Usability: The Site Speaks for Itself

That's about as accurate as any other sweeping generalisation made by any other web usability guru.

This book features case-studies in usability and information architecture from the makers of eBay, the BBC news on-line site, The Economist web site, SynFonts (a flash-driven font foundry e-commerce site), evolt (fully cross-browser compatible) and metafilter.

Know your audience, design for your audience, test for usability, and solicit feedback from your audience.

There are no hard-and-fast rules for usability on the Web, which is why this book steers away from the rigid rules of gurus. Instead, this book looks at six very different, but highly usable sites. The web professionals behind these sites discuss the design of each site from inception to today, how they solicited and responded to feedback, how they identified and dealt with problems, and how they meet the audience's needs and expectations.

This book is edited by Molly E. Holzschlag, a member of Web Standards Project and author of a dozen books on web technologies, and Bruce Lawson, the brand manager of glasshaus.

- Max Gadney of the BBC talks about the trials of moving from the TV medium to the Web, and the differences in usability requirements between the main news site, and the sports and children's sites

- David Wertheimer talks of how The Economist's web site involved careful design work to ensure the branding mirrored the print magazine, and looks at implementing easily distinguished free content and subscription only sections

- eBay: Kelly Braun and Tom Walter look at the work involved in designing an e-commerce site that makes a profit each quarter, while meeting the needs of 42 million users

- Don Synstelein of SynFonts shows how he assembled a usable Flash-driven e-commerce site, which enhances his users' experience and protects his copyright. He shows that that, when used properly, Flash can be 100% ok

- Adrian Roselli, an IA guy from evolt, writes on how they needed to be on the vanguard of usability and accessibility, compatible with every browser known to man – and yet maintain branding look and feel

- Matt Haughey writes of his adventures in constructing Metafilter, a great community site, on no budget. This includes usability testing, usable advertising, and community management

37.8%的使用者體驗專家都是錯的。這和其他網頁使用者體驗大師所做的任何一個概括性陳述一樣準確。這本書介紹了來自eBay、BBC新聞網站、《經濟學人》網站、SynFonts（一個以Flash驅動的字體商店電子商務網站）、evolt（完全跨瀏覽器兼容）和metafilter的使用者體驗和資訊架構案例研究。了解你的受眾，為你的受眾設計，測試可用性，並從你的受眾那裡獲取反饋。在網絡上，沒有絕對的可用性規則，這就是為什麼這本書避開了大師們的嚴格規則。相反，這本書探討了六個非常不同但極易使用的網站。這些網站背後的網絡專業人士討論了每個網站的設計從起源到現在的過程，他們如何徵求並回應反饋，如何識別和解決問題，以及如何滿足受眾的需求和期望。這本書由Molly E. Holzschlag（Web標準項目成員，撰寫了十幾本關於網絡技術的書籍）和Bruce Lawson（glasshaus品牌經理）編輯。BBC的Max Gadney談到了從電視媒體轉向網絡的困難，以及主要新聞網站和體育和兒童網站之間的可用性要求的差異。David Wertheimer講述了《經濟學人》網站如何進行精心設計以確保品牌與印刷雜誌相呼應，並介紹了實施易於區分的免費內容和僅限訂閱的部分的工作。eBay的Kelly Braun和Tom Walter討論了設計一個每季都能盈利並滿足4200萬用戶需求的電子商務網站所需的工作。SynFonts的Don Synstelein展示了他如何組建一個可用的Flash驅動的電子商務網站，以增強用戶體驗並保護他的版權。他展示了當Flash被正確使用時，它可以100%正常。evolt的IA專家Adrian Roselli寫道，他們需要成為可用性和可訪問性的先鋒，與人類所知的每個瀏覽器兼容，同時保持品牌的外觀和感覺。Matt Haughey講述了他在沒有預算的情況下建立Metafilter社區網站的冒險。這包括可用性測試、可用性廣告和社區管理。