Software for Use

Recognizing usability as the key to successful software, Constantine and Lockwood provide concrete tools and techniques that programmers can employ to meet that end. Much more than just another set of rules for good user-interface design, this book guides readers through a systematic software-development process. This process, called usage-centered design, weaves together two major threads in software-development methods: use cases (also used with UML) and essential modeling. With numerous examples and case studies of both conventional and specialized software applications, the authors illustrate what has been shown in practice to work and what has proved to be of greatest practical value.

Highlights :

• Presents a streamlined process for developing highly usable software
• Describes practical methods and models successfully implemented in industry
• Complements modern development practices, including the Unified
• Method and other object-oriented software engineering
  approaches

Table of contents

Acknowledgments
Preface
Section I: Toward More Usable Software

Chapter 1: Software for Use: Usage, Usability, and User Interfaces
Chapter 2: Built-in Usability: A Usage-Centered Design Approach
Chapter 3: In Principle: Rules and Principles of Usage-Centered Design

Section II: Essential Models for Usability

Chapter 4: Users and Related Species: Understanding Users and User Roles
Chapter 5 Working Structures: Task Modeling with Essential Use Cases
Chapter 6: Interface Architecture: Interface Contents and Navigation

Section III: Creating the Visual Design

Chapter 7: Designing the Dialogue: Layout and Communication
Chapter 8: Practical Widgetry: Choosing and Designing Visual Components
Chapter 9: Innovative Interfaces: Creative Interface Engineering and Custom Components

Section IV: Completing the Design

Chapter 10: Expressing Solutions: Implementation Modeling and Prototypes
Chapter 11: Help Me If You Can: Designing Help and Helpful Messages
Chapter 12: Once a Beginner: Supporting Evolving Usage Patterns
Chapter 13: In Place: Fitting the Operational Context
Chapter 14: Same Game, Different Fields: Special Applications, Special Issues
Chapter 15: Usage-Centered Design Applied: The TeleGuida Case

Section V: Assessment and Improvement

Chapter 16: Better Next Time: Improvement by Inspection and Review
Chapter 17: By the Numbers: Measuring Usability in Practice
Chapter 18: Test Scores: Laboratory and Field Testing of Usability

Section VI: Organizing and Managing the Process

Chapter 19: Code and You're Done: Implementing Interfaces
Chapter 20: Using Your Users: Users in the Development Process
Chapter 21: Getting Organized: Usability in the Larger Context

Appendix A: Suggested Readings
Appendix B: Eleven Ways to Make Software More Usable: General Principles of Software Usability
Appendix C: Glossary
Appendix D: Forms for Usage-Centered Design
Appendix E: Subjective Usability Scales for Software (SUSS)
References
Index