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Reviewer: Claudiu Popescu

I would call this book a history of human-computer interaction (HCI), from the first Apple computer to the embedded computers found in many of today's user appliances. The book is addressed to readers interested in the evolution of computer usability concepts. The book contains about 40 interviews with famous inventors in the HCI field. Some of them are veterans, like Doug Engelbart (who invented the mouse), Bill Atkinson (who designed the interface for Apple Macintosh), or Terry Winograd (who extended artificial intelligence to "bring design to software" [1]). Other people are current leaders in the field, like the Google founders. The book is large and heavy (more than 750 pages), and contains 700 pictures of various devices or computer screens, which helps a lot when reading. It is accompanied by a DVD that contains parts from all of the interviews. The style is easy to read and captivating, describing the paths taken to create concepts and devices with people in mind. Three stages in the development of a user product are identified: enthusiast (when the product starts to work), professional (when the product must be reliable), and consumer (when the product must be easy to learn and use). The history presented in the book starts when the mouse and the desktop paradigm were invented, followed by the era of the user interface computers (first Apple, and then the PC). The next few chapters describe the laptop, palm computing, advanced cellular phones, computers for cars and digital cameras, the iPod, and computer games. The book continues with online banking, the dot-com madness, the Internet, and Google. A special chapter discusses usability design for various groups and ages, with a focus on people and prototyping. This book was a very pleasant read, about past, present, and future concepts of computers for people. Online Computing Reviews Service

Reviewer: Michael Haller

William Moggridge, industrial designer and cofounder of the company IDEO, is one of the pioneers in interface design. He also helped to design the first laptop, the GRiD Compass. Not surprisingly, this interface design book is one of the best I have had in my hands over the past few years. The book is really impressive. It offers a deep background from the author’s perspective, and presents the history of this area in a fascinating way—with hundreds of inspirational and funny stories. It is enjoyable to read the stories about the mouse and hear the ideas behind the Canon camera. The book has original sketches and diagrams, screen shots, and historical photographs, which make it a great experience for the reader. The text consists of ten chapters, focusing on “The Mouse and the Desktop,” “My PC,” “From the Desk to the Palm,” “Adopting Technology,” “Play,” “Services,” “The Internet,” “Multisensory and Multimedia,” “Futures and Alternative Nows,” and “People and Prototypes,” where up to five experts speak to the author about their ideas of information design. Each chapter starts with a quote by one of the pioneers, followed by an interview with the author and a personal statement. The book is based on 40 interviews with pioneers from both computer science and design disciplines who worked over the last 30 years. Doug Engelbert, Bill Atkinson, Will Wright, Jun Rekimoto, and Hiroshi Ishii are just some interviewees who provide background details readers might not know. Most of the chapters are presented with a surprisingly high level of detail. In some, however, the author could have gone deeper. The design of this book is also exceptional. It is illustrated with hundreds of color images and shows what a design book should look like. It includes a DVD containing short video clips of each interview. The official Web site also provides these video clips, a downloadable chapter, reviews of the book, a forum for making comments, and detailed information about the author. In summary, the book provides a good overview of all of the aspects of designing interfaces. I highly recommend it to all experts who want to dive deeper into the world of interface design. All people who are programming software should at least know the stories behind the user interfaces they are working with. Both designers and developers new to interface design who want to get a broad view of this field will also appreciate this book. Students will also benefit from it, because it provides a good overview of this technology. Online Computing Reviews Service