Marjan Venema

3,516 reputation

21021

bio	website	bjmsoftware.com
	location	Netherlands
	age	51
visits	member for	2 years, 9 months
	seen	27 mins ago
stats	profile views	378

Software developer since 1985. Started in Cobol, moved via Clipper/VB to Delphi. Delphi developer since 1998. Work(ed) both self-employed and employed.

Questions

When you ask a question, show your effort, provide all the details that will help someone to help you and be precise.

Answers

When you answer a question, don't just paste your code. Your answers will be much better when you explain why your code is doing what it does and how it achieves the asker's goal. It makes it a whole lot easier to follow along. As it is I am much more inclined to up-vote answers that have explanatory text about what the code is doing and why it is written as it is.

Answers that just contain links aren't likely to get an up-vote from me either

Other

Obligatory link whenever someone thinks they are improving security by imposing all sorts of rules on password composition: Password strength

	3,516 reputation	bio	website	bjmsoftware.com	visits	member for	2 years, 9 months
21021 badges		location	Netherlands		seen	27 mins ago

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May 3	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” I really like new mockup plus explanation. Great edit! Would upvote again if I could.
May 3	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” +1 for recognizing cultural influence on how the symbols are interpreted.
May 2	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” Ah! <lightbulb on> (thanks for your patience and sticking with me).
May 2	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” Huh? What about the "... acceptance/approval"? Never mind, it may just be that it is way past my bedtime after a headache filled day...
May 2	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” Fair enough. I just find it curious that something that just means "yes, done, the case" has come to be so deeply associated with "something positive" or "something good"
May 2	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” I don't quite agree that a tick mark necessarily means something positive. In the most basic sense it just means "yes, something is in fact the case".
May 2	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” Yes, I understand that you use a tick for success and an "x" for failure. Does that mean you are suggesting that OP should use the tick or the X for a unit that has serious violations? OP's use case has after all nothing to do with success or failure. Just with something being or not being the case.
May 2	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” A checkmark implies "yes" and thus "this unit has a serious violation", while an "x" implies "no" and thus "this unit does not have a serious violation"
May 2	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” In this case a red tick mark is actually spot on. It is "yes" and it is not good because we are talking about serious violations. A check mark does not necessarily imply something positive. Its most basic meaning is simply "yes, x is in fact the case". Check marks could also be used to tell/ask whether someone is a liar. The tick then just means (s)he is in fact a liar... and does not say anything about what value we place on someone being a liar.
May 2	comment	red checkmark vs. a red “X” How does this relate to a unit in OP's table having or not having serious violations?
May 2	comment	Measuring Keystroke Against Click Count Great post clarifying how to quantify the gut-feeling that clicks do not equal keystrokes and more importantly that UX can't be reduced to measuring those. Keeping it in my toolbox for dealing with managers! :-)
Apr 30	comment	How to show user login password is wrong after the first time e.g. flash “wrong password” message Why not simply display a message indicating the number of the attempt. IE "incorrect username / password combination" in combination with a "this will be your n-th attempt to login" near the login/submit button.
Apr 29	comment	Should I verify that the output directory exists or just create it? Use a folder selection dialog that also allows for new folder creation. Offer manual input as an alternative. Draw attention to the fact that the specified folder does not exist by whatever non-modal notification means you prefer and offer a checkbox to create it on continuation.
Apr 29	comment	Should I verify that the output directory exists or just create it? +1 Standard pattern in desktop development is to show a dialog allowing the user to select the folder from the OS's folder tree. The dialog can optionally be configured to allow creation of a new folder. End result: folder should exist after dialog is exited. If it turns out it no longer is when you come to save files in that folder that is an error condition of which the user should be notified as it sh/could only happen by somebody deleting an existing (however briefly) folder in the meantime.
Apr 29	comment	What is the difference between the home page and landing page IMHO your definitions of home page and landing page make incorrect assumptions. Your definitions state what you would like to happen, not what can actually happen. Any page can be the first page someone discovers. There is absolutely no reason why the first page someone sees is the home page or a page that you would like them to land on when they follow advertisement or newsletter links. They may after all arrive through a link in a search engine, a link sent to them by a friend, etc.
Apr 29	comment	What is the difference between Categories, Keywords, Labels and Tags? Why couldn't keywords be used to find blog posts? They play a vital role in any search engine. It might be that many content management systems do not offer search or page lists by keyword but that is an attribute (or rather a limitation) of those cms's and not something inherent to keywords.
Apr 28	revised	What is the difference between user journey and task flow edited title
Apr 27	comment	Time Scheduler UI +1 Much better than any list of times (especially without 24-hour time specs). People are vision-oriented creatures and this gives you a lot of information about the scheduled slots in relation to each other in one glance. It would be a breeze to spot slots that are not exactly "nice". Think of a night shift followed by a morning shift... Much harder to spot in a list.
Apr 27	comment	When soliciting donations on a website, should you start by providing a box for the donation amount? Not sure about the order in which the amounts are shown. See my comment under Gildas' answer. Would you happen to know of any research on the effect of listing amounts in ascending or descending order?
Apr 27	comment	When soliciting donations on a website, should you start by providing a box for the donation amount? @3nafish I wouldn't reverse the order. Having the list in ascending order would make me feel good about donating a small amount and would make me feel better (and better, and better) about donating a bigger amount. Getting donations is about making people feel good about donating. List in reverse order would me feel like less good for "only" being able to donate a small amount. That may actually lose you donations as people may choose not to donate at all over feeling like they are "small potato" contributors because they can't afford more. NEEDS TESTING THOUGH.