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Usability and Design Bibliography for International

Products
December 10, 1998
Chauncey Wilson
Chaunsee@aol.com

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Andrews, D. C. Technical Communication in the Global Community.

Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ, 1998.

Andrews has a section entitled “Crossing Cultures” at the end of most chapters.

Apple Computer, Inc. Human Interface Guidelines: The Apple Desktop

Interface. Reading, MA, 1992.

Axtell, R. E. Do’s and Taboos Around the World (3rd Edition). Wiley, New
York, 1993.

Axtell, R. E. Gestures: The Do's and Taboos of Body Language Around the
World. Wiley, New York, 1991.

Belge M. The Next Step in Software Internationalization. Interactions. ACM

Publishers. Vol 2. No 1. pp 21-25, 1995.

Bishop, M. International Web Site. The Coriolis Group, Scottsdale, AZ, 1998.

Borgman C L. Cultural Diversity in Interface Design. SIGCHI Bulletin. Vol. 24.

No. 4. p31, 1992.

Coe, M. Human Factors for Technical Communicators. Wiley: New York, NY,
1996.
Coe's book provides technical communicators with clear explanations of the impact of
human factors on technical communication.

Del Galdo, E. M. and Nielsen, J. (Eds.) International User Interfaces. Wiley:

New York, NY, 1996.
Del Galdo and Nielsen's book is a collection of chapters on topics dealing with usability
engineering, culture and design, international differences in software user training, case
studies on international user interface design, and the design of multilingual documents.
Examples of Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, and Europeans designs are shown.
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Fernandes, T. Global Interface Design: A Guide to Designing International

User Interfaces. AP Professional: Boston, MA, 1995.

Fernandes book is an excellent reference for GUI designers. His book has sections on
visual design, international formats, cultural issues, symbols and taboos, and cultural
aesthetics. This book has the best examples of good and bad international GUI designs
that I’ve seen.

Fowler, S. L. and Stanwick, V. R. The GUI Style Guide. AP Professional:

Boston, MA, 1995.

Fowler and Stanwick provide a detailed list of localization and internationalization

resources.

Hall, P. A. V. and Hudson, R. (Ed.) Software Without Fontiers: A Multi-

platform, Multi-cultural, Multi-nation Approach. Wiley: New York, 1997.

Software Without Frontiers is a detailed reference book that deals with globalization
methods, internationalization architectures, cultural conventions, documentation and
translation, message generation, and quality assurance.

Hars , A. Localizing software is not just a multilingual issue; it's also

multicultural. http://www.byte.com/art/9603/sec18/art1.htm

Hoft, N. L. International Technical Communication: How to Export

Information About High Technology. Wiley: New York, NY, 1995.

Hoft provides a comprehensive sourcebook on the issues associated with the design of
international technical communications. She covers topics ranging from the
management of internationalization groups to the criteria for selecting good translators.

Hoft, N. L. Case Studies in International Technical Communication.

http://www.world-ready.com/cases/index.htm

Horton, William, The Almost Universal Language: Graphics for International

Documents. Technical Communication, Vol. 40, No. 4. pp. 682-693,
November, 1993.

Horton, W. The Icon Book: Visual Symbols for Computer Systems and
Documentation. Wiley: New York, NY, 1994.

Everything you ever wanted to know about icon design. The Icon Book describes the
process for designing icons, provides guidelines for icon design, and gives advice on how
to design for international audiences. There is one version of the book that includes a
disk with a set of 500 icons. Small companies that can’t afford graphic designers might
find this set of icons useful as a starting point for design.
Horton, W. Designing and Writing Online Documentation. Wiley: New York,
NY, 1994.
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Internationalization (i18N).
http://www.vlsivie.tuwien.ac.at/mike/i18n.html

A semi-organized list of Web sites that focus on internationalization of software.

Internationalization Working Group of the W3C. Non-western Character sets,

Languages, and Writing Systems.
http://www.w3.org/International/

International Technical Communication (ITC) PIC Home Page.

Http://www.iquest.com/~btatro/itc.itc.html

ISYS Information Architects, Inc. Hall of Shame: Globalization.

http://www.iarchitect.com/global.htm

ISYS Information Architects, Inc. Globalization Tips.

http://www.iarchitect.com/htglobal.htm

Jackson, R., MacDonald, L. and Freeman, K. Computer Generated Color: A

Practical Guide to Presentation and Display. Wiley: New York, NY, 1994.

Jones, S., Kennelly, C., Mueller, C., Sweezy, M., Thomas, B., and Velez, L. A
Digital Guide: Developing International User Information. Digital Press:
Bedford, MA, 1992.

This book has detailed guidelines on how to develop international user information. It is
an excellent reference for companies creating international software.

Kano, N. Developing International Software for Windows ® 95 and Windows

NT ®: A Handbook for International Software Design. Microsoft Press,
Redmond, WA, 1995.

Karat C, and Karat J. World-wide CHI: Perspectives on Design and

Internationalization. SIGCHI Bulletin. Vol. 28. No. 1. pp. 39-40. January 1996.

Kellogg W, Thomas J. Cross-cultural Perspectives on Human-Computer

Interaction: A Report on the CHI'92 Workshop. SIGCHI Bulletin. Vol. 25. No.
2. pp. 40-45, April 1993.

Leaptrott, N. Rules of the Game: Global Business Protocol. Thomson

Executive Press: Cincinnati, OH, 1996.

Leptrott offers advice on how to discover the rules of international business “games”.
Chapters topics include: “The game of Global Business”, “Discovering the Rules”,
Conflicting Rules: Ethics and Integrity”.
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Liungman, C. G. Dictionary of Symbols. ABC-CLIO, Inc: Santa Barbara, CA,

1991.

Luong, T. V., Lok, J.S. H., Taylor, D. J., and Driscoll, K. Internationalization:
Developing Software for Global Markets. Wiley, New York, NY, 1995.

Luong and his colleagues have compiled a detailed set of the rules that developers of
international software need to know. The book is clearly written, even when discusses
technical programming issues. The one drawback that I found was a lack of graphics -
the book is heavy on text and light on graphics.

Microsoft Corporation. Developing International Software for Windows 95

and Windows NT: Glossary. 1996.
http://microsoft.com/OfficeDev/Articles/DISAppA.HTM

Microsoft Corporation. The Windows Interface Guidelines for Software

Design. Microsoft Press: Redmond, WA, 1995.

This is Microsoft’s much expanded GUI guidelines for Windows 95 and Windows NT.
The first section of the book deals with fundamentals of designing user interface; the
second covers Windows interface components; the last section covers design
specifications and guidelines.

Microsoft Corporation. The GUI Guide: International Terminology for the

Windows Interface. Microsoft Press: Redmond, WA, 1993.

The GUI Guide provides a list of terms used in Windows’ products in 14 languages. This
book would be an excellent resource for international teams and translation agencies.

Microsoft Corporation. The Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical

Publications. Microsoft Press: Redmond, WA, 1996.
The Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical Publications is a comprehensive usage
manual for Windows 95 software and documentation. This style guide contains lists of
technical terms and examples of appropriate usage, acronyms and abbreviations, and
special characters.

Miller, C. L. Transborder Tips and Traps. BYTE. Vol 19. No 6. pp. 93-102,
1994.

Nakakoji K. Crossing the Cultural Boundary. BYTE. Vol. 19. No. 6. pp. 107-
109, June 1994.

New Mexico State University. Books on International Technical

Communication. http://www.nmsu.edu/techprof/attwrsrc/books.html

A list of books and links to other references on international technical communication.

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Nielsen, J. (Ed.) Designing User Interfaces for International Use. Elsevier:

Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 1990.

Nielsen, J. Usability Engineering. Academic Press: Boston, MA, 1993.

(Note: There is a paperback version available. The paperback version has
additional references and some updated material.)

Nielsen’s Usability Engineering is highly recommended. The book describes the

process by which development groups can create usable applications. The book details
how usability issues must be considered throughout the development process and
provides techniques for gathering usability data. There is excellent information on low-
cost usability testing techniques.

Nielsen, J. International Web Usability.

http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9608.html

Nielsen, J. Global Web: Driving the International Network Economy.

http://www.useit.com/alertbox/980419.html

Nielsen, J. International Usability Testing.

http://www.useit.com/papers/international_usetest.html

Nielsen, J. Flag Problems. http://www.useit.com/alertbox/flagproblem.html

O’Donnell, S. M. Programming for the World: A Guide to

Internationalization. PTR Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1994.

Russo P, and Boor S. How Fluent is your Interface? Designing for

International Users. Proceedings INTERCHI '93 Conference on Human Factors
in Computing Systems: INTERACT '93 and CHI'93. (Amsterdam, 24-29 April).
ACM Press. pp. 342-347, 1993.

Smith, W. J. ISO and ANSI Ergonomic Standards for Computer Products: A

Guide to Implementation and Compliance. Prentice Hall: Upper Saddle River,
NJ, 1996.

Society of Technical Communication. Global Talk Newsletter of the

International Technical Communication SIG.
http://www.iquest.com/~btatro/itc.itc.html.
You can download copies of Global Talk, the newsletter of the STC International SIG.

Steiner, H. and Haas, K. Cross-cultural Communication: Communicating in

a Global Marketplace. Thames and Hudson: London, 1995.
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This book has a series of case studies on how marketing communications experts solved
problems they faced when designing marketing materials outside their own cultures. This
book gives examples from corporate identity programs, magazines, books, and
advertisements.

Stevenson, D. W. Audience Analysis Across Cultures. Journal of Technical

Writing and Communication. Vol. 13, No. 4, pp. 319-330.

The New York Times, Sunday, August 18, 1996, p. 7. What’s A-O.K in the
U.S.A is Lewd and Worthless Beyond.

Thorell, L.G. and Smith, W.J. Using Computer Color Effectively: An

Illustrated Reference. Prentice Hall: Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1990.

Trenner, L. and Bawa, J. (Eds.) The Politics of Usability: A Practical Guide to

Designing Usable Systems in Industry. Springer-Verlag: London, UK, 1998.

This short paperback has excellent advice for anyone who is trying to establish a
usability presence. Chapters topics include: making a business case for usability,
overcoming inertia in large organizations, integrating usability into system development,
and cultivating an effective client relationship. Each chapter ends with a list of major
lessons learned. Newcomers to the field can gain some savvy from this book.
Experienced practitioners may find some new methods or political ideas that will make
their work easier. Part 4 of this book focuses on international usability topics (the title is
“The Politics of Expansion: How to Work Effectively on an International Scale”).

Trompenaars, F. Riding the Waves of Culture: Understanding Cultural

Diversity in Business. Nicholas Brealey Publishing, London, 1996.

Weiss, T. Translation in a Borderless World. Technical Communication

Quarterly, Vol. 4, No. 4, pp. 407-423, 1995.
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Wixon, D. and Ramey, J. Field Methods Casebook for Software Design.

Wiley, New York, 1996.

Chapter 8 by Susan Dray and Deborah Mrazek describes an international ethnographic

study from beginning to end.

Yeo, A. World-Wide CHI: Cultural User Interfaces, A

Silver Lining in Cultural Diversity.
http://www.cwi.nl/~steven/sigchi/bulletin/1996.3/international.html