Rating: 
Summary: Great Look at UI Design
Review: A witty look at UI design, the strength of this book is in its scope. It covers everything broadly - while it is true not all environments have the same flexibility, there is enough here to get you started and get you thinking of alternatives for whatever your particular issue is. This is a good refresher / introduction into UI design and is a must to have on the shelf.
Rating: 
Summary: Overly generic
Review: As a programmer, I fit the stereotype and know very little about UI design. Although I was only looking to gain a basic understanding of design, I still found the book's coverage overly generic. The content can be summed up as follows: use tabs, do what Microsoft does, heuristics are overdone in many apps, test designs incrementally, don't overuse colors, and avoid all the fluff in web page design. Critical design issues such as color combinations, UI standards, and best controls for particular jobs were not covered. The author glossed over these by telling the reader to find out what metaphor the user expects and design the application in that context. Despite these failings, the book is well written and can be read rapidly. This book rates about two stars for content and four for readability. Overall, this book rates approximately three stars.
Rating: 
Summary: Not worth it...
Review: Before even starting I have to say that I work in the field of Quality Assurance so I have read a lot of material on this subject, thus my standards are pretty high for this type of book. However, I also work in the programming field as well so I feel justified in my comments. As such, I think this is a book that will only please the programmer who likes to do minimal research and/or feels they do not have the time to devote to a better treatment of this subject. First of all, you can get the majority of the book online at the author's Web site. I highly recommend checking that out before you plunk down the cash for this book. Second, all this author did was take a smattering of ideas that have been promulgated in other books and on the Web and distilled it down to a few simple particulars per chapter. (You can find a lot of his thoughts echoed from the UseIt Web site by Jakob Nielsen as well as the Interface Hall of Shame. He also takes some ideas directly from Donald Norman's "The Design of Everyday Things." Finally, a lot of this can be found on the AskTog Web site.) You might think that would be a good thing. Perhaps in some ways it would. The problem is that only a smattering of that information is culled and thus a lot of the meat is missing. The author also makes some statements throughout the book that contradict or are not provided with good reference information so as to determine validity. Example: "In fact, users don't read anything." In the very next sentence, however, he says that "when you do usability tests, ... there are quite a few users who simply do not read words." So now it is not all users (as the first statement implies), just a few. The bigger complaint within this, however, is that the author does not state what these "usability tests" are. He also does not cite any major usability studies at all. In fact, those who have studied usability realize that the above statement about "users don't read anything" applies to a certain subset of users in a certain subset of usability tests. You would not know that from reading this book. The accessibility coverage is also very poor. Accessibility interfaces are now law in the United States (since the start of 2001) and yet this very important topic is given short shrift. Also, the author does not make clear one of the biggest topics for usability and accessibility design: the distinction between programs between intuitive and intuitable. Finally, the author rarely provides the basis for the facts he states. It is fine to talk about "affordances" and "metaphors" but if you do not explain the rationale behind such things (or what studies indicate that these things work), you are doing your readers a disservice. I much more recommend a book like "GUI Bloopers" for those who want a good read by an informted individual on this subject who is not just copying others. For those programmers who really want to learn about usability and the principles behind it, I recommend "Software for Use" or the "Usability Engineering Lifecycle." (Please note: those last two books are more geared to a Quality Assurance role, but are probably some of the most informative out there.) I would also more recommend the books by Alan Cooper (which are more theoretical but also more applicable in some cases). Overall, I think this book was written for the programmer who does not have a lot of time to get through a larger book. Perhaps that makes sense to some. For me, it does not. Usability and accessibility are very important in the modern world, particularly in relation to the Web or with Web-based applications where the user is much more likely to give up on a piece of software than they would be if they just spent money on a software package. Thus, this is not a subject that you should expect to understand in this small montage of information. I recommend reading the book at his Web site to determine if you want to buy the full book. If you do use this as a starter book (basically usability-with-training-wheels) then I urge you to consider other books on the same subject (some of which I have mentioned in this review) to get more informed on the subject. I also recommend checking out some of the online material that is quite abundant and where it seems most of this author's work derived from.
Rating:
Summary: Eye Opener for Programmers
Review: I echo the comments from the other reviewers. This book is great! However, it is not quite what I expected, it's better! I expected an elaboration of the Windows User Interface Standards; instead it takes a general design approach to user interfaces like the books on product design in general but specific to the Windows User Interface or windowslike user interfaces. It was an eye opener for me because it brings up things I never thought about and which I'm already applying to my software development efforts: font type used in text boxes or input boxes in general (non proportional) which enables easier editing, use of metaphors (how to use and not to use), getting ALL of the user input prior to executing a time consuming process (and of course, warning the user), and easy to do usability testing (ask 3 to 5 people what they think). My favorite chapter is Chapter 14, Relativity: Understanding UI Time Warps. I think this chapter is worth the price of the book alone.
Rating:
Summary: Not as good as the website
Review: I'll admit that I have read Joel's book before .. on his website. Reading it in print was a different experience. Frankly, I expected MORE from something that I can sit on the toilet and read. It's written like a weblog .. which is fine for scrolling across the web, but I would agree with one of the other reviewers that the book is not so meaty as it could be .. and relies too heavily on anecdotes. Nonetheless, Joel's insight and matter-of-fact analysis is good, and can be used to effectively convey some basic UI concepts to programmers -- a species usually less than concerned with such issues. Indeed, I have (in a fit of frustrated anger) suggested that several programmers I've been working with take this book home with them one night and not return until it has been read cover-to-cover. It's a quick read, and a good way to hit someone on the head with the UI religion without too much force.
Rating: 
Summary: Microsoft what?
Review: if i had to use one word to describe this book it would be brevity. the chapters i cared about the most were more like quick summaries of 3 - 4 pages mixed with some large photos. i also didn't appreciate most of the examples being microsoft products. i realize they rule the world, but their software is pretty much all the same. i would have appreciated more examples. additionally, i have to design for pc and mac-based computers. this book is primarily for the pc user/programmer. i would have appreciated much more on how to design for the fringes (e.g., people with disabilities now constitute about 1/5 of the population). instead, i got 3 pages and a big 1/2 page picture of a cheese slicer. huh? and, it appears that nothing is based on actual research beyond the author's own experiences. i like a book that thoroughly reviews the research in the field and brings in the work of other experts to solidify positions and advice. that is quite missing here. his bibliography includes 6 books and no journal articles. perhaps i was too generous with the 2 stars. perhaps, i just had different expectations and this book actually does what the author intended. who knows? it just didn't work for me.
Rating:
Summary: Basic theory in Human Interface Design. Nothing new.
Review: If you're a beginner in the world of Human Interface Design, this book is for you. If you're a programmer looking to make his/her program more user-friendly, this book is for you. Otherwise, for anyone else, the theory and concepts are basic at best. I'd recommend tracking down the long out of print Apple Computer "Inside Macintosh" series of books as they are more detailed and written by some of the pioneers of Human Interface Design. The one redeeming point here is the quality of the screenshots. Very impressive indeed and help to get the point across. Otherwise, you may find this book an entertaining read, but not something you'd learn a great deal from.
Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable from Start to Finish
Review: It was a pleasure to read this book. Joel has an amazing writing style that is friendly, upbeat, funny, and insightful. While he clearly isn't the world's definitive expert on UI design, his years of real world experience and wealth of examples make this book both valuable and enjoyable. This has to be one of my favorite technical books. Joel's irreverent, tell-it-like-it-is, approach is part of the charm of this book. For example, chapter 10 is titled, "People Can't Control the Mouse" and chapter 13 is titled, "Those Pesky Usability Tests". From my years of software development in the games industry, many of his points on UI design hit home in a big way. I was actually shocked at how applicable the entire book was to game development. As a professional programmer, I felt the book was talking my language and completely in agreement with my own experiences. The truth is that there are so many boring and questionable technical books out there, it's refreshing to read something that is so honest and dead-on right.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent, amusing and easy to read. Go buy.
Review: Joel has a great writing style making this book a delight to read. It covers all the major areas of interface design in a thoroughly pragmatic way. This is user interface design for practical people who want their software or web sites to be used, not hung on the wall of a gallery. The pace is fast, the tone light, but the message important. Go buy it.
Rating:
Summary: Programmers, find out why UI designers have it tough!
Review: Joel is a good writer who happens to be a programmer. That alone is enough to reccommend this one-of-a-kind book. His website contains tons of insightful, opinionated essays, and most of the time he's right, whether his topic is design, business stragegy, HR, or coding techniques. He's an ex-Microsoft employee who's saavy enough to know what MS does right and what they don't. In this book, much of which is available at his site, he's taking an approach that I don't think anyone else has: why UI design matters to programmers. He's not talking to experienced visual desingers, or HCI people, or interaction desingers or what have you. He's talking to programmers, the folks who will actually write lines of code. This book, in a quick 150 pages, shows programmers why interaction designers will spend, say, two days worrying about a couple of words or the placement of two buttons. Like Steve Krug's book "Don't Make Me Think", it's a somewhat lightweight treatment of the topic for an experienced UI desinger, but you'd be foolish to pass it up for that reason. This, along with Krug would be a great book for Project Managers or senior staff wondering what all the fuss about "usability" really means. Where Jakob Nielsen's preachy fussiness can bore you to tears, Joel and Krug will make you eager to put their ideas into practice. Any company that can get its programmers, managers, and designers on the same page about the still under-appreciated value of UI design (and the analysis that goes into it) will find they can make better products faster.
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