Internet Cross Logo
Internet Cross your one stop web tutorial website
Your Ad Here
Search Internet Cross Shop:

Back to Designing Web Usability (VOICES) product information


Back to your previous page

<< Previous

----

Next >>

Spotlight customer reviews:
Customer Rating: Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5
Summary: Be wary of others "opinions"...
Comment: This book is highly opinionated and seems to lack any validity in it's claims other than the authors self appointed "usability guru" status. I fell into the trap of taking this book way too seriously. It affected my work to the point where my partners and clients where saying, "What are you thinking!" Don't let this guy ruin your career! If you still feel you must read this book, remember not to take it as gospel. There's never one right way to do anything!
Customer Rating: Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5
Summary: whole lot of fluff
Comment: It's hard to get through this book, partly because of poor design. It's padded with a lot of screen shots (of long gone websites) where he dissects the problems of the page. The screens aren't captioned, and often the accompanying text is separated from the page. There are many sidebars too, that sometimes deal with the topic at hand, often not. The end result, with competing areas of focus, is that this book is the hard copy equivalent of a tag. As for the content itself, it is mainly his opinon, when he does mention research it isn't referenced. Also, I've picked this book up often as a research tool, only to be disappointed that his guidelines were too generic/vague to put into practice--his idea of a web page is somewhat limited to a very general, text-centric information site. The examples, and guidelines in many instances, are dated; due to following the leader or listening to usability pundits many of his rants are obsolete. His free website is a better resource than this book.
Customer Rating: Average rating of 4/5Average rating of 4/5Average rating of 4/5Average rating of 4/5Average rating of 4/5
Summary: A Very Useful Book
Comment: I don't know what so many people are moaning about when it comes to reviewing this book. I think this is an excellent resource; full of insight and experience that Nielson has gathered from his usability studies both past and present. I am sure this book would help many many Web developers to build better sites. Maybe there are people out there who are beyond this book and have the sophistication, knowledge and experience to lean on their own resources, but for the rest of us this is a very solid place to start. If you are interested check out Nielsen's own Web site and dig into his mailing list archive. It is an invaluable resource to me, and I have printed out many of these article and put them in a folder for my own reference. His site is useit.com. My Web development company has a fantastic designer and a great production team, this book only helps enhance our existing talents. Go to your local book store and read through it there even.
Customer Rating: Average rating of 2/5Average rating of 2/5Average rating of 2/5Average rating of 2/5Average rating of 2/5
Summary: Too much of nothing
Comment: Nielsen's approach to teaching web design is "learning by example". The entire book is an endless series of screen dumps accompanied by Nielsen's comments about what is "good" and "bad" about the particular design. Unfortunately, most of the narration are only substantiated by "proof by pronunciation by eminent authority" (i.e. Nielsen himself). There is almost no reference to research, and very little resembling theory. There certainly is a lot of common sense expressed in the book, and an occasional tip and trick of to be utilised by a practising web designer may also from its pages of this book. But in its stated objective: to teach the student the fundamental principles of web site design, Nielsen's book fails miserably.
Customer Rating: Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5Average rating of 1/5
Summary: It would help if the author had practiced.
Comment: This book can be summarized as a complete waste of time for anyone who really wants help with web design. Neilsen has not done any actual web design work in years and still looks back to his job at Sun (10 years ago) as if it has any relevance to the web today. 10 years ago a simple text based non graphics web site was preferable because no one had a connection fast enough to use the web in a graphical format, there were no real graphical browsers, and computers wre not powerful enough to do what a flash site today can do.

You don't need a PHD in interface design to know that less graphics on a site will make it download faster. You also don't need to pay him $175,000.00 to review your site (That is what he charges). Anyone who thinks this old man deserves that kind of money to look at their site and give their opinion needs more help then any one book can give them. You could hire a whole market research firm to do focus groups and surveys for less than this.

In no way has this man addressed the fact that every web site does not have to appeal to every possible person that comes to it. Web sites are made for a purpose and the only people that the site you design has to appeal to is your target audience. Neilsen picks apart every site because this person or that person may not like the site for whatever reason. You could find some reason to dislike any site, but that isn't how you design a web site. You pick you target audience and you design a site that appeals to that audience. You can't be everything to everyone.

Neilsen thinks a boring text only web site is what everyone needs. Maybe his eyesight is starting to go and he can't focus enough to keep up with a site that has actual visual appeal.

Try combining a little creativity with usability and see if people like the site better.

  

<< Previous

Next >>

Showing page 19 of 46
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 
16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 
31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45 | 
46 |