[thelist] Jakob Nielsen [was Anti-aliasing]

Tue Feb 26 05:39:00 CST 2002

Memo from Martin P Burns of PricewaterhouseCoopers

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To:    thelist at lists.evolt.org
Subject:    RE: [thelist] Jakob Nielsen [was Anti-aliasing]

>>At 7:54 PM -0500 2/25/02, dan donaldson wrote:
>>>Reading a bit of his site reveals an inconsistent philosophy based on
>>>outdated information.
>
>>Is this really fair? He's been at it for seven years - a lot has
>>changed - to his credit, he keeps his old articles up and available

>I based me criticism solely on his current explanations of why his
>site has few graphics and doesn't use the mailto: tag.

Really? Sounds like you're scratching around for excuses because
he's raised a few questions about your best friend, Flash.

boo hoo. Toys back in the pram please.

>And the fact
>that recent and current content is very hard for me top read without
>drastically resizing my browser window.

Are you *sure* you're on the right site? I'm having problems finding
content which doesn't resize to the browser window. And, hey, it
obeys the font sizing set by my browser...

>>But anyway, my point is: what on his Flash-related alertbox
>>(http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20001029.html) do you disagree with?

>Other than that the "facts" he uses to support his criticism are
>incorrect and that he mistakes bad use of Flash as something that's
>inherent to Flash itself,

If Flash developers are incapable of producing anything but bad
Flash, then that's not a valid distinction - if all (or near all) Flash is
bad Flash, then it's indistinguishable from an inherant property
of Flash. Certainly the Flash on the home page of http://www.gozz.com
is confusing as hell - is that supposed to be Good Flash?

>I disagree with the premise he assumes:
>that the purpose and goal of every web page is to present text-based
>information in a way that will not challenge or surprise the visitor.

The majority are. So you need to make a case for exceptions to
that default.

>One could take a few points from his Action Alert and expound on
>them; make the concentration: How not to use Flash," but it would
>just be duplicating information and guidelines available on
>Macromedia's site.

So if the information is on the One True Source for Flash info, why
isn't it used..? CF developers normally use Best Practise as outlined
in the Allaire/MM info, ASP developers use MS coding standards,
so are Flash developers just plain dumb?

>>*   Link colors don't work. Given this, you cannot easily see where
>>  you've been and which links you've yet to visit. This lack of
orientation
>>  creates navigational confusion.

>Incorrect. At the time Jacob wrote this, the current version of Flash
>could change the colors (or size, or position if you wanted) of
>visited links within the Flash movie. And keep them changed between
>sessions if the visitor accepts cookies.

So why have I *never* seen this in a Flash site? Because it's too
much work to recreate that which HTML and browsers do automatically?
Is that an inherent problem with Flash? I think it could be.

>>*   The "Make text bigger/smaller" button does not work.
>>  Users are thus forced to read text in the designer-specified font size,
>>  which is almost always too small since designers tend to have excellent
>>  vision.

>Incorrect. If it's important to allow visitors to change font size,
>you can do that within a Flash movie ...

Does it obey the setting I have in my browser? Ah, no. *If* the designer
remembers and has time/budget to add change font size functionality,
it'll be there. But otherwise..?

>everyone is free to use a mixture of Flash an HTML text, I know of no
>jurisdictions where doing so is forbidden by law.

However, it seems to be so in the minds of Flash developers who seem
to only have one tool... "YEAH! Flash navigation!"

>>*   The "Find in page" feature does not work. In general, Flash
>>integrates poorly with search.

>Correct on the first part, incorrect on the second. You can make a
>search feature within the Flash movie, of course sometimes the
>browser's search function will be superior ...

So if I'm mixing Flash and HTML as you suggest, how does my search
engine (which spiders the site) search the Flash assets?

>but I don't think I'm
>the only developer that's been charged with displaying searchable
>data as a Flash movie, because the data and desired format of search
>results lent itself to be best accomplished in Flash.

Oh, you mean two *different* searches - one which works everywhere
else, and across the site, and one which only works in the Flash on
this specific page. Sounds like "integrates poorly" to me...

>>*   Internationalization and localization is complicated. Local
>>websites must
>>  enlist a Flash professional to translate content.

>This is the biggest non-point of the whole thing. If you need to
>change the language of copy on a straight HTML page, you're going to
>have to "enlist a [HTML] professional."

Nope. If you're at that kind of scale, you'd likely have a CMS, with
non-HTML professionals.

>On top of that (and this
>again shows his ignorance) you don't have to be a "Flash
>professional" to change the language of external data files from
>which Flash culls text content.

When was that introduced, and how widespread is its usage?

>>  Also, text that moves is harder to read for users who lack fluency
>>in the language.

>Um, I find it hard to believe he's unaware that it's possible to have
>text that doesn't move in a Flash movie. I doubt this point struck
>home with anyone, including himself.

So if it's just static text, why have it in Flash..?

>>  If Flash was cheap to produce and if all content creators could
>>make a Flash object
>>  as easily as they write a standard Web page, then perhaps many of
>>these problems
>>  would be alleviated.

>ROFLMAO. Here's Jakob, I'm Jacob - I've got a deadly serious scowl on
>my face: "Flash poses a fundamental threat to the status quo. We
>must, I say MUST, make it our number one priority to continue doing
>things as they were done in the Golden Age of 1994. Nothing new can
>be introduced! I mean like look at my ugly web page - I've been doing
>HTML for years and my straight HTML web site sucks!"

And the logical connection between that quote and your analysis is..?

Cheers
Martin

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