User Interface Design book recommendation

[SANDRA CHARKER <scharker -at- OZEMAIL -dot- COM -dot- AU>]

Has anyone else come across this splendid book:

  Cooper, Alan _About Face.  The Essentials of User Interface Design_
  IDG Books, 1995.  ISBN 1-56884-322-4

I haven't seen it reviewed anywhere and I'd be interested in other people's
opinions of it. I found it while browsing in a bookshop, bought it on impulse
in preference to Technical Editing or Bugs in Writing, which are both on the
list of "worthy additions to my professional bookshelf when I've got some
money", and I'm heartily glad I did.

From the Introduction:

> I wish I could say this book is for user interface designers and let it go at
that. Most user interfaces are still designed by programmers, an increasing
number of whom are growing uneasy as they glimpse the gulf between the skill
set needed for software construction and the skill set needed for software
design. Documentation writers, trainers and technical support people
increasingly share this same worry. It is for this growing community of
design-aware developers that this book is written. <

Discussions I have found particularly interesting include metaphor in software
design, cross-platform software consistency, errors and error message dialogs,
window sizing, standards, online help, and 'undo' facilities. Some made me
laugh, some made me splutter, all made me think. In a book for an emerging
discipline, what more could you ask?


Sandra Charker

scharker -at- ozemail -dot- com -dot- au           ** Never express yourself more
                                  ** clearly than you can think
                                  **                        ... Nils Bohr