[thelist] Useability/design Opinion's sought

Christian Heilmann lists at onlinetools.org
Tue Mar 22 19:36:19 CST 2005


>>really easy. I think the best article about links I read so far is Jukka's
>>"Links want to be links": http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/www/links.html
>>    
>>
>
>I started reading over this article, and before getting through the
>first page, something occured to me. This guys links are aweful, simply
>god aweful. And his page looks terrible.
>:)
>
>In particular, the top menu structure of links is bordering on
>unreadable, due to the overwhelming effect all that bright underlined
>blue text creates. Also, studies have shown that columnar text is easier
>to read than text which spans the entire monitor screen. Most people
>simply leave their browser open full screen, and it is difficult for the
>eye to follow the long path back to the next line and find it properly.
>
>But if your text is contained within a nice column, like alistaparts,
>the eye doesn't have so far to go.
>
>Also, I think one should give the reader the benefit of the doubt. For
>example, in a menu/listing type structure, it is usually obvious that
>these are links, and hence a more subtle (and readable) color/font might
>be preferred.
>
>  
>
Could be, but this is
a) A matter of taste
b) A matter of audience. "Studies" show a lot, as another one may prove 
that multi column layouts are harder to  read[1]. ALA for example could 
be tough with a screen magnifier , as the main navigation is far to the 
right. Then again, ALA is about web design, hence fitting  the audience, 
although the new design caused a lot of uproar in the comments[2].

Apart  from your last paragraph being off-topic (the question was about 
links _in_  text, not about how a menu  should look like) it is far too 
easy to generalise in both directions.

My stance about liquid vs fixed layout  is to question yourself: What 
pisses your visitor off more easily: The need to make the  browser  
window  smaller until the text is easy to  follow or to scroll 
horizontally when the designer-defined "best line length" just is not 
available?

Personally I use 1280x a lot and never have my brower window open to the 
whole size. I do enjoy the option of having my sidebars open and read a 
page without horizontal scrolling though.

>All of this is very interesting. There is a definite fine line between
>"design" issues and "useability" issues. Is it our duty as web designers
>to try and "show the way", and create sites that are more
>asthetic/ergonomic/easy on the eyes ?
>
>  
>
How can  you? Making assumptions? I  do a lot of  usability testing in 
my job, and some of the things we  assume to be very ergonomical, 
aesthetically pleasing and easy baffle a lot more people than one may 
think. It depends what you design: Do you  design a site like a brochure 
or do users really need to interact with  it? The best option is to 
offer the visitor a chance to customise the page to her needs.

One example that really got me thinking lately was this:
http://www.northyorks.gov.uk/portal/index.jsp
The left hand navigation moves the current section up when you drill 
down into a sub section  (Click environment for example). At first I  
was very confused  by  that behaviour, but then I  considered the benefits.
- The section navigation will always be  "above the fold"
- Non-sighted users and Keyboard / Switch access users don't have to  
tab through a lot of  irrellevant links  before they get to the next 
section inside this one

Clearly a bold new concept that could become a  web design pattern, 
given the acceptance of the users.

>The original designers of the web were not usability experts. When they
>decided on "underlined blue" as representing a link, they consulted no
>cognitive research studies.
>  
>
Actually these were the  first  browser developers. The designers 
(technical designers that is) of the  web simply defined a  link as a 
text connecting this  document either to  another one or to another 
section of this document.  My first browser was lynx, and that one did 
not  show links as blue and underlined :-)

[1] http://www.alistapart.com/articles/lowvision/
[2] http://www.alistapart.com/qa/




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