox (”Instructions must die!”). And as a bonus, he talks about why and how to conduct usability testing. But without a doubt, the real value of this book is the way it exposes our mental processing of information.
New Riders, 2000 ISBN 0-7897-2310-7
Jim Owens is a technical writer in Ottawa, Canada. His interests in information design topics include visual presentation, content organization, topic planning, and rhetorical approach. Other related books he recommends are Managing Enterprise Content by Ann Rockley, How to Write a Usable User Manual by Edmond H. Weiss, The Non-Designer’s Design Book by Robin Williams, Content Management for Dynamic Web Delivery by JoAnn Hackos, and Single-Sourcing: Building Modular Documentation by Kurt Ament.