Vaspers the Grate (Steven Edward) — “Since the vast majority of blogs are authored by a single person, the chances of very many of these unknown strangers having anything important or interesting to say to you: almost zero.”
I’ll keep this short and sweet. Earlier this year, Chris McEvoy informed me that he rebuilt WebWord postings and comments from July 2001 through Oct 2003. This “lost” content is now found, posted, and completely available to you.
I’ll add a more permanent link in the navigation when time permits. Done!
p.s. I really miss the WebWord logo. Need to give that some room on the site too. Here’s some love for now…
Web Pro News — “Now that usable websites have become so commonplace, especially among the major web players, it’s time to start looking to the future. Suddenly, a usable website isn’t going to be enough to separate us from our competitors (apart from those using the developers who’ve been based on Mars). There is a solution.”
Usable web sites have become commonplace? That’s funny! And, not true. While many sites are usable, most still stink.
We’ve heard it before, but it is true: old content is good content. Here’s an example of my own:
UPS: Arrival, Arrival, Departure, Arrival, Departure… It has been popular recently, but I don’t know why.
That’s something to noodle over. You can’t predict the future and you can’t know what people will want tomorrow, or next week, or next year. Generate good content and move along. You never know if you have created a real gem for the future.
I also want to mention that it is a good idea to archive content, but it is a very bad idea to change URLs. You break links (i.e., link rot). Don’t forget that. I’ve run into a lot of broken links recently, especially on my own site. (Grr!)
Here is my answer:
jean-francois,
I’ll start with a couple of caveats. First, I don’t know the goal of the site or the page. (Free internet studies?) Second, my comments and recommendations are going to be very rough. This is a very light heuristic analysis which is not based on any solid data.
Regarding the first comment, the usability of the page would very likely be improved by adding a simple purpose statement. “The purpose of this page is to…” Depending on your users, it might also make sense to offer a link / help icon / pop up that provided further help. I don’t think taking users to another page makes sense in this case. In any event, offering up more information about what to expect and what to do would help quite a bit. Place this information near the top of the page, above the menu itself.
Next, I think we should look at Usable Web Menus for a quick list of usability “rules” to consider:
1. Menus must be considerate of the user’s main task
2. Menus must be distinct from content
3. Menus must be clearly readable
4. Menus must be easily scanned for information
5. Menus must be easily operated
6. Menus must behave as your target user would expect
7. Menus must load quickly as possible
8. Menus must be consistent across a site
9. Menus must put a higher premium on usability than branding
10. Menus must be localizable
11. Menus must be accessible to the handicapped
12. Menus must work on multiple browsers
Note: I don’t recommend Usable Web Menus. It is out of date and out of print. Still, I like the rules posted above and I usually reference them when reviewing menus.
I’m going to target item 5 first. I don’t mind the use of folders. Users are generally familiar with this paradigm, mainly because of Windows. My main issue is that the text is not clickable. The folder icon and the text should be clickable. It might make sense to underline the text. If that isn’t a design you like, consider having an underline appear as the user rolls over the text in the menu. Either way, strongly consider making the text clickable.
Regarding item 6, the menu doesn’t quick operate as I would expect. First, it pops open and is justified at the top of the page. I’d rather have it just open up. Don’t bother with that justification because it causes the user to lose their context on the page. Second, I don’t like that the menu closes items I have open. Since you’re utilizing a Windows folders paradigm, stick with it. Keep folder open until manually closed. Users expect this. Also consider that some users will want to compare one menu section that is open to another that is open. That’s not possible unless you follow my recommendation.
I’d focus on improving what the user sees when they open a menu item up. The box format isn’t too bad in terms of the literal format. I understand your desire for visual control, particularly the table layout and justification. However, what does catalog number mean and why does it matter? What is other media and why does it matter? It is possible that your purpose statement could provide some clues, but I’d need to see it to provide better advice.
I do have other comments, but my time is up! I’ll conclude by saying that you have good raw material. The changes needed are evolutionary rather than revolutionary. That’s how I feel right now at least…
p.s. I think you could get a lot of mileage out of using Ajax. Namely, I’d consider providing users with a clue about what they would get as they rolled over the menu items. You have good data and metadata, consider showing that data, perhaps to the right hand part of the page. I recommended this on a recent project and it was a smash hit!
p.p.s. A flyout menu, done right, might be another design solution if you are looking for a new look and feel. I’m kind of partial to FreeStyle Menus v1.0 RC9 (for inspiration, if nothing else).
In the spirit of the holiday season, I would very much like to help a WebWord reader. I will donate approximately one hour of my time to the first person who tells me that they need usability help today. ($250 value, wink wink!) First come, first serve. I’m at your disposal…
OLD Ease of Learning: How fast can a user who has never seen the user interface before learn it sufficiently well to accomplish basic tasks?
NEW Ease of Doing: How fast can a user accomplish the desired task? How much time? How much energy applied per unit of measured time?
Why better? Takes into consideration users doing something versus knowing how to get it done; practical and concrete measures; accounts for situations where learning is not needed nor desired. Deliberately factors out the need for learning, education, or necessary assistance.
OLD Efficiency of Use: Once an experienced user has learned to use the system, how fast can he or she accomplish tasks?
NEW Pain Tolerance: What is the level of pain users are willing to endure to learn a task? How much are they willing to suffer before abandoning the task?
Why better? Takes into account the very real fact that many users are not willing to complete a task if it is too painful or difficult. Especially useful for examining and digging into why tasks and transactions are completed. Why measure speed and efficiency if users never even get the opportunity to become experienced? Further, this breaks the assumption that users must be experienced at all to accomplish a task.
OLD Memorability: If a user has used the system before, can he or she remember enough to use it effectively the next time or does the user have to start over again learning everything?
NEW Recommendability: What is the likelihood that a user will recommend the system to others? If users are willing to recommend, they are willing to use again. Further, if a user recommends the system to another user, it is obviously memorable.
Why better? Word of mouth is the most powerful marketing a system can entertain. It is obviously business oriented and somewhat task focused, but more importantly, it truly focuses on user to user connections which is something lost with memorability, and usability in general. Focuses on networks and social connections of people. Also, while memorability is good for focusing on decreasing costs associated with re-learning it is bad for understanding translation to growth. Recommendability is more positive and focuses on the value of improvements, working with others, and human to human interaction. Bottom line, cost reduction is limited in value whereas growth is not.
OLD Error Frequency and Severity: How often do users make errors while using the system, how serious are these errors, and how do users recover from these errors?
NEW Subjective Severity of Errors: To what extent are users willing to suffer the errors of a system? How intense do users perceive the errors? To what level do errors impact user satisfaction, but more importantly, task completion and recommendability?
Why better? Errors are only errors if users subjectively experience pain. Some users are very forgiving and their task completion may not be impacted at any level. Of critical note, Error tolerance and subjective severity is directly tied to recommendability, which in turn is particularly useful for business and monitoring system profitability.
OLD Subjective Satisfaction: How much does the user like using the system?
NEW Dance to Profit: Is the system good enough to drive down costs and increase profits when considering how users operate as part of the system? What is the financial impact of users on a system? What is the financial impact of systems on users?
Why better? When recommendability is high, error tolerance is high, and subjective severity is low, a poor design system can actually be quite profitable. The Dance to Profit is the measure to ensure that businesses are considering their systems while watching user tasks and the bottom line. For those not as concerned with profitability, simply replace profitability with the most importance measure of success for your system, organization, etc. Look for the measure that keeps the end goal as the end goal, in the context of good user experience.
Comments?
“For the longest time, the Web has existed as a static medium, where only animated GIFs and, later on, Flash added some life to pages. With the advent of web standards and DOM scripting, people have started to look more and more at Javascript to add interactivity to websites. With FACE, a new technology by Tim Hofman and myself, this process has been made so simple that anyone can make their websites come to life, without having to know a whiff of Javascript.”
We’re getting pretty close to the day when a designer can literally design a web page without any development (code) required. Photoshop –> Page. Or, Visio –> Site. Some would say we’re already there, but I’m not there yet. Not enough evidence for me.
No matter how technology plays out, you’ll always need usability. In fact, as the technology improves, it’ll get harder and harder to get good usability. It becomes all too easy to make the experience more difficult. Too easy for gee whiz to beat down ease of use and simplicity.
…all it takes is basic math skills and a good understanding of CSS
Dey Alexander comes through with a great list of persona references: Discussion articles, research articles, tutorial, case studies, examples, templates…
(Thanks for the heads up James Robertson and Anu Gupta.)
A List Apart (author: Brian Crescimanno) — “It’s often the smallest usability quirks, however, that create the biggest annoyances for users, especially when it comes to HTML forms. Follow these guidelines, and you’ll be off to a good start.”
I agree that small usability quirks are often big annoyances. My research and experience confirms this.
Read more about how to improve the usability of your forms…
The dungeon is aware and awake,
with monsters; Four heroes work
together, yet apart, as our puppets
Human masters push them: gold
Fire and magic, magic and fire
hack-n-slash!
The thrust of change,
The plunk of coins
MCMLXXXV
The dungeon gives,
but not as much as it takes
Invisible and invulnerable, yet
Death still finds, hunts, kills: drains
mountain, castle, forest, and pyramid
red, blue, green, and yellow
Warrior, Valkyrie, Archer, and Wizard
Now you must know this quest:
Don’t shoot food!
I’ve not seen such bravery!
Your life force is running out…
hack-n-slash!
The thrust of change,
The plunk of coins
MCMLXXXV
“The goal has always been to satisfy people’s needs. This has been the case since the stone ages. If you do that well you will succeed, regardless of it includes Web 2.0 thinking. ”
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