Web Site User Interface Design: Principles and Development Process Minder Chen [email protected]

Web Site User Interface Design:Web Site User Interface Design: Principles and Development Process

Minder [email protected]

© Minder Chen, 1997-2011 Web Process and GUI - 2

References• Donald Norman, The Psychology of Everyday Things, Basic Books, 1988.

– http://www.nngroup.com/

• Jacob Nielsen, Designing Web Usability, New Riders Publishing, Dec. 1999. – http://www.useit.com/

• Steve Drug, Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, 2nd Edition, New Riders Press, August 28, 2005.

– http://www.sensible.com/chapter.html

• Web Style Guide: Basic Design Principles for Creating Web Sites, 3rd edition, Yale University Press, Jan. 15, 2009

• http://webstyleguide.com/wsg3/index.html

• Accessibility standards: – http://www.section508.gov/

– http://www.w3.org/WAI/ – http://www.webaim.org/standards/508/checklist

http://www.nngroup.com/

http://www.useit.com/

http://www.sensible.com/chapter.html

http://webstyleguide.com/wsg3/index.html

http://www.section508.gov/

http://www.w3.org/WAI/

http://www.webaim.org/standards/508/checklist


Form vs. Function

“…the process of inventing things which display new physical order, organization, form, in response to function…– Notes on the Synthesis of Form, by

Christopher Alexander


• This is the presidential election ballot form from election headquarters in Palm Beach County, Florida November 8, 2000. The confusion over which spot to punch for the Gore/Lieberman ticket has created controversy as there were officially 3,407 votes for Buchanan in Palm Beach County yet there are only 304 registered Reform party voters in that county. (Marc Serota/Reuters)


User-Centered Design principles

1. Use both knowledge in the world and in the head

2. Simplify the structure of tasks

3. Make things visible

4. Get the mappings right

5. Exploit the powers of constraints-Natural & Artificial

6. Design for Error

7. When all else fails, standardize

Source: http ://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Norman


Making Things Visible


Get the Mappings Right


Design for Errors

CTRL-ALT-DELETE


Initial Screen Design for Telephone Directory service operator

PORT073 MANTEL INFO RELEASE 4.2 USER=JOHNSMIT 08-10-09 11:27:23

---------------------------------------------C O M P U T E R T E L E P H O N E I N D E X---------------------------------------------

> THE SUBSCRIPER IS

> First Name: JONES > Last Name: BROWN

> 17 PINE STREET >> NEW YORK> NY 10012

PF1=HELP PF2=DIRECTORY INFORMATION PF5=OTHER SERVICESPF4=VIDEOTEX


Usability Problems Classification in the Dialogue

• Simple and natural dialogue• Speak the user’s language• Minimize the user’s memory load • Be consistent• Provide feedback • Provide clearly marked exits • Provide shortcuts • Provide good error messages• Error prevention


Improved Dialogue Design (CUI)TELEPHONE INDEX

====================

Telephone number (212) 345-6789 has the following subscriber:

Jim E. Jones

17 Pine Street

New York, NY 10012

Press:

RETURN key to be able to enter a new telephone number

ESC to leave the Telephone Index

PF1 to get Help about how to use this system

PF2 to go to the Directory Information system

PF4 to go to the general Videotext service

PF5 to get a list of Other Services available


Improved Dialogue Design (GUI)TELEPHONE INDEX

Enter telephone number to retrieve information

of its subscriber: (212) 345-6789

Subscriber's

Name: Jim E. Jones

Street Address: 17 Pine Street

City, State, ZIP: New York, NY 10012

Search a new telephone number

Online Help (F1)

Exit

Go to Directory Information System

Go to the General Videotext Service

Go to other services

Go


Web Development Life Cycle• Identify goals

– Every web site has goals – Work with clients to define them– Multiple goals

• Identify target users– User platforms– Technical knowledge of the user– Domain knowledge of the user

• Determine task requirements• Design the Web site

– Determine the major themes of the web sites– Define navigation maps

• Implement the Web site• Evaluate the Web site• Modify and improve the Web site


Roles and Responsibilities• Client (Customer)

– Funding– Requirements– Constraints

• Designer– Overall tone of the web site– Look and Feel– Color

• Interactive Media Developer– Build the web pages

• User Interface Designer– Navigation – Layout – Easy to use (Usability)

• Project manager– Leadership – Coordination – Assign tasks– Manage schedule and budget

• Business Manager– Managing client relationships


Web Site Design

Page design sometimes gets the most attention. After all, with current web browsers, you see only one page at a time. The site itself is never explicitly represented on the screen. But from a usability perspective, site design is more challenging and usually also more important than page design.

-- Jacob Nielsen.


Web Development Layers • Web management: the usability of a web site is

more a function of how it is managed than how good its designers are.

• Interaction design– Navigation support– Web page layout– Templates– Search

• Content design: The actual writing on the pages– The message is the message


Site Elements• Home page

– Menu-driven– News-oriented – Path-based – Splash screens or image maps

• Graphics and texts• Submenus pages and subsites (alternative home pages for special

audiences)• Tables of contents, site indexes, site maps• Product/service/information pages• "What's new" pages• Search features• Contact information

– Street address, phone number, fax numbers, maps, travel directions, parking information

• User feedback and virtual community pages• Bibliographies and appendixes• FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) pages• Customized server error pages

Source: Web Style Guide


Adding content to your site • Consider creating, borrowing, buying, or

licensing content from other sources.

• Producing interesting content is a matter of finding time, thinking creatively, writing coherently, listening to your customers, and, in some cases, asking for their help.

• Content categories: – informational content

– interactive content

– multimedia content

– software content.


Informational content• Product descriptions

• Photos and graphics

• FAQs

– (Frequently Asked Questions) are a common element of most Web sites. They serve as an easy way to answer questions about your business and how the site works. Good FAQs should dramatically cut down on e-mail. Your FAQs should include information about the products you sell, how to order, what credit cards are accepted, what secure transaction system is used, and where to find specific information on your site.

• News sections

• Reviews

• Guest columns

• Newsletters

• Databases

• Testimonials

• Customer-generated articles and reviews


Interactive Content• While informational content is a basic offering,

interactive content gives customers something to do and contribute to the contents as well as build up a sense of community. – Contests

– Polls

– Chat Rooms and Message Boards

– Discussion forum

– Product review

– Web boards


Multimedia and Software Content• Multimedia Contents

– Video: QuickTime and AVI files

– Sound: AIFF and WAV files

– Virtual reality photography

• Software Content: programs that users download from your site. – software demos

– custom programs

– Shareware


Web Site Design

Could be more than one level


Balanced Menu Structure

Web Site Architecture Design Example


Navigation Diagram and Page Banner• FrontPage 2003


Navigation Bars & Buttons• Button bars are also the most logical place to put links back to your

home page, or to other menu pages related to the current page. A button bar can be built with text (like ours at C/AIM, below), or a series of individual button graphics at the top or bottom of the page.


Navigation Bars & Buttons

Image Map is used. Tab control style is the standard in the industry for navigation bar.


Separate content from the interface • Developing content independently from the user interface allows you to

develop both more efficiently. If the two are developed interdependently, then every change made in one would have to be immediately considered in the other. Frames, JavaScript, and Java applets all allow you to separate the interface from the content. For example, the text in this guideline is used in both the print-all version and the frames version without modification.


Page Layout


What the designer Build


What another user sees


Layout


Search Function: Ziprealty.com


Show the result


Gifts.com: Gift Finder


Data Collections from Customers• If you make your customers fill out voluminous

forms, you may find your site littered with abandoned shopping carts.

• By putting your visitors to work as soon as they step into your cyber shop – making them fill out personal information – you run the risk of running them out faster than they came in. If you make it hard to buy something, they won't.

• Don't treat your site like an exclusive club or some kind of secret-handshake society

• Conclusion: – Only collect the data that are necessary to

offer the service to the customer


Simple UI Evaluation Criteria • Trust• Comfort• Familiarity• Clarity • Reliability• Appeal: Flashy, Colorful• Function vs. Form


Usability• Intuitive interaction• Natural task flow• Following user's expectation• Satisfying user's goal

Source: Phil Green, AMS


Web Site Evaluation• Is the purpose of the site clear? • Does the site clearly address a particular audience? • Is the site useful and relevant to its audience? • Is the site interesting and engaging? • Does the site enable users to accomplish all the tasks

they need or want to accomplish? • Can these tasks be accomplished easily? • Is the information organized in a way that users will

expect and understand? • Is the most important information easiest to find? • Is textual information clear, grammatically correct, and

easy to read? • Do you have a clear idea of what the site contains? • Do you always know where you are, and how to get

where you want to go? • Is the presentation attractive? • Do pages load quickly enough?

Web Site User Interface Design: Principles and Development Process Minder Chen [email protected]

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