Section One: Know Thy User--Part I: Bridging the Gap

Chapter List

Chapter 1: Goal-Directed Design

Chapter 2: Implementation Models and Mental Models

Chapter 3: Beginners, Experts, and Intermediates

Chapter 4: Understanding Users: Qualitative Research

Chapter 5: Modeling Users: Personas and Goals

Chapter 6: Scenarios: Translating Goals Into Design

Chapter 7: Synthesizing Good Design: Principles and Patterns

The design of interaction begins well below the surface of our systems, applications, and hardware. Imagining that we can create a good user experience for our products after their internals have been constructed is like saying that a good coat of paint will turn a cave into a mansion. Even as technology frees us to perform great feats of invention, it simultaneously ties us to ways of thinking that are contrary to the natural expression of human behavior. Almost all of the problems with the design of digital products originate from well-intentioned, intelligent, and capable people focusing on the wrong things. Instead of technology and tasks, we must focus on the goals toward which users strive and the motivations they have for doing so—even if the users themselves can't articulate them. This section provides a detailed overview of our method of bridging that gap between users goals and product design.