Books & Courses

Some believe if you're not born with a gift for design, you'll never be able to effectively work with it. This is false. Design is a science-based skill that can be learned by anyone - including you! The "Foundations of Design for Developers" eBook will help you gain a solid grasp of the design fundamentals every engineer needs to know. Many engineers and developers are interested in learning design but discouraged by the mountain of information available.Finish the eBook and you'll be well-equipped to bridge the gap between design and development, and

• Understand why design decisions are made and what your designer was working towards.
• Collaborate and find compromises where you may have previously found only frustration.
• Add that elusive design touch to your projects.
• Build polished software interfaces with smooth UX.

In an ideal world, usability testing might be considered exclusively the job responsibility of UX designers or researchers. However, for many of us and for various reasons, that just isn't a reality. No matter what the situation is, running basic usability tests is something everyone is completely capable of—and it comes with the bonus of making us better at our own jobs, as well, by better understanding our users.

In this course, we'll discuss finding participants, thinking through the testing logistics, writing and facilitating a usability test, and reviewing the data. Each learner will get the chance to write a usability testing script for a feature in their own website or application that they'd like to test. Then, they'll be challenged to practice usability tests with those scripts to get hands-on experience facilitating tests. Learners will leave this course feeling empowered and confident to start a usability testing program at their own workplace!

The thought of accessibility—especially testing for accessibility—can be intimidating. In reality, writing and testing accessible code requires only moderate adjustments to the development process. Any developer, from junior engineer to senior team lead, can do it.

Join expert Kathryn Grayson Nanz to take the mystery out of accessibility. You'll examine foundational knowledge, vocabulary, and the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) for common aspects of web design, code, and page content. You'll run a step-by-step accessibility audit on your own website or application, reviewing the product for accessibility in multiple ways and brainstorming solutions for accessibility mistakes. By the end of the course, you'll feel empowered to start building accessible development into your existing processes and patterns at work.