holiday reading

Finally finished How Buildings Learn. It's a remarkable book, one that makes you look at and reevaluate your surroundings, and question things you took for granted-- from the shape of your living room to the house across the street's glassed-in front porch. All Web designers should read this book. Websites, like buildings, exist in time. But web construction materials cost so little and adjustments are so seemly easy that websites are often built to solve an immediate need with no concern for future ones.

However, human resources are what websites are made of (rather than timber or concrete) and these days good human resources are extremely precious (<2% unemployment, folks). They should be used carefully. Better to invest in a good requirements gathering process and a use-driven architecture plan. The chapter entitled "The Scenario-Buffered Building" gives a good and quick process for brainstorming possible uses for a building that is entirely applicable to website design.