Prerequisites
None. Assignments will involve user testing, paper prototyping, and implementing a prototype of a working design, using some computational medium. However, you can select how to implement your solutions, and you can choose whether to use HTML with an editor like Adobe Dreamweaver, Flash, Microsoft Expressions Blend/Sketchflow, or even PowerPoint. Thus, everyone from non-programmers to expert programmers are welcome. No background in HCI is expected.
Corequisites
None.
Grading
| Assignment | Percent of Final Grade |
|---|---|
| Homework 0 | -- |
| Homework 1 | 12% |
| Homework 2 | 12% |
| Homework 3 | 12% |
| Homework 4 | 12% |
| Homework 5 | 12% |
| Homework 6 | 10% |
| Final Exam | 30% |
Textbook
My colleagues
wrote a major new textbook, and our class helped improve
it for over 2 years. We have been using it for a few years now, and it receives good marks from the class:
H. Rex Hartson and Pardha S. Pyla, The UX Book: Process and Guidelines for
Ensuring a Quality User Experience, Morgan Kaufmann / Elsevier, 2012.
Other useful resources
Beyer, H. and Holtzblatt, K., Contextual Design: Defining Customer-Centered Systems. 1998, San Francisco, CA: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers, Inc. ISBN: 1-55860-411-1 (paperback)
Author's site 
;
or Amazon
Jakob Nielsen. Usability Engineering. Morgan Kaufmann, San Francisco, 1994. ISBN 0-12-518406-9 (paperback) [updated from the the older hardcover: ISBN 0-12-518405-0].
Author's site ;
or Amazon
Donald A. Norman, The Design of Everyday Things. Basic Books; 1st Basic edition (September 2002), ISBN: 0-465-06710-7 (paperback) [updated from the original 1988 hardcover version]. Author's site ;
or Amazon