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Books : Computers & Internet : Web Development : Website Architecture & Usability

• Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, 2nd Edition

  Steve Krug

  
  
   

• Web Analytics: An Hour a Day

  Avinash Kaushik

  
  Written by an in-the-trenches practitioner, this step-by-step guide shows you how to implement a successful Web analytics strategy. Web analytics expert Avinash Kaushik, in his thought-provoking style, debunks leading myths and leads you on a path to gaining actionable insights from your analytics efforts. Discover how to move beyond clickstream analysis, why qualitative data should be your focus, and more insights and techniques that will help you develop a customer-centric mindset without sacrificing your company’s bottom line.

  Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.

  
   

• Designing Interfaces: Patterns for Effective Interaction Design

  Jenifer Tidwell

  
  Designing a good interface isn't easy. Users demand software that is well-behaved, good-looking, and easy to use. Your clients or managers demand originality and a short time to market. Your UI technology -- web applications, desktop software, even mobile devices -- may give you the tools you need, but little guidance on how to use them well.

  UI designers over the years have refined the art of interface design, evolving many best practices and reusable ideas. If you learn these, and understand why the best user interfaces work so well, you too can design engaging and usable interfaces with less guesswork and more confidence.

  "Designing Interfaces" captures those best practices as design patterns -- solutions to common design problems, tailored to the situation at hand. Each pattern contains practical advice that you can put to use immediately, plus a variety of examples illustrated in full color. You'll get recommendations, design alternatives, and warnings on when not to use them.

  Each chapter's introduction describes key design concepts that are often misunderstood, such as affordances, visual hierarchy, navigational distance, and the use of color. These give you a deeper understanding of why the patterns work, and how to apply them with more insight.

  A book can't design an interface for you -- no foolproof design process is given here -- but "Designing Interfaces" does give you concrete ideas that you can mix and recombine as you see fit. Experienced designers can use it as a sourcebook of ideas. Novice designers will find a roadmap to the world of interface and interaction design, with enough guidance to start using these patterns immediately.

  
   

• World of Warcraft Programming: A Guide and Reference for Creating WoW Addons

  James, II Whitehead, Bryan McLemore, Matthew Orlando

  
  “WoW” is what you’ll say when you see how many ways you can tweak the World of Warcraft interface after you read this book! If you’re new to programming, we’ll teach you the basics of Lua and XML and walk you through writing your first addon. If you already have some original addons in your arsenal, jump right into Parts III and IV and work with templates, function hooking, custom graphics, state headers, and more. We’ll even help you distribute your addons, making WoW better for everybody.

  • Respond to events, creates frames, and use the WoW API to interact with the game
  • Learn the Lua programming language through interactive examples, from values and variables to custom functions and control structures
  • Write well-formed XML and validate using schemas
  • Find specific functions easily in the comprehensive references of APIs, API categories, events, and widgets
  • Create custom graphics, scroll frames, dropdown menus, and much more

  A Note from the Publisher:

  In the first printing, we mistakenly omitted the Authors’ Acknowledgements, which included the names of many World of Warcraft community members who helped bring this book to market.  I want to publicly thank them for their efforts, and apologize for the omission, which will be corrected in the second printing.

  It is the members of the WoW community that make Blizzard’s amazing game an even greater experience for millions of players around the world, and their efforts on this book are greatly appreciated.

  Chris Webb
  Executive Editor

  From the Authors:

  James and Lee Whitehead, thank you for standing behind me on everything that I’ve done throughout my wacky life. None of this would have been possible without the guidance and support that you’ve provided me. Michelle Hastings, thank you for finding a way to bridge a 5300 mile gap and still make me feel like I’m in your living room. Robert and Gregory Whitehead, thank you for sticking by me wherever I am and whatever I do without ever passing judgment. Tom Harper, thank you for letting me be a part of your life. Every single day with you is an adventure I can’t wait to begin, and you have changed my life forever.

  Jamie Anderson and Edward Wilman, thank you for letting us invade your sanctuary and for being such good friends. Charlie Radcliffe, Björn Alfthan, Anne Christianson, and Chris McCabe, thank you for being great flatmates. Worcester College MCR, thank you for giving me a community of friends in a very foreign land.

  Karen Hobson, thank you for being so helpful and supportive throughout the last two projects; you’ve helped keep me afloat. Sam Lantinga, thank you for all the time and effort you put into helping the World of Warcraft community. Kevin M. Kelly, thank you for your odd sleep patterns and availability; exploration of the unknown is always easier when you have a friend with a map. Daniel Stephens, thank you for your help digging through various parts of the API and for giving me a good jumping-off point for my data exploration.

  Chris Webb, thank you for bringing this book and Hacking World of Warcraft into existence. Both books serve as great resources for the WoW UI community. Maryann Steinhart, thank you for your guidance through the entire process. Your feedback, as always, has proved instrumental to the process. Matthew and Bryan, for working with me on this extremely ambitious project, it’s definitely been a rollercoaster.

  Thanks to everyone who kept me moving when I needed a push, and those who slowed me down when I needed a break. Thank you to all of my users for putting up with bugs and lack of updates while the book was still being written; your patience and support is what keeps me writing addons. Finally, thank you to all the members of the WoW UI community for everything you do.--Jim

  First, I would like to thank all those involved with the book: Jim for inviting me to take part; Bryan for sticking with it through all his work pressures; Chris, Maryann, and the rest of the folks at Wiley for allowing this project to materialize. Thanks to Rick and Stephen for picking apart our work. Supreme thanks go to Iriel, AnduinLothar, Cladhaire, MentalPower, Esamynn, Beladona, Krka, Legorol, Shirik, Cidan, Kevin, Sam, and all the members of #wow-lounge for putting up with our incessant questions. Thank you to all the folks who helped us churn out the API docs at the 11th hour.

  Thank you to PepsiCo and Rockstar, Inc., without whose caffeinated beverages I never would have completed my chapters. I’d also like to thank whoever made the massage pad I keep on my computer chair. The best go out to the folks behind “Brisco County Jr.,” “Firefly,” and every other television series that should’ve gone on for years. For entertaining me in my few breaks, xkcd.org, bash.org, Portal, World of Warcraft, “Bones,” “Nip/Tuck,” and “Mythbusters” have my undying gratitude. What thanks for a book of this nature would be complete without recognition of Blizzard for its wonderful product and incredible passion?

  Special thanks go out to my de facto colleagues from the UI & Macros forum for their hard work, dedication, and flaming of people who didn’t read the stickies while I devoted my time to this project: Troodi, the nicest troll I’ve ever met; Jelly, enthusiastic ForumToCPoster user; Kamdis, female Draenei—@@’nuff said; Lunessa, my no. 1 supporter for my presidential bid; Lopeppeppy, whose name I can finally type from memory; Kaydeethree, with the best diagram of how to find stickies ever; Kelfarr, under people’s skin before he even posts; Alestane, unnervingly patient; Valaron, never met a better Orc; Lealla, yay drood!; Aella, whom I always confuse with Lealla; everybody else whom I forgot to name; and our Administratrix Extraordinaire, Cairenn, for holding everything together!

  My deepest thanks go to my family for making me who I am, and, most important, to my wife, Juliella, thank you for supporting me in this endeavor even when it meant I had to put you on /ignore from time to time.--Matthew

  Wanda and Joe Newman, for the hours you put up with me not being willing to get off the computer. Thanks for all the support over the years, and for buying me my first copy of VB when I was 15, and sorry for all the arguments. Willis McLemore, thanks for supporting me without ever expecting anything from me.

  Brent Miller, for helping me really start out on this awesome journey. You helped guide me when I first got started doing WoW addons, and many of the things we talked about helped shape me as a professional coder. Thanks for the first versions of Ace and for shrugging off all that responsibility onto me when you left. Oh, and thanks for listening to me rant.

  Jim Whitehead and Matthew Orlando, you have been better co-authors than anyone else can ask for. Thanks for putting up with me while I learned how to do this, and for handling the content that I had no clue about. Sorry again for the times when I got overwhelmed. Thanks to all the editors and support from Wiley for helping me get through this, and for putting up with me when I gave you problems.

  PProvost, Ammo, Cladhaire, hyperChipmunk, kergoth, Mikk, Nargiddley, pastamancer, nevcairiel, Tekkub, Tem, vhaar, Wobin and the members of #wowace. Thanks for the ideas, inspiration, strife, and hard work. Thanks for helping WowAce grow to more than a million users and for all the great mods!

  Shirik, Tekkub, Wobin, Mentalpower, Esamynn, Cide, Ammo, Nevcairiel, and Iriel (and any I have accidentally forgotten). Thank you for helping so much on the reference. We would never have been done in time without you.

  Karen Hobson. You’ve been a friend to me during some of the darkest times in my life, and I'll always treasure your company and support. I don’t think it’d be possible for me to thank you enough.

  Aidan McLemore, who still thinks Daddy can do anything. Last, but by no means least, Kristina McLemore. Thanks for believing in me and following me across the country, for always loving me, and for helping me but, most important, for not divorcing me during the production of this book.--Bryan

  A special thanks is owed to a group of hard-working members of the user interface community, without whom the reference section of this book would not have been completed. Each of you truly stepped up when we needed your help, and we’re extremely grateful for everything you’ve done for us. Thank you [Ammo], Beladona, Cide, Gazmik, JoshBorke, MentalPower, Nevcairiel, Shirik, Tem, and Wobin for giving us your time, and a little bit of your sanity.

  Dan Fernandez, thank you for your work on the World of Warcraft AddOn Studio and your help in writing Chapter 14. We’re hopeful that the software will continue to develop and mature as another tool in the addon author’s toolbox.

  
   

• Joomla! A User's Guide: Building a Successful Joomla! Powered Website

  Barrie M. North

  

  The First Easy-to-Use Guide to Joomla!-The World’s #1 Open Source Content Management System

   

  If you want to build sophisticated websites that can be easily edited and updated, you need to master Joomla!-the world’s #1 open source content management system. Now there’s an easy-to-read, easy-to-use guide to Joomla! for every site manager, administrator, and developer. Leading Joomla! consultant Barrie North covers all you need to get results: installation, administration, site organization, template development, content updates, and a whole lot more. You’ll find never-before-published tips, tricks, and troubleshooting solutions, as well as three start-to-finish case studies.

   

  New to Joomla? No problem! This book starts with the simplest design and system concepts, and builds your expertise step-by-step. You’ll rapidly master Joomla!’s power, even if you have no content management, scripting, or CSS expertise. Experienced with Joomla!? You’ll turn to this book constantly for its authoritative, plain-English, example-rich Joomla! 1.0 and 1.5 reference content.

   

  ·   Understanding content management, what Joomla! does, and how its components fit together

  ·   Building Joomla! sites from scratch, and systematically customizing them to your needs

  ·   Organizing content with sections, categories, blogs, and tables

  ·   Creating dynamic pages and effective navigation

  ·   Working with Joomla! modules and components

  ·   Search engine optimization for Joomla! sites

  ·   Start-to-finish case studies: building a school website, an e-commerce site, and a blog

  ·   The most valuable Joomla! extensions and add-ons: finding them, and using them

  ·   Key differences between Joomla! 1.0 and 1.5, and what they mean to you

  
  

  
  

  About the Website

  The accompanying site for the Joomla 1.5 book, provides five fully functional Joomla! sites with live follow-along examples from the book and up-to-date information on Joomla! The site also includes
  

  
  

  • An active forum where you can ask questions specific to chapters from the book from a Joomla expert 
    
  • 5 fully functional Joomla 1.5 live follow-along examples from the book. You can browse the sites and their backends live online.
  • Downloads of 5 free websites for Joomla 1.5 based on various chapter of the book. These are SQL dumps you can import to instantly give you a completed Joomla site. 
    
  • 4 free tutorial templates and 3 free templates from joomlashack.com including the popular commercial template - JS Aqualine!
  
   

• CSS: The Definitive Guide

  Eric Meyer

  
  CSS: The Definitive Guide, 3rd Edition, provides you with a comprehensive guide to CSS implementation, along with a thorough review of all aspects of CSS 2.1. Updated to cover Internet Explorer 7, Microsoft's vastly improved browser, this new edition includes content on positioning, lists and generated content, table layout, user interface, paged media, and more.

  Simply put, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a way to separate a document's structure from its presentation. The benefits of this can be quite profound: CSS allows a much richer document appearance than HTML and also saves time -- you can create or change the appearance of an entire document in just one place; and its compact file size makes web pages load quickly.

  CSS: The Definitive Guide, 3rd Edition, provides you with a comprehensive guide to CSS implementation, along with a thorough review of all aspects of CSS 2.1. Updated to cover Internet Explorer 7, Microsoft's vastly improved browser, this new edition includes content on positioning, lists and generated content, table layout, user interface, paged media, and more. Author Eric Meyer tackles the subject with passion, exploring in detail each individual CSS property and how it interacts with other properties. You'll not only learn how to avoid common mistakes in interpretation, you also will benefit from the depth and breadth of his experience and his clear and honest style. This is the complete sourcebook on CSS.

  The 3rd edition contains: Updates to reflect changes in the latest draft version of CSS 2.1 Browser notes updated to reflect changes between IE6 and IE7 Advanced selectors supported in IE7 and other major browsers included A new round of technicaledits by a fresh set of editors Clarifications and corrected errata, including updated URLs of referenced online resources

  
   

• Information Architecture for the World Wide Web: Designing Large-Scale Web Sites

  Louis Rosenfeld, Peter Morville

  
  The post-Ajaxian Web 2.0 world of wikis, folksonomies, and mashups makes well-planned information architecture even more essential. How do you present large volumes of information to people who need to find what they're looking for quickly? This classic primer shows information architects, designers, and web site developers how to build large-scale and maintainable web sites that are appealing and easy to navigate.

  The new edition is thoroughly updated to address emerging technologies -- with recent examples, new scenarios, and information on best practices -- while maintaining its focus on fundamentals. With topics that range from aesthetics to mechanics, "Information Architecture for the World Wide Web" explains how to create interfaces that users can understand right away. Inside, you'll find: An overview of information architecture for both newcomers and experienced practitioners The fundamental components of an architecture, illustrating the interconnected nature of these systems. Updated, with updates for tagging, folksonomies, social classification, and guided navigation Tools, techniques, and methods that take you from research to strategy and design to implementation. This edition discusses blueprints, wireframes and the role of diagrams in the design phase A series of short essays that provide practical tips and philosophical advice for those who work on information architecture The business context of practicing and promoting information architecture, including recent lessons on how to handle enterprise architecture Case studies on the evolution of two large and very different information architectures, illustrating best practices along the way

  How do you documentthe rich interfaces of web applications? How do you design for multiple platforms and mobile devices? With emphasis on goals and approaches over tactics or technologies, this enormously popular book gives you knowledge about information architecture with a framework that allows you to learn new approaches -- and unlearn outmoded ones.

  
   

• Letting Go of the Words: Writing Web Content that Works (Interactive Technologies) (Interactive Technologies) (Interactive Technologies)

  Janice (Ginny) Redish

  
  Redish has done her homework and created a thorough overview of the issues in writing for the Web. Ironically, I must recommend that you read her every word so that you can find out why your customers won't read very many words on your website -- and what to do about it.;-- Jakob Nielsen, Principal, Nielsen Norman GroupThere are at least twelve billion web pages out there. Twelve billion voices talking, but saying mostly nothing. If just 1% of those pages followed Ginnys practical, clear advice, the world would be a better place. Fortunately, you can follow her advice for 100% of your own sites pages, so pick up a copy of Letting Go of the Words and start communicating effectively today.--Lou Rosenfeld, co-author, Information Architecture for the World Wide WebOn the web, whether on the job or at home, we usually want to grab information and use it quickly. We go to the web to get answers to questions or to complete tasks to gather information, reading only what we need. We are all too busy to read much on the web.This book helps you write successfully for web users. It offers strategy, process, and tactics for creating or revising content for the web. It helps you plan, organize, write, design, and test web content that will make web users come back again and again to your site. Learn how to create usable and useful content for the web from the master Ginny Redish. Ginny has taught and mentored hundreds of writers, information designers, and content owners in the principles and secrets of creating web information that is easy to scan, easy to read, and easy to use. This practical, informative book will help anyone creating web content do it better.Features* Clearly-explained guidelines with full color illustrations and examples from actual web sites throughout the book. * Written in easy-to-read style with many ;befores; and ;afters.;* Specific guidelines for web-based press releases, legal notices, and other documents.* Tips on making web content accessible for people with special needs.Janice (Ginny) Redish has been helping clients and colleagues communicate clearly for more than 20 years. For the past ten years, her focus has been helping people create usable and useful web sites. She is co-author of two classic books on usability: A Practical Guide to Usability Testing (with Joseph Dumas), and User and Task Analysis for Interface Design (with JoAnn Hackos), and is the recipient of many awards.* Clearly-explained guidelines with full color illustrations and examples from actual web sites throughout the book.* Written in easy-to-read style with many ;befores; and ;afters.;* Specific guidelines for web-based press releases, legal notices, and other documents. * Tips on making web content accessible for people with special needs.
  
   

• Sketching User Experiences: Getting the Design Right and the Right Design (Interactive Technologies)

  Bill Buxton

  
  Bill Buxton and I share a common belief that design leadership together with technical leadership drives innovation. Sketching, prototyping, and design are essential parts of the process we use to create new products. Bill Buxton brings design leadership and creativity to Microsoft. Through his thought-provoking personal examples he is inspiring others to better understand the role of design in their own companies--Bill Gates, Chairman, Microsoft
  
  "Informed design is essential." While it might seem that Bill Buxton is exaggerating or kidding with this bold assertion, neither is the case. In an impeccably argued and sumptuously illustrated book, design star Buxton convinces us that design simply must be integrated into the heart of business--Roger Martin, Dean, Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto
  
  Design is explained, with the means and manner for successes and failures illuminated by engaging stories, true examples and personal anecdotes. In Sketching User Experiences, Bill Buxton clarifies the processes and skills of design from sketching to experience modeling, in a lively and informative style that is rich with stories and full of his own heart and enthusiasm. At the start we are lost in mountain snows and northern seas, but by the end we are equipped with a deep understanding of the tools of creative design.--Bill Moggridge, Cofounder of IDEO and author of Designing Interactions
  
  "Like any secret society, the design community has its strange rituals and initiation procedures. Bill opens up the mysteries of the magical process of design, taking us through a land in which story-telling, orange squeezers, the Wizard of Oz, I-pods, avalanche avoidance, bicycle suspension sketching, and faking it are all points on the design pilgrim's journey. There are lots of ideas and techniques in this book to feed good design and transform the way we think about creating useful stuff". -Peter Gabriel
  
  I love this book. There are very few resources available that see across and through all of the disciplines involved in developing great experiences. This is complex stuff and Buxton's work is both informed and insightful. He shares the work in an intimate manner that engages the reader and you will find yourself nodding with agreement, and smiling at the poignant relevance of his examples.--Alistair Hamilton, Symbol Technologies, NY
  
  Books that have proposed bringing design into HCI are aplenty, though books that propose bringing software in to Design less common. Nevertheless, Bill manages to skilfully steer a course between the excesses of the two approaches and offers something truly in-between. It could be a real boon to the innovation business by bringing the best of both worlds: design and HCI. --Richard Harper, Microsoft Research, Cambridge
  
  There is almost a fervor in the way that new products, with their rich and dynamic interfaces, are being released to the public-typically promising to make lives easier, solve the most difficult of problems, and maybe even make the world a better place. The reality is that few survive, much less deliver on their promise. The folly? An absence of design, and an over-reliance on technology alone as the solution.
  
  We need design. But design as described here depends on different skillsets-each essential, but on their own, none sufficient. In this rich ecology, designers are faced with new challenges-challenges that build on, rather than replace, existing skills and practice.
  
  Sketching User Experiences approaches design and design thinking as something distinct that needs to be better understood-by both designers and the people with whom they need to work- in order to achieve success with new products and systems. So while the focus is on design, the approach is holistic. Hence, the book speaks to designers, usability specialists, the HCI community, product managers, and business executives. There is an emphasis on balancing the back-end concern with usability and engineering excellence (getting the design right) with an up-front investment in sketching and ideation (getting the right design). Overall, the objective is to build the notion of informed design: molding emerging technology into a form that serves our society and reflects its values.
  
  Grounded in both practice and scientific research, Bill Buxton's engaging work aims to spark the imagination while encouraging the use of new techniques, breathing new life into user experience design.
  
  . Covers sketching and early prototyping design methods suitable for dynamic product capabilities: cell phones that communicate with each other and other embedded systems, "smart" appliances, and things you only imagine in your dreams;
  . Thorough coverage of the design sketching method which helps easily build experience prototypes-without the effort of engineering prototypes which are difficult to abandon;
  . Reaches out to a range of designers, including user interface designers, industrial designers, software engineers, usability engineers, product managers, and others;
  . Full of case studies, examples, exercises, and projects, and access to video clips (www.mkp.com/sketching) that demonstrate the principles and methods.
  
  About the Author
  
  Trained as a musician, Bill Buxton began using computers over thirty years ago in his art. This early experience, both in the studio an on stage, helped develop a deep appreciation of both the positive and negative aspects of technology and its impact. This increasingly drew him into both design and research, with a very strong emphasis on interaction and the human aspects of technology. He first came to prominence for his work at the University of Toronto on digital musical instruments and the novel interfaces that they employed. This work in the late 70s gained the attention of Xerox PARC, where Buxton participated in pioneering work in collaborative work, interaction techniques and ubiquitous computing. He then went on to become Chief Scientist of SGI and Alias|Wavefront, where he had the opportunity to work with some of the top film makers and industrial designers in the world. He is now a principal researcher at Microsoft Corp., where he splits his time between research and helping make design a fundamental pillar of the corporate culture.
  
  * Covers sketching and early prototyping design methods suitable for dynamic product capabilities: cell phones that communicate with each other and other embedded systems, "smart" appliances, and things you only imagine in your dreams;
  
  * Thorough coverage of the design sketching method which helps easily build experience prototypes-without the effort of engineering prototypes which are difficult to abandon;
  
  * Reaches out to a range of designers, including user interface designers, industrial designers, software engineers, usability engineers, product managers, and others;
  
  * Full of case studies, examples, exercises, and projects, and access to video clips that demonstrate the principles and methods.
  
   

• About Face 3: The Essentials of Interaction Design

  Alan Cooper, Robert Reimann, David Cronin

  
  This completely updated volume presents the effective and practical tools you need to design great desktop applications, Web 2.0 sites, and mobile devices. You’ll learn the principles of good product behavior and gain an understanding of Cooper’s Goal-Directed Design method, which involves everything from conducting user research to defining your product using personas and scenarios. Ultimately, you’ll acquire the knowledge to design the best possible digital products and services.
  
   

• USB Complete: Everything You Need to Develop Custom USB Peripherals

  Jan Axelson

  
  Who should read this book?

  This book is for you if you want to know how to design and program a peripheral with a Universal Serial Bus (USB) interface, or if you want to know how to communicate with USB peripherals from the applications you write. These are some of questions the book answers:

  What is USB and how do peripherals use it to communicate with PCs? There’s a lot to the USB interface, and understanding how USB works is essential in creating hardware and program code that works efficiently and reliably. This book’s focus is on the practical knowledge you’ll need in selecting components and writing device firmware to communicate over the bus.

  How can I decide if my project should use a USB interface? Maybe your design isn’t suited for USB. I’ll show you how to decide whether it is. If the answer is yes, I’ll help you decide which of USB’s three speeds and four transfer types to use.

  How do I choose a USB controller chip for my peripheral design? Every USB peripheral must contain an intelligent controller. There are dozens of controller chips designed for use in USB peripherals. In this book, I compare popular chip families and offer tips on how to decide, based on both your project’s needs and your own background and preferences. As with any embedded-system project, developing a USB device also requires a development system for loading and debugging code, and I cover the options here as well.

  How do applications communicate with USB peripherals? To communicate with a USB peripheral, a PC needs two things: a device driver that knows how to communicate with the PC’s USB drivers and an application that knows how to talk to the device driver. Some peripherals can use drivers included with Windows. Others may require a custom driver. This book will show you when you can use Windows’ built-in drivers and how to communicate with devices from Visual Basic and Visual C++ applications. You’ll also find out what’s involved in writing a device driver and what tools can help to speed up the process.

  How do USB peripherals communicate? USB peripherals typically use a combination of hardware and embedded code to communicate with PCs. In this book, I show how to write the device firmware that enables Windows to identify a device and load the appropriate device driver. I also include example firmware for exchanging data with a PC.

  How do I decide whether my peripheral can use bus power, or whether it needs its own supply? A big advantage to USB is that many peripherals can be powered entirely from the bus. Find out whether your device can use this capability and how to manage power use, especially for devices that use battery power.

  How can I be sure that my device will operate as smoothly as possible for its end users? On the peripheral side, smooth operation requires understanding the specification’s requirements and how the device can meet them. In the PC, proper operation requires a correctly structured information (INF) file that enables Windows to identify the device and software that knows how to communicate with the device as efficiently as possible. This book has information and examples to help with each of these.

  What’s new in the Second Edition?

  In the months after the publication of the first edition of USB Complete, much happened in the world of USB, including the release of version 2.0 of the USB specification. USB 2.0 supports a bus rate of 480 Megabits per second, forty times faster than USB 1.1. This and other developments in hardware and software prompted this second edition of the book.

  Rather than just tacking on a chapter about USB 2.0, I’ve revised the book from start to finish to reflect the changes in 2.0. By popular request, another addition is Visual C++ code to accompany the Visual Basic examples for application communications with USB devices. I’ve also expanded the material about Windows drivers and applications to include Windows 2000, and have added information on new controller chips and development tools. Other additions and updates are sprinkled throughout, many prompted by reader suggestions.

  Jan Axelson

  
   

• Learning the bash Shell, 2nd Edition

  Cameron Newham, Bill Rosenblatt

  
  The first thing users of the Linux operating system come face to face with is the shell. "Shell" is the UNIX term for a user interface to the system -- something that lets you communicate with the computer via the keyboard and display. Bash, the Free Software Foundation's "Bourne Again Shell," is the default shell for Linux, the popular free UNIX-like operating system. It's also a replacement for the standard UNIX Bourne shell, which serves both as a user interface and as a programming language. Like the FSF's other tools, bash is more than a mere replacement: it extends the Bourne shell in many ways. Features include command line editing, key bindings, integrated programming features, command completion, control structures (especially the select construct, which enables you to create menus easily), and new ways to customize your environment.

  Whether you want to use bash for its user interface or its programming features you will find Learning the bash Shell a valuable guide. The book covers all of bash's features, both for interactive use and programming. If you are new to shell programming, Learning the bash Shell provides an excellent introduction, covering everything from the most basic to the most advanced features, like signal handling and command line processing. If you've been writing shell scripts for years, it offers a great way to find out what the new shell offers. The book is full of examples of shell commands and programs that are designed to be useful in your everyday life as a user, not just to illustrate the feature being explained. All of these examples are freely available to you online on the Internet.

  This second edition covers all of the features of bash Version 2.0, while still applying to bash Version 1.x. New features include the addition of one-dimensional arrays, parameter expansion, and more pattern-matching operations. bash 2.0 provides even more conformity with POSIX.2 standards, and in POSIX.2 mode is completely POSIX.2 conformant. This second edition covers several new commands, security improvements, additions to ReadLine, improved configuration and installation, and an additional programming aid, the bash shell debugger.

  With this book you'll learn:

  • How to install bash as your login shell
  • The basics of interactive shell use, including UNIX file and directory structures, standard I/O, and background jobs
  • Command line editing, history substitution, and key bindings
  • How to customize your shell environment without programming
  • The nuts and bolts of basic shell programming, flow control structures, command-line options and typed variables
  • Process handling, from job control to processes, coroutines and subshells
  • Debugging techniques, such as trace and verbose modes
  • Techniques for implementing system-wide shell customization and features related to system security
  
   

• Programming WPF

  Chris Sells, Ian Griffiths

  
  If you want to build applications that take full advantage of Windows Vista's new user interface capabilities, you need to learn Microsoft's Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF). This new edition, fully updated for the official release of .NET 3.0, is designed to get you up to speed on this technology quickly. By page 2, you'll be writing a simple WPF application. By the end of Chapter 1, you'll have taken a complete tour of WPF and its major elements.

  WPF is the new presentation framework for Windows Vista that also works with Windows XP. It's a cornucopia of new technologies, which includes a new graphics engine that supports 3-D graphics, animation, and more; an XML-based markup language, called XAML, for declaring the structure of your Windows UI; and a radical new model for controls.

  This second edition includes new chapters on printing, XPS, 3-D, navigation, text and documents, along with a new appendix that covers Microsoft's new WPF/E platform for delivering richer UI through standard web browsers -- much like Adobe Flash. Content from the first edition has been significantly expanded and modified. Programming WPF includes: Scores of C# and XAML examples that show you what it takes to get a WPF application up and running, from a simple "Hello, Avalon" program to a tic-tac-toe game Insightful discussions of the powerful new programming styles that WPF brings to Windows development, especially its new model for controls A color insert to better illustrate WPF support for 3-D, color, and other graphics effects A tutorial on XAML, the new HTML-like markup language for declaring Windows UI An explanation and comparison of the features that support interoperability withWindows Forms and other Windows legacy applications

  WPF represents the best of the control-based Windows world and the content-based web world. Programming WPF helps you bring it all together.

  
   

• Learning the vi and Vim Editors

  Arnold Robbins, Elbert Hannah, Linda Lamb

  
  There's nothing that hard-core Unix and Linux users are more fanatical about than their text editor. Editors are the subject of adoration and worship, or of scorn and ridicule, depending upon whether the topic of discussion is your editor or someone else's. vi has been the standard editor for close to 30 years. Popular on Unix and Linux, it has a growing following on Windows systems, too. Most experienced system administrators cite vi as their tool of choice. And since 1986, this book has been the guide for vi. However, Unix systems are not what they were 30 years ago, and neither is this book. While retaining all the valuable features of previous editions, the 7th edition of Learning the vi and vim Editors has been expanded to include detailed information on vim, the leading vi clone. vim is the default version of vi on most Linux systems and on Mac OS X, and is available for many other operating systems too. With this guide, you learn text editing basics and advanced tools for both editors, such as multi-window editing, how to write both interactive macros and scripts to extend the editor, and power tools for programmers -- all in the easy-to-follow style that has made this book a classic. Learning the vi and vim Editors includes: A complete introduction to text editing with vi: How to move around vi in a hurry Beyond the basics, such as using buffers vi's global search and replacement Advanced editing, including customizing vi and executing Unix commands How to make full use of vim: Extended text objects and more powerful regular expressions Multi-window editing and powerful vim scripts How to make full use of the GUI version of vim, called gvim vim's enhancements for programmers, such as syntax highlighting, folding and extended tags Coverage of three other popular vi clones -- nvi, elvis, and vile -- is also included. You'll find several valuable appendixes, including an alphabetical quick reference to both vi and ex mode commands for regular vi and for vim, plus an updated appendix on vi and the Internet. Learning either vi or vim is required knowledge if you use Linux or Unix, and in either case, reading this book is essential. After reading this book, the choice of editor will be obvious for you too.
  
   

• The Inmates Are Running the Asylum: Why High Tech Products Drive Us Crazy and How to Restore the Sanity

  Alan Cooper

  
  
   

• Designing Web Navigation: Optimizing the User Experience

  James Kalbach

  
  Thoroughly rewritten for today's web environment, this bestselling book offers a fresh look at a fundamental topic of web site development: navigation design. Amid all the changes to the Web in the past decade, and all the hype about Web 2.0 and various "rich" interactive technologies, the basic problems of creating a good web navigation system remain. Designing Web Navigation demonstrates that good navigation is not about technology-it's about the ways people find information, and how you guide them.
  
  Ideal for beginning to intermediate web designers, managers, other non-designers, and web development pros looking for another perspective, Designing Web Navigation offers basic design principles, development techniques and practical advice, with real-world examples and essential concepts seamlessly folded in. How does your web site serve your business objectives? How does it meet a user's needs? You'll learn that navigation design touches most other aspects of web site development. This book:

  • Provides the foundations of web navigation and offers a framework for navigation design
  • Paints a broad picture of web navigation and basic human information behavior
  • Demonstrates how navigation reflects brand and affects site credibility
  • Helps you understand the problem you're trying to solve before you set out to design
  • Thoroughly reviews the mechanisms and different types of navigation
  • Explores "information scent" and "information shape"
  • Explains "persuasive" architecture and other design concepts
  • Covers special contexts, such as navigation design for web applications
  • Includes an entire chapter on tagging

  While Designing Web Navigation focuses on creating navigation systems for large, information-rich sites serving a business purpose, the principles and techniques in the book also apply to small sites. Well researched and cited, this book serves as an excellent reference on the topic, as well as a superb teaching guide. Each chapter ends with suggested reading and a set of questions that offer exercises for experiencing the concepts in action.
  
   

• Core JavaServer(TM) Faces (2nd Edition) (Sun Core Series)

  David Geary, Cay S. Horstmann

  

  JavaServer Faces (JSF) is quickly emerging as the leading solution for rapid user interface development in Java-based server-side applications. Now, Core JavaServer™ Faces–the #1 guide to JSF–has been thoroughly updated in this second edition, covering the latest feature enhancements, the powerful Ajax development techniques, and open source innovations that make JSF even more valuable.

  Authors David Geary and Cay Horstmann delve into all facets of JSF 1.2 development, offering systematic best practices for building robust applications, minimizing handcoding, and maximizing productivity. Drawing on unsurpassed insider knowledge of the Java platform, they present solutions, hints, tips, and “how-tos” for writing superior JSF 1.2 production code, even if you’re new to JSF, JavaServer Pages™, or servlets.

  The second edition’s extensive new coverage includes: JSF 1.2’s improved alignment with the broader Java EE 5 platform; enhancements to the JSF APIs; controlling Web flow with Shale; and using Facelets to replace JSP with XHTML markup. The authors also introduce Ajax development with JSF–from real-time validation and Direct Web Remoting to wrapping Ajax in JSF components and using the popular Ajax4jsf framework.

  This book will help you

  • Automate low-level details and eliminate unnecessary complexity in server-side development
  • Discover JSF best practices, ranging from effective UI design and style sheets to internationalization
  • Use JSF with Tiles to build consistent, reusable user interfaces
  • Leverage external services such as databases, LDAP directories, authentication/authorization, and Web services
  • Use JBoss Seam to greatly simplify development of database-backed applications
  • Implement custom components, converters, and validators
  • Master the JSF 1.2 tag libararies, and extend JSF with additional tag libraries

  
  Preface
  Acknowledgments
  Chapter 1: Getting Started
  Chapter 2: Managed Beans
  Chapter 3: Navigation
  Chapter 4: Standard JSF Tags
  Chapter 5: Data Tables
  Chapter 6: Conversion and Validation
  Chapter 7: Event Handling
  Chapter 8: Subviews and Tiles
  Chapter 9: Custom Components, Converters, and Validators
  Chapter 10: External Services
  Chapter 11: Ajax
  Chapter 12: Open Source
  Chapter 13: How Do I . . .
  Index 
  
  
   

• Designing the Obvious: A Common Sense Approach to Web Application Design

  Robert Hoekman Jr.

  

  Designing the Obvious belongs in the toolbox of every person charged with the design and development of Web-based software, from the CEO to the programming team. Designing the Obvious explores the character traits of great Web applications and uses them as guiding principles of application design so the end result of every project instills customer satisfaction and loyalty. These principles include building only whats necessary, getting users up to speed quickly, preventing and handling errors, and designing for the activity. Designing the Obvious does not offer a one-size-fits-all development process--in fact, it lets you use whatever process you like. Instead, it offers practical advice about how to achieve the qualities of great Web-based applications and consistently and successfully reproduce them.

  
   

• Advanced Rails Recipes

  Mike Clark

  
  Ruby on Rails continues to build up a tremendous head of steam. Fueled by significant benefits and an impressive portfolio of real-world applications already in production, Rails is destined to continue making significant inroads in coming years.

  Each new Rails application showing up on the web adds yet more to the collective wisdom of the Rails development community. Yesterday's best practices yield to today's latest and greatest techniques, as the state of the art is continually refined in kitchens all across the Internet. Indeed, these are times of great progress.

  At the same time, it's easy to get left behind in the wake of progress. Advanced Rails Recipes keeps you on the cutting edge of Rails development and, more importantly, continues to turn this fast-paced framework to your advantage.

  Advanced Rails Recipes is filled with pragmatic recipes you'll use on every Rails project. And by taking the code in these recipes and slipping it into your application you'll not only deliver your application quicker, you'll do so with the confidence that it's done right.

  The current beta includes contributions from Aaron Batalion, Adam Keys, Adam Wiggins, Andre Lewis, Andrew Kappen, Benjamin Curtis, Ben Smith, Chris Bernard, Chris Haupt, Chris Wanstrath, Cody Fauser, Dan Benjamin, Dan Manges, Daniel Fischer, David Bock, David Chelimsky, David Heinemeier Hansson, Erik Hatcher, Ezra Zygmuntowicz, Geoffrey Grosenbach, Giles Bowkett, Greg Hansen, Gregg Pollack, Hemant Kumar, Hugh Bien, Jamie Orchard-Hays, Jamis Buck, Jared Haworth, Jarkko Laine, Jason LaPier, Jay Fields, John Dewey, Jonathan Dahl, Josep Blanquer, Josh Stephenson, Josh Susser, Kevin Clark, Luke Francl, Mark Bates, Marty Haught, Matthew Bass, Michael Slater, Mike Clark, Mike Hagedorn, Mike Mangino, Mike Naberezny, Mike Subelsky, Nathaniel Talbott, PJ Hyett, Patrick Reagan, Peter Marklund, Pierre-Alexandre Meyer, Rick Olson, Ryan Bates, Scott Barron, Tony Primerano, Val Aleksenko, and Warren Konkel.

  
   

• The Elements of User Experience: User-Centered Design for the Web (VOICES)

  Jesse James Garrett

  

  Smart organizations recognize that Web design is more than just creating clean code and sharp graphics. A site that really works fulfills your strategic objectives while meeting the needs of your users. Even the best content and the most sophisticated technology won't help you balance those goals without a cohesive, consistent user experience to support it.

  But creating the user experience can seem overwhelmingly complex. With so many issues involved-usability, brand identity, information architecture, interaction design-it can seem as if the only way to build a successful site is to spend a fortune on specialists who understand all the details.

  The Elements of User Experience cuts through the complexity of user-centered design for the Web with clear explanations and vivid illustrations that focus on ideas rather than tools or techniques. Jesse James Garrett gives readers the big picture of Web user experience development, from strategy and requirements to information architecture and visual design. This accessible introduction helps any Web development team, large or small, to create a successful user experience.