Conceptual Design for Interactive Systems

Foreword

Ben Shneiderman, University of Maryland

Technology designers who shape user experiences seek to smooth the path for novices and serve the demanding needs of experts. This was true for fifteenth-century book designers, nineteenth-century train designers, and twenty-first-century smartphone designers. Their innovative designs emerged from a deep empathy for people, sensitivity to diverse social contexts, and imaginative sparks to create new ways of thinking about technology.

When scrolls were reconceived as books, the idea of numbered pages made it possible to have tables of contents, indexes, and cross-references. These breakthrough inventions depended on an understanding of how books would be used differently from scrolls. Similarly, ...