Non-CMS Books

I’ve read a few books over the years that have nothing to do with CMS but have affected how I view the discipline. Both books have to do with human interaction in the physical environment.

• How Buildings Learn: This is an examination of how buildings grow and change over time, and a lot of the lessons apply to large, organic, evolving websites. The was the source of a sidebar in my book about “shearing layers.”
• The Life and Death of Great American Cities: This connection is a little more distant, but Jacobs discusses cities as a connecting fabric for humans, and her thoughts on movement and – weirdly – sidewalks, might echo when you think about how you make digital “spaces.”