Standards are officially sanctioned guidelines for design.
3
votes
1answer
81 views
What is the standard / benchmark test for user familiarity or proficiency with computer technology?
When conducting usability testing, a variable that comes up is the competence or familiarity of different users with Internet or software application technology. It seems strange to compare different ...
6
votes
3answers
160 views
On log in form, what should a password unmask button look like and say?
On the log in form, I want to give users the option to unmask the password field so they can see what they type. The phrase "unmask password" is too technical and its purpose may not be apparent to ...
6
votes
6answers
382 views
Why does Skype's “x” button minimize the application instead of closing?
I was browsing through the web and I came across this sentiment:
Dear Skype, this (red X) button means close, not minimize
I also found the same question on the Skype website. Why would a ...
1
vote
3answers
55 views
Should settings buttons show current or alternate setting? [duplicate]
As a general standard, when having an icon for a setting, I've never been sure whether to display the icon for the currently enabled setting, or the alternative.
My exact situation is within a mobile ...
14
votes
4answers
464 views
Are HTTP error codes user-friendly?
Why do we still have these HTTP error codes?
For me it seems like they are completely useless for the user (not for all but most of them). It says nothing helpful (look at the screenshot above, it ...
5
votes
2answers
108 views
Standards, guidelines or usability research for touch laptops?
From what I've read about CES it seems like a big upcoming trend in hardware is touch enabled laptops. And of course Microsoft's Surface device is sort of a touch enabled laptop.
This is a whole new ...
4
votes
2answers
163 views
Opens in a new window icon placement
When using an icon to represent a link I believe the standard convention is [icon] [Link].
A colleague has raised the point that for links that open in a new window, the icon should appear after the ...
7
votes
3answers
228 views
What is the best way to get a UX/UI team to adopt standards?
We're a team of around 4 UI Developers, 1 Designer and 2 UX. We work on a series of ongoing projects and every month or so, we start a new small project from scratch. All projects are owned by the ...
0
votes
2answers
143 views
What is the best model for Label and Value placement in Android Mobile device
This is one topic I always have debates on with my client. How to put labels and corresponding value for a mobile device running on Android OS. Google has not specified any best practice for the same ...
4
votes
3answers
390 views
Is there any standard guideline for requirements gathering?
On Programmers.SE, there was a question a few days ago, asking wether there's an update to the IEEE 830-1998, which is a recommended best practice (not a standard!) for organization of a Software ...
3
votes
1answer
356 views
Is it worth paying to read ISO 9241-110:2006 - Ergonomics of human-system interaction — Part 110: Dialogue principles
The requirements section of wikipedia's page on user interface design refers to ISO 9241, particularly part 10 which has been withdrawn and replaced with ISO 9241-110:2006 - Ergonomics of human-system ...
1
vote
1answer
85 views
Key usability features to pull out from software use?
We are developing this software and I have a hunch that creating a framework such as Google Analytics for our window based java application would be a good idea.
However I'd like to know which ...
5
votes
2answers
355 views
Screen sizes, how do we determine standards and what are they?
Recommending a screen size
Recently I have been doing some research on screen sizes and realized that I had to rethink many of my previous assumptions. As a UX professional I feel it is of utmost ...
6
votes
4answers
447 views
Best position for collapse indicator on collapsible content
What is the convention/standard/best-practice for the placement of a collapse/expand button/indicator on collapsible content?
I've seen many examples of the placement on the left (left of title in ...
3
votes
2answers
162 views
How little is too little padding between button text and its button border?
jQuery has a default amount of padding within their buttons, as seen here: jQuery UI - Button Demo.
I think it looks nice, but my boss keeps telling me to kill the padding. Specifically, he said to ...
5
votes
4answers
2k views
Is there a standard for single product websites?
I'm looking to help a friend provide website design feedback to his sister's start-up company.
The site is http://myyogaloop.com
They are making some pretty basic mistakes. For example there are two ...
14
votes
2answers
414 views
How to mark a field as recommended?
When I have a required field in a form, there is several ways to indicate to the user that this field is required. In addition, we can add client validation on that field, to force the user to fill ...
5
votes
4answers
2k views
Android back button - Global history back, or menu back?
On the Android, is the expected action of the back button to navigate backward through menus, or does it just go "back" to the previous screen you came from?
I don't have an Android device to sample ...
8
votes
3answers
510 views
Using country flags with currencies?
We are considering incorporating national flags into a currency selector, alongside ISO currency codes, like this:
We are well aware we should not use flags for selecting languages because there ...
15
votes
5answers
949 views
How do you document your interaction flows?
For many years I've been using an evolved version of Jesse James Garrett's Visvocab diagramming style for documenting information architecture and interaction design concepts.
Today though we're ...
1
vote
2answers
100 views
Animation on Handheld: How Much is Too Much?
In web applications in the 1990s, it was pretty common to see animation (animated gifs, marquees, etc.) -- since then, the industry has pretty much established this as a no-no for (professional) ...
5
votes
4answers
144 views
How familiar are users with the “Print to PDF” concept?
We are talking about some solutions at work for printing a summary generated from some interface content in an application. Many users may only want to print this out, but others would like the ...
65
votes
8answers
4k views
Are round check boxes confusing or an accepted standard?
I was browsing dribbble.com today and came across a new post by one of the designers that I follow. He had posted a new modal form which was using rounded check boxes. I have never seen these before.
...
2
votes
1answer
57 views
What is a good method for creating a guide for standardized markup?
I need to create a guide or wiki that outlines different standardized techniques for marking up reusable elements in our software. When adding new features our developers are often able to reuse or ...
14
votes
6answers
3k views
How to mark required (and optional) fields in a form where some fields are NOT editable?
I have a form showing properties of an entity in a web app: some of the fields in the form are read-only and some are editable. Within the editable fields, some are required to be filled with a value ...
5
votes
4answers
340 views
Is this element using the correct affordance?
what do you guys think about this page http://apple.stackexchange.com/:
The "active" button is highlighted in a way that looks like the iphone's drag button.
So the first thing that comes to my ...
8
votes
4answers
781 views
Recommended best practices for industrial interface design?
I'm looking to collect input on best practices for the design of industrial HMI.
There are already standards promoted such as ISA-5.5-1985, Graphic Symbols for Process Displays, but the writing ...
6
votes
2answers
181 views
Pros/Cons of customized/reproduced HTML elements
I have a very specific case where the <select/> elements in a browser interface are replaced with a custom HTML structure while styling is added via CSS and functionality is added via ...
16
votes
7answers
963 views
What UX solutions are there for the EU cookie legislation?
The EU cookie legislation http://www.out-law.com/page-10510 is rightly or wrongly are being introduced, there has been much negative comment from both legal and technical commentators - that said it ...
30
votes
8answers
24k views
Where can I find style guide for metro UI for web applications?
I am interested in the Metro UI that microsoft has used for windows phone 7 for web. I see that their site microsoft.com has been done with metro UI recently.
I am looking for a style guide and ...
7
votes
2answers
231 views
How and when to go about challenging a tried and true user behavior?
There are many user behaviors that have been ingrained in us over time. Some of them good, and some of them just because, "that's the way that it has been done for years, people expect it." The ...
13
votes
4answers
663 views
Common pattern for “multiple fields, at least one required”
Clearly the asterisk is a popular web standard for identifying unconditionally required fields.
But what if any one field out of several is required? For example, there are separate fields for home ...
7
votes
3answers
189 views
UX Organisation
I was just wondering if there are any organisations or groups which monitor or provide insight into User eXperience, such as the W3C for the World Wide Web, or the IEEE? Although they are not creators ...
5
votes
4answers
209 views
What reasons are there to not break a web applications default scrolling mechanism?
on the project I am working on, they want the web application to have the header, sidebar and footer remain fixed in the browser. So only the content area will scroll. I don't think this is a good ...
17
votes
8answers
3k views
Using mailto: links for email addresses…what is the practice these days?
When giving out your email address on a site, do people still use the mailto:email@example.com syntax for the link?
Does this work with people using web mail clients? I use gmail and whenever I click ...
13
votes
13answers
914 views
What guidelines exist for designing UIs?
UI guidelines can be helpful to provide rules-of-thumb, or at least remind you of things to think about when designing a UI. What sets of guidelines exist?
22
votes
8answers
2k views
Is there an optimal font size?
For most website projects I've been involved with, the font size for the bulk text is usually 12px - 13px, but I'm wondering if this is a good size. I remember reading an article saying that font ...
11
votes
10answers
378 views
Coding Best Practices as UX?
I've been stating in most of my recent contracts that meeting HTML coding Best Practices (what's outputted to the browser) is an important part of UX.
This would include things like Semantics (using ...
9
votes
4answers
800 views
Font sizes for WCAG2.0 AAA
Anyone know what the WCAG2.0 definition of 'Normal' and 'Large' fonts are, as they relate to the AA and AAA levels?
I've googled and read the WCAG site and docs but unless I'm being really stupid ...
20
votes
5answers
296 views
Does ISO 9241 really matter?
I've been using ISO 9241 (Ergonomics of Human System Interaction) over the years to provide some structure and rigour to my UX process. It suits the (standards driven) industry I'm currently working ...
