I just finished reading Designing the Obvious by Robert Hoekman, Jr.  It it is a book about web interface design and the process to achieve simple and efficient web applications.  It is entirely conceptual, no code.

If you’re designing web apps or having someone design one for you, you should read this book. I have never read a book twice, never. This one will be the first.

Before I reread this one though, I’ll be reading Robert’s follow-up, Designing the Moment.

Jeffrey Zeldman had an interesting post recently entitled Content preceeds design.

“Content precedes design. Design in the absence of content is not design, it’s decoration.”

I`ve been involved with a number of projects where the design was created in the absense of content.  Inevitably, when content starts getting added, it breaks the design.

My tag line says, “Bringing Together Function and Form”.  Which is really saying the same thing that Jeffrey says.

Form without function is decoration.