Interaction Design for Usability
How This Course Will Help Your Career
What You’ll Learn
- An understanding of the basics of usability, including visual design, navigation and menu design, search engine optimization, and accessibility
- How to design for efficiency and persuasion
- What lean and agile processes are
- How to integrate user-centered design into lean and agile development
- How to make a case for user-centered design
- How to engage the whole team in user-centered design
This course will teach you fundamental usability concepts and methods and will tie them together with interaction and visual design. By completing the course, you will become equipped with the tools required to create products with outstanding user experience and usability. Your newly acquired knowledge will also enable you to reduce the costs, risk, and time required to design and implement such products.
You’ll learn to adopt a user-centered approach to UX design and usability so you can create user-friendly products that people love to use—for example, by allowing for user errors and providing timely feedback messages. More importantly, it is crucial that your entire team—developers, project managers, and product owners alike—adopt this holistic, user-centered mindset. This course therefore aims to provide any team member with just that: it will not only equip you with fundamental usability and design concepts, but also introduce you to lean and agile processes that will allow your whole team to become design-centric.
You should take this course if you belong to a team whose goal is to create a great product—whatever role you play in that. The fact of the matter is that usability experts and UX designers are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the people who influence the design of a product. A sound understanding of user-centered design processes is thus greatly beneficial whether you’re a UX designer, developer, or a newcomer to design who wants to be part of a product team one day.
Gain an Industry-Recognized UX Course Certificate
Use your industry-recognized Course Certificate on your resume, CV, LinkedIn profile or your website.
Our courses and Course Certificates are trusted by these industry leaders:
Is This Course Right for You?
This is a beginner-level course recommended for anyone involved in building interactive systems:
- UX, UI, and web designers keen on building interactive systems with users in mind
- Project managers interested in keeping their products focused on the user
- Software engineers looking to build upon their understanding of how apps, systems and websites can be built with the user in mind
- Entrepreneurs who want to ensure their entire outlook and team remain focused on user-centered design
- Marketers interested in incorporating a user-centered perspective across all touch-points
- Newcomers to design who are considering making a switch to UX, UI, or web design
Courses in the Interaction Design Foundation are designed to contain comprehensive, evidence-based content, while ensuring that the learning curve is never too steep. All participants will have the opportunity to share ideas, seek help with tests, and enjoy the social aspects afforded by our open and friendly forum.
Learn and Work with a Global Team of Designers
You’ll join a global community and work together to improve your skills and career opportunities. Connect with helpful peers and make friends with like-minded individuals as you push deeper into the exciting and booming industry of design.
This course is taught by William Hudson, a leading expert in user-centered design who consults and teaches internationally. The lessons have a practical focus but also incorporate background and theory to help you understand the more complex issues involved. On top of this, you will be able to enhance your learning through the (optional) related reading—this consisting of over 40 titles across a broad array of subjects.
Course Overview: What You'll Master
- Each week, one lesson becomes available.
- There's no time limit to finish a course. Lessons have no deadlines.
- Estimated learning time: 65 hours 15 mins spread over 19 weeks .
Lesson 0: Welcome and Introduction
-
0.1: An introduction to courses from the Interaction Design Foundation (37 mins)
-
0.2: Let Our Community Help You (1 min)
-
0.3: How to Earn Your Course Certificate (16 mins)
-
0.4: Expand Your Network and Grow Your Skills in Our Online Forums (5 mins)
-
0.5: Global Skills, Local Jobs: Build Your Network in Your Area (1 min)
-
0.6: Gain Timeless Skills Through Courses from the Interaction Design Foundation (21 mins)
-
0.7: Mandatory vs. Optional Lesson Items (7 mins)
-
0.8: A Mix Between Video-Based and Text-Based Lesson Content (6 mins)
Lesson 1: User-Centered Design Boot Camp
-
1.1: Introduction (1 hour 31 mins)
-
1.2: Mind the Empathy Gap (1 hour 35 mins)
-
1.3: The Art/Science of Programming (29 mins)
-
1.4: Human Centered Design (25 mins)
-
1.5: Community-based learning and networking (8 mins)
Lesson 2: Visual Design for Usability
-
2.1: Visual Design Versus Usability (51 mins)
-
2.2: Principles of Visual Perception (35 mins)
-
2.3: Layout and Grids (42 mins)
-
2.4: Colour, Fonts & Images (1 hour 32 mins)
-
2.5: Form Design (58 mins)
-
2.6: Community-based learning and networking (7 mins)
Lesson 3: Navigation & Menu Design
-
3.1: Designing for Users' Goals (1 hour 23 mins)
-
3.2: The Scent of Information (1 hour 31 mins)
-
3.3: Mega Menus & Faceted Search (42 mins)
-
3.4: Menu Design for Mobile Devices (29 mins)
-
3.5: Community-based learning and networking (9 mins)
Lesson 4: Designing for SEO & Accessibility
-
4.1: Basics of SEO and Accessibility (1 hour 2 mins)
-
4.2: Good Page Structure and Markup (1 hour 5 mins)
-
4.3: SEO and Accessibility Tools (29 mins)
-
4.4: Legal Aspects of Accessibility (28 mins)
-
4.5: Completing the Accessibility Puzzle (29 mins)
-
4.6: Community-based learning and networking (9 mins)
Lesson 5: Human Error, Messages & Feedback
-
5.1: Human Error (2 hours 8 mins)
-
5.2: Planning for Errors (30 mins)
-
5.3: Feedback and Flow (33 mins)
-
5.4: Attracting Attention (18 mins)
-
5.5: Error Messages (1 hour 8 mins)
-
5.6: Community-based learning and networking (8 mins)
Lesson 6: Usability Evaluation
-
6.1: Introduction (1 hour 10 mins)
-
6.2: Expert/Heuristic Evaluation & Benchmarking (42 mins)
-
6.3: Paper Prototyping (12 mins)
-
6.4: Usability Testing (47 mins)
-
6.5: Eye Tracking (48 mins)
-
6.6: A/B & Multivariate Testing (17 mins)
-
6.7: Community-based learning and networking (9 mins)
Lesson 7: User-Centred IA With Card Sorting
-
7.1: Basics of Card Sorting (1 hour 22 mins)
-
7.2: Terminology (1 hour 16 mins)
-
7.3: Cluster Analysis (46 mins)
-
7.4: Other Analysis (32 mins)
-
7.5: Avoiding Common Pitfalls (21 mins)
-
7.6: Community-based learning and networking (8 mins)
Lesson 8: Dynamic Web Pages: Effective Use of Ajax
-
8.1: Basic Principles of Ajax (1 hour 42 mins)
-
8.2: Perceptual Issues (46 mins)
-
8.3: Ajax Guidelines (58 mins)
-
8.4: SEO & Accessibility (27 mins)
-
8.5: A Worked Example (35 mins)
-
8.6: Community-based learning and networking (9 mins)
Lesson 9: Writing Effective Web & Intranet Content
-
9.1: What Users Want (49 mins)
-
9.2: Inverted Pyramid & Visual Structure (16 mins)
-
9.3: Readability Versus Legibility (21 mins)
-
9.4: Readability Metrics (1 hour 22 mins)
-
9.5: Community-based learning and networking (8 mins)
Lesson 10: Designing for Efficiency
-
10.1: Ease of Learning Versus Efficiency of Use (56 mins)
-
10.2: Keystroke-Level Model (38 mins)
-
10.3: Fitts' Law (17 mins)
-
10.4: The Art of Efficient Shortcuts (31 mins)
-
10.5: Micro-Usability (28 mins)
-
10.6: Community-based learning and networking (9 mins)
Lesson 11: Persuasion, Trust and Seduction
-
11.1: Psychology of Persuasion (1 hour 24 mins)
-
11.2: Perceptions of Trust (35 mins)
-
11.3: Comparative Web Credibility (47 mins)
-
11.4: User Goals & Emotional Journeys (18 mins)
-
11.5: Seductive Design & The Halo Effect (48 mins)
-
11.6: Community-based learning and networking (8 mins)
Lesson 12: Making the Case for UCD in Agile
-
12.1: 'Optional' User Experience (1 hour 8 mins)
-
12.2: Understanding Your Audience (1 hour 10 mins)
-
12.3: Making the Most of Metrics (55 mins)
-
12.4: Building a Persuasive Case (1 hour 1 min)
-
12.5: Community-based learning and networking (8 mins)
Lesson 13: Integrating UX/UCD & Agile
-
13.1: Origins of Agile (44 mins)
-
13.2: Tension Between Agile & UCD (1 hour 6 mins)
-
13.3: Empathetic Design (23 mins)
-
13.4: Parallel Streams Approach (1 hour 2 mins)
-
13.5: Focusing on Users (51 mins)
-
13.6: Design Maps as a Collaboration Tool (16 mins)
-
13.7: Community-based learning and networking (10 mins)
Lesson 14: Agile UX: Users, Personas & Design Maps
-
14.1: Psychology of Personas (1 hour 59 mins)
-
14.2: User Research (43 mins)
-
14.3: Roles and Personas (1 hour 8 mins)
-
14.4: Feature & Dependency Matrices (34 mins)
-
14.5: Design Maps (23 mins)
-
14.6: Community-based learning and networking (8 mins)
Lesson 15: Agile UX: Use Cases, Stories & Scenarios
-
15.1: Brief Introduction to Requirements (1 hour 0 mins)
-
15.2: Use Cases & Use Case Diagrams (1 hour 4 mins)
-
15.3: Scenarios & Story-Telling (31 mins)
-
15.4: Sketches, Storyboards & Wireframes (29 mins)
-
15.5: Community-based learning and networking (10 mins)
Lesson 16: Agile UX: Conceptual Models
-
16.1: Conceptual Models & Their Benefits (34 mins)
-
16.2: User Versus Domain Models (1 hour 13 mins)
-
16.3: Appropriate Levels of Detail (32 mins)
-
16.4: Conceptual Models & Design Maps (25 mins)
-
16.5: Community-based learning and networking (10 mins)
Lesson 17: Course Certificate, Final Networking, and Course Wrap-up
How Others Have Benefited
April Holder, United States
“The course had an incredible amount of depth for the cost of the course. It reminded me of taking a college course but without all the hassle of attending the lectures at the professor's preferred time. It was great to learn from an instructor who typically teaches computer science, as there were lots of little tidbits William Hudson offered that were additional to the course; he explained his way of thinking very well to make it accessible to my way of thinking (which can be quite different than his)”
Nora Szell, Luxembourg
“The course was very informative, well structured and well paced as well!”
Ashish Rajak, India
“The instructor has decades of experience in the design industry. He is really a good storyteller and mentor. I'm pleased to learn from such a person. Thank you so much, Mr. William Hudson! :)”
How It Works
-
Take online courses by industry experts
Lessons are self-paced so you'll never be late for class or miss a deadline.
-
Get a Course Certificate
Your answers are graded by experts, not machines. Get an industry-recognized Course Certificate to prove your skills.
-
Advance your career
Use your new skills in your existing job or to get a new job in UX design. Get help from our community.
Start Advancing Your Career Now
Join us to take “Interaction Design for Usability”. Take other courses at no additional cost. Make a concrete step forward in your career path today.
Advance my career now