Maybe there's a resurgence going on at O'Reilly. For a while, I felt they were very stagnated. The books were dull and proliferating faster than I could keep track. I may not have been the only one. All of by brick and mortar bookstores shrunk their computer book section substantially.

So, I was faced with an interesting problem at work - how to illustrate a very large data set. I looked around and even asked friends for sites they may have seen. One of my friends, R, suggested that I pick up this book. I was hesitant, but I got it anyways. It was definitely worth it.

The book describes patterns of interfaces. These patterns are described with applicable problem space and how they address the problem space. For example, when should a split panel be used? If you don't require the dead tree version, the author has built a stunning online version that is free, but not _quite_ as deep as the book. Here's a link to the Two Panel Selector. You may find that the online version is all you need. I think it is all I need now that I have read the book.

I think my only criticism of the book is not deciphering a way to represent all the data in grid. I know this would not be easy, but it would be very interesting to list the problem space on one dimension of the grid and solutions at the intersections. So, I might have "large data sets" and "visual display" and the various patterns could be listed.

Links
http://designinginterfaces.com/
back to more books