ux digest

Use breadcrumbs for multilevel hierarchies

Verne — Sun, 24 May 2009 04:00:17 +0000

As part of helping your user navigate your site’s content, consider implementing breadcrumbs to compliment your primary navigation. Breadcrumbs are a series of links that show the hierarchical path to the current page a user is on and usually follows the convention of Parent > Child > … > Current Page. If you’re running a site that hosts many different pages that are categorized or organized in some kind of multilevel hierarchy, breadcrumbs will come in handy for the following reasons:

It helps the user easily identify where they are in the site.
It requires less clicks to return to a parent page.
It can attract users to browse other areas of the site if they’ve entered the site through a child page.

A few best practices on usage:

Ideally, breadcrumbs should be used on sites with 3 or more levels (i.e. an ecommerce site).
Breadcrumbs should be in the top half of the site, but below the primary navigation (if it is horizontal).
Breadcrumbs are most commonly horizontal and ordered left to right.
Typically, ‘>’ is used to separate links in a breadcrumb, but anything that implies the parent-child relationship can work.

Source: Breadcrumbs in Web Design: Examples and Best Practices (Smashing Magazine)

Recommend a solution on your pricing table

Verne — Sat, 23 May 2009 04:00:44 +0000

If you’ve ever purchased a hosting plan or anything else that gave you the option of choosing between several options and packages, you’re familiar with the pricing table. On many sites, it’s a monster of a chart that tries to show you the difference in value between two or more different product packages.

If you’ve got a pricing table or something similar on your site, rather than simply listing all the options you have, offer a recommendation on which one to choose. It may not be the right solution for all your customers, but it’ll be a good starting and reference point for them.

37signals on designing the Highrise signup chart:

While looking at the new signup chart, and our previous charts, I noticed something. We don’t suggest a plan. We give people choice, but we don’t point them in a recommended direction. We should. The thinking goes that more options are OK if you help direct someone to a default choice. But more options without a recommendation just lead to decision paralysis, uncertainly, and buyer’s remorse.

Source: Design Decisions: The new Highrise signup chart (37signals)

Use relevant pagination styles

Verne — Sat, 23 May 2009 02:34:40 +0000

Pagination is found all over the web – from blogs to galleries to directories – and choosing the right style of pagination to use has important implications for how your users sort through your pool of information. Most opt to go with the most common convention of using numbers (Page 1, 2, 3). However, consider how annoying page numbers can be for somebody sorting through a directory of people. On which page do people starting with the letter ‘k’ begin?

Whether you use numbers, letters, dates or any other convention, be considerate of the relevance of your pagination style with the content it is organizing.

Source: Easy as 1, 2, 3? (Good Usability)

Optimize your pathway pages

Verne — Fri, 22 May 2009 04:00:06 +0000

Pathway pages are pages on your site that provides links and information about a collection of individual items (be they articles, products, pictures, etc). Pathway pages usually represent a category or group of items. For example, clicking Patio Furniture on a furniture website’s navigation will bring you to a pathway page that shows all the various types of patio furniture available. From this collection, a user will choose one to explore.

It’s important to recognize the purpose of a pathway page: to help the user find what they’re looking for. As such, pathway pages act more as a supplementary navigation more than a content page.

From Good Usability:

When we’re on a pathway page, we’re still on the journey to the content we need. We don’t want to read is melatonin safe for teenage girls with of cancer risks clomid , we just want to find the link and move on. zyrtec toddlers and

The lesson here is to optimize your pathway pages by:

Making it stupid simple to find specific items by laying them out in an intuitive and friendly manner;
Making it easy to navigate to specific items by linking headings, thumbnails and Read More text; and
Decluttering the page by removing all unnecessary content.

Source: Good pathway pages (Good Usability)

Emphasize important actions

Verne — Sat, 16 May 2009 05:34:05 +0000

Bring clarity to the user’s experience by emphasizing actions that are more important than others. In the case of web forms, emphasizing the Save action over the Cancel/Back action helps the user find the button they’re looking for even quicker. lamictal acne

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Source: Priority provides clarity (Creative Briefing) no prescription genuine cialis

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Creating better paper prototypes

Verne — Wed, 13 May 2009 13:00:15 +0000

Paper prototypes were previously discussed as a great method to give ideas some shape quickly without having to worry about the technicalities of building mockups in Photoshop (you’ll do this eventually, but it’s a tiresome process when you’re just brainstorming). However, from reader comments and conversations with designers, it seems that many struggle with bringing sketches accurately into the Photoshop environment. To ease your struggles, follow these 4 tips:

Visualize your idea before bringing out the paper and pen.
Keep proportions of web elements in mind while sketching.
Look at the bigger picture and avoid dwelling over small details.
Consider technical limitations.

Source: Improving the transition from paper to Photoshop (Creative Briefing) celexa causing racing thoughts cipro impact on psa test stroke cats prednisone online buy hgh real

Mimic the behaviour of desktop apps

Verne — Thu, 07 May 2009 20:15:57 +0000

For those building web apps, help the user’s transition from the desktop to the browser be more seamless and natural by mimicing the bahaviour of desktop apps on your web app. Code libraries have matured to allow for drag and drop and other advanced interactivity – take advantage of this to help deliver a more familiar and comfortable experience.

Source: Google Docs intuitive drag and drop (UI Scraps)

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Test your information architecture with Treejack

Verne — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 01:01:25 +0000

We put a lot of emphasis on optimizing usability, user interactions and user interfaces. One area of the user experience that we often overlook testing on is information architecture. This is likely due to an absence of methods to test the effectiveness of information architecture. Sam Ng of Optimal Workshop saw the gap and built Treejack – an online test that helps site owners make decisions on their information architecture.

From the Treejack site:

Run simple online tests to get real numbers. Upload your sitemap, set tasks and see the paths participants take for each task. Results will focus your efforts on the areas of the IA that matter most.

Source: Treejack (Optimal Workspace)

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Usability Checklist

Verne — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 13:00:37 +0000

Websites come in many shapes, forms, designs, colours and layouts. But nearly every site has a common set of elements that subconsciously help the user to identify where they are, what they’re looking for, how to find it, and what to do next. Before you go any further, run your sites through this checklist to make sure you have all the basic elements: a site ID, a page name, a clear navigation, an option to search, an indication of the user’s current location, a tagline or site description, and a sense of the site’s page hierarchy.

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Source: Quick Usability Checklist (UX Booth)

Show your customers what they’re buying

Verne — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 12:05:07 +0000

The disadvantage of buying online is that you lose the tactile essence of toying and testing the product that you would normally get in a store.

So, a [potential] customer’s next saving grace is the product preview image.
As such, you should put particular effort into showing the user the clearest and largest (relative to screensize, layout, etc) possible image of the product to reassure them of exactly what they’re putting their money into.

See the source link below for a first hand example of how an effective product preview image can help close the sale.

Source: MacCase product view (UI Scraps)