Book Review: Mobile First

According to a recent report, by 2015 more people in the US will be accessing the Internet using mobile devices than through PCs. If this was the only thing mobile had going for it, it would be enough to justify the need for Luke’s new book ‘Mobile First’.

Luke argues that you should design, and build, your mobile experience first. He hits you (gently) over the head with data point after data point making it increasingly obvious that this mobile first technique not only makes sense, but should in fact be the de facto standard for creating sites on today’s web. He makes his case carefully, succinctly and convincingly.

After he has you sold on the importance of this approach, he spends the rest of the book arming you with the information you’ll need to start creating better mobile experiences. He walks you through how to organize your content, develop appropriately sized touch targets, embrace new touch gestures, simplify the process of input on mobile devices and more. Amazingly, he manages to do this in only 120 pages.

All of this knowledge is described in very clear detail. The book is interspersed with subtle humor that makes the book not just educational, but entertaining as well. I was particularly fond of the revelation that anchor tags are part of HTML 0 which works in most browsers except Internet Explorer.

If you pair this book with Ethan’s ‘Responsive Web Design’ (the last book published by A Book Apart) you are arming yourself for the future. Combine these two approaches and you are well on your way to creating more bulletproof sites (if there is such a thing on today’s web).

Needless to say, I highly recommend Luke’s book. As with the rest of the A Book Apart series, it succeeds brilliantly at fulfilling their goal of arming you with the information you need quickly so you can get back to work. You would be doing yourself a disservice by not adding it to your library.