…I bumped into something so amazingly clever, so cool, so “Why didn’t I think of that”—I couldn’t resist writing a quick post about it.
Posted on 11/05/2008 under Design & Usability, 4 comments
Sent from my iPhone
On the intro page of every chapter, there’s an indicator bar that shows you following information:
- The number of chapters, and an indication of which one you’re about to read. (here, it’s the first)
- The length of the chapters, giving you an idea of how much time you’ll spend reading them.
Now, I don’t know if this is the first time an author puts something like this in his/her book, but this is genius! I remember reading Reader’s Digest, and loving the little notification at the start of every article: “x-number of minutes to read this article”.
Web Form Design is written by Luke Wroblewski, and published by Rosenfeld Media.
When you buy directly from Rosenfeld Media, you’ll pay US$36 for the paperback and digital editions, US$19 for digital only. (Compare with US$36 for paperback only at Amazon.)
I’ll try writing down a short review after I finish reading it.
Comments on this post (Write new)
Matt Downey said 63 days ago:
I just started reading this book two days ago and noticed the same thing. What a great idea!
Wired Magazine does something similar. They have a “progress bar” that gives you an idea of where you are and how much is left in the section you’re reading.
Very clever indeed, thanks for sharing.
Josh Pyles said 58 days ago:
I just finished this book, and I think those bars are really clever too. A smart idea really!
The only design that I felt could be improved of this book was the body copy typeface.
Tim Van Damme said 58 days ago:
@Josh: you’re right, the choice of typeface could be better!
Lou Rosenfeld said 43 days ago:
Thanks for the input; I’m the book’s publisher, and I hope you’re enjoying it.
The progress bar is one small thing in our design that I’ll take credit for. My background is in information architecture, so it shouldn’t be surprising that our books feature this progress bar. ;-) It seemed to pass muster with our test subjects when we evaluated the design of our books.
You’re not the first people who mentioned that they’d like to see a better typeface. I realize it’s an issue of taste, but if you don’t mind, please comment here (or email me) your thoughts on how you think it could be better (or if you think there’s a much better replacement candidate).
BTW, I absolutely love your elephant logo; we happen to have an elephant too.