Andrew L. Van Slaars

Users don’t follow directions. At least when I’m a user, I don’t.

If you have a text field on your website or in your application and there is a limit to the number of characters it can except, don’t just tell me about it, make sure that’s how it works!

I just filled out a form with a text field that was followed by the text “(max. 20 characters)”. How many characters does it let me enter? As many as I want! Adding the MAXLENGTH attribute to your input tag, maybe a little JavaScript to let me know when I’ve exceeded the limit. Maybe, just maybe, you could validate your form to make sure I haven’t messed the input up.

This particular form simply and without warning let me submit the text and cut it off at 20 characters. I happened to have entered 22 characters and now my output makes me look like I can’t speak English.

Creating a quality user experience requires a little work on your part to make sure the end user can be successful using your application, even when they don’t follow instructions.

Product Design, Usability design, Usability

Building software is challenging. Building usable software is hard work!

One thing that helps make your software more usable is making your user interface fit users’ mental models of how they should interact with your software.

Yahoo! is more than just search. They maintain several web applications and strive to keep their user interactions as consistent as possible(where appropriate). This consistency aids in usability as users come to expect specific types of UI layout and interaction.

In order to maintain this consistency, Yahoo! maintains a library of UI/UX design patterns. Some of them are exposed to the public. The act of sharing these design patterns is a win-win. Developers creating web applications get some help deciding how to handle specific user interactions. Yahoo! gets to spread their techniques across the web, contributing to a positive feedback loop of consistency, centered on their user interaction approach.

There are some items in the pattern library that I had never thought of. There were some things that seemed like common sense… that’s the point. Even if you don’t agree with the techniques used by Yahoo!, it’s always good to get somebody else’s take on a subject.

If you are involved in the design, development, maintenance, testing, marketing, etc. of an application, you should check out the Yahoo! Design Pattern Library.

The only thing I feel is lacking is a PDF version of each pattern for viewing outside of the browser. That’s pretty minor though.

Product Design, Tools, Usability design patterns, Usability, yahoo

No, I’m not talking about lights on a Christmas tree, or lights on a firetruck… I’m talking about the flashing blue light on Bluetooth headsets. I’d like to know who decided the light should flash while the headset is in use. Why does it do that?

Think about it (not that it should take much)… you have this thing on your ear, which you can’t see… so what is the point of the light? Is it so other people can see the light? Why would they want to? If anything, it’s distracting.

The other day, a friend of mine was wearing one, and it was flashing, but she was not actively using it. She couldn’t see the flashing light, but I could and it was quite annoying.

Another friend told me about taking his daughter to the movies, where apparently several people were wearing these headsets and he described the flashing blue lights as blinding… now I know those people weren’t talking to anybody.

What is it that makes people feel the need to wear their headsets when they don’t need them. Are they like jewelry? Is it supposed to look cool? If bluetooth headsets are a fashion statement, I missed the memo and I don’t get it.

Phenomenal design choice! (note the sarcasm)

Human Behavior, Product Design bluetooth headset, Product Design