“The hard part first” is a post I came across via Designer Depot. Now, there’s not research into it but as soon as you read it it makes complete sense. Basically, what Chris Coyier proposes is that when doing form design, we should put the actual action that the user requested first.
This might sound obvious at first and you might not know what the hell I’m talking about but think about the form for leaving a comment on certain websites. First thing you’ll get requested for are your details, and then you can leave a comment or send a message. We’ve been doing it like that for so long that we haven’t even questioned the way it works. What Chris suggests is that we put the actual comment box first and then we go into the annoying details which make the process more cumbersome. That way you commit to filling the form and, for whatever the reason, it seems like an easier experience.
Anyway, he has more examples in hist post so take a look.
A roundabout with a stop sign… kind of defeats the whole point of having a roundabout. This is a great example to use as a comparison for bad interface design.
Today was the first day of the IDEA conference (there was a workshop yesterday, on the 14th, but that was like an add-on or a plug-in… not a bonus because you had to pay for it).
From the program, the speakers I liked the most were Christing Wodtke and Leisa Reichelt. Everyone else had interesting information too, it’s just those two where closer to what I do.
Christina Wodtke started making analogies between Web Design / Development and Architecture which I thought was very interesting. The reason I loved this is because 5 years ago, when I lived in London (UK) I was going to Architecture Exhibitions to try and find inspiration for Web Design. I was trying to link Web with Architecture (and I’m not talking about Information Architecture). She did a better job than me, obviously.
She also said that we should go back to layout. Our designs are too boring and we need more movement. Of course, she’s not talking about crazy designer site out there but more about user interfaces for web applications. And it’s true, we’re all making square modular design boxes. Maybe we round the corners, but it’s still too square. She has a point. Standards are cool and I know that repetition makes it easy for the user but if we don’t break with the standard we don’t innovate, and that is the worst that can happen to the web or technology for that matter.
Leisa Reichelt spoke about her adventures in the Open Source world. She tried to take on the job of fixing Drupal’s massive User Experience issues, but this one wasn’t a success story. It’s a real world story and that’s what I liked about it. She hit a lot of walls when it came to re-thinking the whole experience of this CMS app. They tried to go to the root of the problem, but the problem was no one got it. Everyone tends to build from a top-level place. Designing before even thinking how to structure and make things functional.
But it happens to all of us. We get asked to make something pretty but no one gets it that when we walk into a project the problem is not generally as easy as just giving the interface a new look. I also have to deal with the problem of BA’s and Bosses creating 24,000 features for an app, which of course will never be used by 94.5% of the users and it will make their experience super annoying.
