Getting Real: Epicenter Design (by 37signals)
Epicenter Design
Start from the core of the page and build outward
Epicenter design focuses on the true essence of the page — the epicenter — and then builds outward. This means that, at the start, you ignore the extremities: the navigation/tabs, footer, colors, sidebar, logo, etc. Instead, you start at the epicenter and design the most important piece of content first.
Whatever the page absolutely can't live without is the epicenter. For example, if you're designing a page that displays a blog post, the blog post itself is the epicenter. Not the categories in the sidebar, not the header at the top, not the comment form at the bottom, but the actual blog post unit. Without the blog post unit, the page isn't a blog post.
This is such a key aspect of software and UI design, I can't promote it enough.
Stated simply: Start with the content -> then add the stuff that helps people get around the content.
Don't forget to read the entire book. It's free.
