I bought the book, but it’s mostly focused on how usability issues have changed over time, which is interesting, but I’m more concerned about what’s a problem now. I find the O’Reilly Designing Interfaces book to be a much better usability problem solver.
“When people go back and re-submit http post requests and result in dublicate submitted forms”
Don’t blame the user for shitty web applications.
Using GET/links for views allows users to bookmark pages and navigate freely.
Use POST/submit-buttons for actions, the user will be notified when resubmitting the page. The page won’t be resubmitted when using the back button, only on F5/refresh.
I also use transaction IDs in FORMs, usually these are the UUIDs used as primary keys for appending to the database. If the user hits F5, this will simply yield a “PRIMARY KEY CONSTRAINT” violation which can be formatted to a nice, comprehensible text message.
Cheers
I think we have two kinds of people here: 1) people who are totally in tune with the web and their browser and can read scrolling pages and write 90 words a minute, and 2) me, the neanderthal, who likes books, doesn’t like things moving around, and types 90 characters a minute.
And then there are all the people who are not here (reading this blog), who use the web, and they come in about 16 different flavors. So your web site design really needs to take into account your audience, intended or not. People read different ways. Some people skim and just absorb the overall sense, others read every word and absorb (intake?) every sentence.
"Violating web-wide conventions"
includes
- “Links that don’t change color when visited”
- "Breaking the back button"
and potentially - “Opening new browser windows”
- “Pop-up windows”
I’m okay with Nielsen. He’s got a paycheck, he seems to enjoy what he’s doing, and he tends to practice what he preaches. What gives me pause is his antagonism. He treats the designers of today as some variety of Luddite who are incapable of accepting new trends, let alone new technologies. And most importantly, he forgets that most websites (and the usability attached to it) should be designed for specific audiences. Slashdot is not designed for general users. MSDN is not designed for general users. Design portfolios are not designed for general users.
Nielsen artificially inflates the prospected ROI for companies who want to be all things to all people with his repeated mantras. I, personally, do not want to see the web be so sanitized. I like my corners that break all the rules, knowingly, because of specific demands by their limited audience. His lambastings must, therefore, be taken with a grain of salt–unless you’re in the process of redesigning msnbc.com or yahoo.com.
Remember, the most used site, Google, violates several rules (scrolling, complex URLs, dense content, et al). And Google appears to appeal to everyone–how many people are confused by it? Further, how many average web users know what the ‘Cached’ link means? Or why there are two areas of ‘Sponsored Links?’ The web is necessarily relative.
taking the user out of the context of what he’s reading bad as well?
He recommends supporting pages in the book. From a section on fundamental errors:
“Content authoring: writing in the same linear style as you’ve always written. Instead, force yourself to write in the new style that is optimized for online readers who frequently scan text and who need very short pages with secondary information relegated to supporting pages.”
I prefer that myself as long as it isn’t in a stupid popup, magic div, or new window. It takes me one click and one key press to visit a page and pop back as long as you don’t use that navigation breaking crap.
@Stephen - Nielsen does not practice what he preaches (see article: “What is Usability” at fusability.com) but he certainly does have a paycheck.
David Janke seems to have hit the nail on the head here. Nice to see that someone gets it.
I was a Web Developer and a university qualified programmer before I moved into the world of usability. I have been involved in web design for 9 years now, and I have this to say:
“If you can’t design an visually pleasing website while also making it usable, then you have no right to call yourself a designer.”
Usability is central to, and one of the founding principals of, design.
Jakob is an interesting fellow - the issue of bad information design never seems to register in his research - what makes a web site unusable more than anything is a complete disconnect between user goals and the site content - bring those two closer together and you will be surprised how many of the cardinal sins Jakob espouses fade into oblivion…
#9760;#9760;#9760; Web designers who think they know better than me what size text I find comfortable to read, and whose web page layout doesn’t cope when I tell my browser to override their ill-founded opinion.
I’m still trying to resolve the issue of opening new browser windows on external links. I like the idea of making it easier for folks to stay at my site but also explore links that I make available. But I dislike the invasiveness of forcing a new browser opening upon the hapless user.
" Also, in terms of writing for the web, it’s important to put the most relevant information at the top of the article or page:"
In other words, don’t bury the lead.
I still differ with a:visited colors. It was a suitable point when the same colors were applied to each single link on each single page
Interesting article, very good
Thanks.
I’m slightly more inclined to listen to Nielsen than Raskin, but only slightly. It’s so easy to criticize when you only deal with the fluff at the top and don’t have to care about the tradeoffs involved in real-world design.
Even if one ignores the dull and ugly aesthetics of useit.com, I think it’s been accepted for some time now that you just don’t use two-column split layouts on a web site. Columns are good for print media, not online content. That’s three skulls for violating a web-wide convention. Oh… and it scrolls, that’s another two skulls.
Just another preacher who criticizes anything and everything, thereby ensuring that he’ll strike a chord eventually.