[thelist] three usability questions

[Diane Soini]

On Friday, July 2, 2004, at 12:37 AM, thelist-request at lists.evolt.org 
wrote:
>
<snip>
> One of my pet peeves is websites that allow long sections of text to 
> run 100% of the browser window. I find it can be difficult to find the 
> next line when reading text at 100% of the window's width. Thoughts?

I like 100% width better than sites with fixed or narrow columns, but 
I'm the only one I know who prefers it that way. I guess I like being 
able to see as much of the page as possible, then if I like what's 
there and am getting tired following long lines, I can resize the 
window. I normally don't surf maximized, but then hordes of people 
don't realize you can do that. When pages are fixed with columns, I 
prefer the column of text to not be very close to the left of the 
screen. At least a few inches away or in the center.

<snip>

> Last query: If we end up doing conceptually grouped sections, the site 
> hierarchy will be pushed one level deeper to 5 levels of links for 
> just a few articles. She has suggested making the second level links 
> "hierarchical menus" . I think it's a bad idea! a. They're so "1999"  
> b. It seems horrid usability to make site navigation go like this:
>
> always visible links > rollover hierarchical menus > always visible 
> links > always visible links > select box for multi-page articles

The company where I work (qad.com) in their last redesign went from top 
level "tabs" with all the hierarchical sub-levels visible in a side 
navigation area, to one where the second-level items appear in 
javascript drop-down menus (All industries, Industry 1, Industry 2, 
etc), with navigation on the side of each page that only lists the next 
level down, but not all the levels above or below.

So, two ways to get there:
1. click on Top level "Industries", and then you get side navigation 
listing all the Industry categories. Click on one of those, and you get 
side navigation relevant only to that industry and only one level 
below, and so on. Or,
2. go straight to an industry from javascript menu and get side 
navigation relevant only to that industry and only one level below. 
Kind of skipping that interim second level in the hierarchy and thus 
using the javascript to reduce the hierarchy rather than expand it.

The rationale for the potential reduced usability of javascript menus 
was that if it really was less usable, there would still be breadcrumbs 
displaying the hierarchy on each page, and a site map if all else 
failed. Also, as the site map is the only page in the whole site where 
links are not created by javascript, it's the only means for those 
without javascript and for search engines.

Not the most usability/standards-aware way to do it, but then they 
don't really care about that sort of thing, just like most companies 
probably do not care that much. But in some sense usability did improve 
because there is less hierarchy to wade through. And from what I hear 
the customers were pleased.

Diane

> --
> - Erik Mattheis
> 612 377 2272
> http://gozz.com/
***