A User-Friend Interface: The DOs and DO NOTs of UI Design (
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How can you create an intuitive website or web application? What are some common
follies to stay away from? How do we keep users coming back for more? And how
is designing a website like cooking chicken? This article describes some guidelines
that can help you as a programmer or designer to channel your creativity, and
design a user-friendly, ergonomic web site. These guidelines range from site structure
to wording and imagery, this is the whole package!Creating a user-friendly website can be a little bit like cooking chicken. If
over-cooked, nobody really enjoys it -- in fact they just look forward to clearing
the palette with something else. If under-cooked, we end up in the hospital with
salmonella. OK, perhaps our site won't send anyone to the ER, but it could certainly
make them leery about coming back for more! If cooked properly however, it will
be a nice all-around experience for all, and our friends will be begging for the
recipe.
So how do we cook the perfect web-site? Well, honestly, perfection is perhaps
a little bit high of an expectation, but we can get nearly there if we follow
some basic rules. Oops, I used the 'r' word (I see you all grimacing). Sorry,
let's change that to principles! Or maybe super-fun-happy-guidelines. Ahhh --
much better.
This article will cover a number of important principles we should adhere to
when charged with the responsibility of designing a User Interface. Keep in mind
that these are not necessarily new ideas, but rather proven concepts. Now I know
that the typical programmer loves to think outside the box, and I am no exception.
We don't like to be forced to conform. But if we think too far outside the UI
box for the sake of originality, we could over-cook our chicken. This is because
we risk breaking the first guideline, which I will cleverly refer to as Guideline
#1.
