This chapter is excerpted from SitePoint’s HTML Utopia: Designing Without Tables Using CSS, Second Edition, which provides a complete introduction to CSS and shows you how to build rock-solid CSS-based web sites from scratch. By the end of the book’s 12 chapters, you’ll understand the ins and outs of CSS, and you’ll be able to create robust, standards-compliant site designs that degrade gracefully in older browsers and are easy to maintain. You can download this chapter in PDF format, along with the first three chapters of the book, if you’d prefer to read it offline. Now, let’s get started building your CSS-based page layout! We now have some sound theory under our belts. The rest of this book will concentrate on how you can put CSS into practice when developing your own sites. This chapter will start with the creation of a simple two-column layout. The Layout Many web site designs start life as mock-ups in a graphics program. Figure 8.1. Figure 8.2. Creating the Document <! The Header
10 Useful Usability Findings and Guidelines Everyone would agree that usability is an important aspect of Web design. Whether you’re working on a portfolio website, online store or Web app, making your pages easy and enjoyable for your visitors to use is key. Many studies have been done over the years on various aspects of Web and interface design, and the findings are valuable in helping us improve our work. Here are 10 useful usability findings and guidelines that may help you improve the user experience on your websites. 1. Form Labels Work Best Above The Field Link A study by UX Matters1 found that the ideal position for labels in forms is above the fields. 2Tumblr3 features a simple and elegant sign-up form that adheres to UX Matter’s recommendation. Positioning labels on the left also poses another problem: do you left-align or right-align the labels? 2. People instinctively notice other people right away when they come into view. Eye-tracking heat map of a baby looking directly at us, from the UsableWorld study. 3. 6. 7. 8.
The Elements Of Navigation Advertisement When users look for information, they have a goal and are on a mission. Even before you started to read this article, chances are you did because you either had the implicit goal of checking what’s new on Smashing Magazine, or had the explicit goal of finding information about “Navigation Design”. After a couple of seconds of scanning this article, and maybe reading parts of the introduction, you may have started to ask yourself whether the information that you’re consuming at the moment is actually relevant to you—the user. Being the compassionate human being that I am, I’ll try to explain to you what this article is about, so you can make your choice either to continue reading, or not. This article is about the tiniest of details that goes into creating the main centerpiece of your digital product—the construction of the elements of your navigation. Words, Words, Words “This might be a good start!” User-Testing Labels Another test is a Word Association3 game. What Is What
Eva-Lotta Lamm — User Experience Designer The LinkedIn Blog Blog Archive Celebrating our 6th birthday with 40 million users! On Cinco de Mayo, we celebrated our 6th birthday AND welcomed our 40 millionth member to the LinkedIn network! With two great reasons to celebrate, employees invited their families to come to the office for an afternoon fiesta. There were popsicles and margaritas, pin the tail on the donkey and a scavenger hunt, cupcakes and tacos, mini sombreros and big fun for adults and kids alike! As we celebrate success, we keep top of mind the importance of supporting our community. Employees graciously donated over $1,400 dollars to donate two bookcases for local pre-schools in Mountain View! Thanks to Alice’s Restaurant for catering the food & drinks and to Kara’s Cupcakes in Palo Alto for providing 600 yummy mini cupcakes…if you haven’t had the banana caramel you should definitely try it – it was our favorite! Thanks to all our members, our employees and their families for another great year! Check out the rest of the pictures taken at the birthday party here
User Experience Design June 21, 2004 I've been practicing information architecture since 1994, and from Gopher to Google have seen dramatic changes in the landscape of organization, search and retrieval. Through these ten tempestuous years, I've found the infamous three circle diagram to be a great tool for explaining how and why we must strike a unique balance on each project between business goals and context, user needs and behavior, and the available mix of content. Figure 1. While this diagram was conceived with IA in mind, it's equally useful for explaining UX. Facets of the User Experience When I broadened my interest from IA to UX, I found the need for a new diagram to illustrate the facets of user experience - especially to help clients understand why they must move beyond usability - and so with a little help from my friends developed the user experience honeycomb. Figure 2. Here's how I explain each facet or quality of the user experience: Useful. A Different Way of Seeing A Big Hive
Web Design: 15 Important Research Findings You Should Know Web Design: 15 Important Research Findings You Should Know A small selection of web design, usability, and accessibility related results of research, most of them derived from Human Factors International (newsletter). Some of them are relatively known, while others may enrich our professional self-understanding: Design is a key determinant to building online trust with consumers. For motivated users of an information site, bad design (busy layout, small print, too much text) hurts more than good design helps. —Sillence, Briggs, et al. (2004). Also see Stanford University’s “Guidelines for Web Credibility”. Layout on a web page (whitespace and advanced layout of headers, indentation, and figures) may not measurably influence performance, but it does influence satisfaction. —Chaperro, Shaikh, and Baker (2005). Experience matters: Blue links are easier to click than black ones, even though black ones have higher visual contrast and are easier to see. —Van Schaik and Ling (2003). —Lin (2004).
Call to Action Buttons: Examples and Best Practices Advertisement Call to action in web design — and in user experience (UX) in particular — is a term used for elements in a web page that solicit an action from the user. The most popular manifestation of call to action in web interfaces comes in the form of clickable buttons that when clicked, perform an action (e.g. "Buy this now!") or lead to a web page with additional information (e.g. "Learn more…") that asks the user to take action. How can we create effective call to action buttons that grab the user’s attention and entice them to click? Best Practices for Effective Call to Action Buttons Designing call to action buttons into web interfaces requires some forethought and planning; it has to be part of your prototyping and information architecture processes in order for them to work well. Draw user attention with size In web pages, the size of an element relative to its surrounding elements indicates its importance: the larger the element is, the more important it is.
10 conseils d’utilisabilité avant de concevoir l’UX L’expérience utilisateur d’un site web, vaste sujet que nous avons déjà traité dans de nombreux articles : Chaque éditeur souhaite que les visiteurs prennent du plaisir quand ils visitent leur site, qu’ils gardent un bon souvenir, qu’ils reviennent et qu’ils recommandent le site à leur entourage. L’expérience offerte sur un site web prend de plus en plus d’importance avec la richesse des offres disponibles sur les différents supports : Web, mobile ou tablette. Le marché du commerce en ligne oblige donc à se démarquer des concurrents en offrant aux utilisateurs plus qu’une plate-forme fonctionnelle en ligne. Il n’est plus possible de rendre public un nouveau service ni préparé ni testé et penser créer des expériences extraordinaires. Il est nécessaire de s’assurer que le site web satisfait les attentes les plus simples des utilisateurs. 1. L’utilisabilité est la capacité d’un système à être utilisé par certains utilisateurs afin d’atteindre leurs buts ou objectifs. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.
6 Grados de Separación- La Web 2.0 y la Generacion “C” (Parte 2) La Banda 2 Cero Hay tres hechos que debemos saber de nuestro presente, hablamos del primero: El Ciclo de innovación tecnológica no se detiene para esperarnos, algunos se ponen ansiosos al conocer esto otros lo usan proactivamente para tener un rédito mas positivo en su futuro profesional.Hablemos del segundo hecho, estamos a penas iniciando la era Conectada. Existe una teoría que en 1929 fue propuesta por el escritor húngaro Frigyes Karinthy en una corta historia llamada Chains se llama “Seis grados de separación” esta intenta probar que cualquiera en la Tierra puede estar conectado a cualquier otra persona del planeta a través de una cadena de conocidos que no tiene más de cinco intermediarios (conectando a ambas personas con sólo seis enlaces). En este video de la TV Chilena se ilustra este tema de una forma divertida:
Don Norman's jnd.org / Simplicity Is Highly Overrated Column written for Interactions, volume 14, issue 3. © CACM, 2007. This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here by permission of ACM for your personal use. It may be redistributed for non-commercial use only, provided this paragraph is included. Comment: This is one of the most misunderstood of all my columns. "Why can't products be simpler?" But when it came time for the journalists to review the simple products they had gathered together, they complained that they lacked what they considered to be "critical" features. I recently toured a department store in South Korea. I found the traditional "white goods" most interesting: Refrigerators and washing machines. But while at the store, I marveled at the advance complexities of all appliances, especially ones that once upon a time were quite simple: for example, toasters, refrigerators, and coffee makers, all of which had multiple control dials, multiple LCD displays, and a complexity that defied description. Why is this?
100 usabilitytips om je website te verbeteren Sommigen van jullie zullen weten dat ik op Twitter usabilitytips deel. Deze tips komen voort uit de onderzoeken die ik uitvoer, en wat ik tegenkom op internet van gerenommeerde partijen/instituten. Omdat het er inmiddels heel wat zijn, heb ik in deze blogpost 100 usabilitytips op een rijtje gezet. Usabilitytip 1 Gebruik voldoende witruimte om rust te creeren. Usabilitytip 2 Het gebruik van 'klik hier' kan echt niet meer. Usabilitytip 3 Denk goed na over de rubrieknamen die je geeft in je navigatiemenu(s). Usabilitytip 4 Zorg dat je een zoekmachine op je site hebt. Usabilitytip 5 Maak gebruik van een 'kruimelpad' zodat gebruikers de weg terug gemakkelijk kunnen vinden. Usabilitytip 6 Gebruik bij een fly-outmenu alleen de verticale vorm omdat gebruikers de horizontale vorm maar lastig vinden om een selectie te maken. Usabilitytip 7 Maak altijd een consistente link naar de homepage op dezelfde locatie op elke webpagina. Usabilitytip 9 Zorg ervoor dat je contactgegevens snel te vinden zijn.
Progress Trackers in Web Design: Examples and Best Practices Advertisement When designing a large website, especially one that contains a store, you may be required to design a system for ordering online, or a multi-step process of another sort. Walking users through this process by making it easy and intuitive is key to helping increase conversion rates. Any frustration along the way may cause them to leave and pursue other options. Progress trackers are designed to help users through a multi-step process and it is vital that such trackers be well designed in order to keep users informed about what section they are currently on, what section they have completed, and what tasks remain. In this article we will look at various uses of progress trackers and see how they’ve been implemented, what they are doing well, and what they are not doing well. What are Progress Trackers? You may not be familiar with the term ‘progress tracker’, also called a ‘progress indicator’ — but chances are good that you have encountered one at one time or another. 1. 2.