Questions tagged [design]
Design is a plan for making an object. Anything that will ever be built usually has a design up front before production of the object. A design can be a wire frame, a prototype, a schema, an image or a drawing.
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Should "Yes, delete it" be red, or green?
Designing an interface for a CMS (Content Management System), I stumbled upon a paradox and I'm a bit confused about what to do and why to do it..
Context
Before deleting an album, the user is asked ...
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Why do many sites leave half of each webpage empty?
Why do many sites leave half of each webpage empty? Isn't this a waste of screen space?
One nice example of this is the Stack Exchange Network sites:
As you can see, there is a ton of whitespace ...
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What's the point of a delayed popup on a webpage?
It seems more and more common, when you enter a page and start reading it shows a popup after ~10 seconds. Personally I just leave the page immediately and look for the content somewhere else. I can't ...
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What reason could Nintendo have had for putting the A and B buttons in a non-alphabetical order?
When Nintendo brought out its first game system, the NES, it had a controller with four buttons:
Select
Start
A
B
However, somewhere, a designer, in their infinite wisdom, decided that the A and B ...
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Do signs printed on the road offer a significant advantage for the user over signs on a post?
I was driving earlier today and I came across a stretch of road that didn't have signs for the speed limit but instead had it written on the road like so:
Image source
It got me thinking that it ...
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How to enforce shoes removal in a lobby/house?
I just moved to a new flat, and I've a personal habit of removing my shoes when entering my flat, similar to the custom in some Asian cultures. This is in order to keep the house clean, and feel the ...
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Why does the cursor have a tail?
Look at your cursor.
What's the purpose of its tail—the small rectangular portion at the bottom-right? To me, it follows that it would be equally useful without a tail. I can certainly see why its ...
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Most User Friendly Color Picker
I'm designing a website, and I need to allow the user to change the color of some elements. I will have to implement a color picker. What kind of color picker is the most user friendly, and looks best?...
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How could you prevent users from leaving their original copy in the photocopier?
I've done this myself on many occasions, even though I know it's a common mistake I need to watch out for.
The steps seem to go as follows (with typical thoughts in brackets):
Walk up to photocopier ...
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Why are clients afraid of empty space?
At first everybody agrees about the simplification need and the "less is more" theory. But when it comes to design, they are uncomfortable to see a minimalist page and want it to be filled with ...
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Why is bright pink background a bad UX/UI?
A lot of people commenting on What color for error messages for a form with a red background? say that bright pink background is a bad UX/UI.
Is it true? Is using bright red/pink as a background ...
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Why do most of us wear wristwatches on the left hand?
Is it something related to tradition? Does wearing it on the left hand have benefits over wearing it on the right hand? I know that some people wear it on the right hand but not as many as people who ...
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Why are messages on the road printed in reverse?
After reading this question, something occurred to me that I've always wondered - but never thought to ask.
Why are road messages/signs printed in reverse?
(source https://xkcd.com/781/)
Anytime I ...
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Why are there three (3) default worksheets in MS Office Excel?
As far as I can remember there have been 3 worksheets ("Sheet1", "Sheet2", "Sheet3") by default in any new MS Excel's workbook. What is the reason for that? I'm pretty sure the most popular number of ...
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Might a design be "too good" for users that expect a low price?
I am working hard on the new design of an online shop using all the best practices. But I had this strange thought: What if a design is so good that it worries the user?
When you see something well ...
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How to visualize data with extreme value differences?
I am working on some routines for a client application to visualize data in a 3d bar chart style. The data consists mostly of smaller values with only a few large values. For example:
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Why do we prefer shiny finish on cars and dull finish on devices?
Across the board, cars have shiny paint (which looks great), while computers, laptops and phones etc. tend to have a dull finish to them.
What’s the logic/psychology behind this?
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What some alternative ways to present tabular data instead of the standard table in the UI?
What some alternative ways to present tabular data instead of the standard table in the UI? I don't want the data to be displayed in formal tables with rows and columns. Is there any way of grouping ...
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Is a higher priority a smaller number?
If I tell you drinking coffee is "priority one" for me; I am reasonably sure you will assume that is it very important for me to drink coffee. But is it logical to think of a low number as a high ...
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Best error color on blue color?
I have the color: #4285f4 and I'm looking for a easy to read error color code. I'm using Google's default error color: #dd2c00. However this doesn't read very well on the page...
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Why are AC adapters (wall warts) designed to block adjacent AC outlets?
The AC adapters for a lot of equipment seem to be specifically designed to block the AC outlets around it (this is in the US).
Is this a safety feature to minimize the power to that outlet or just ...
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Is UX design with the intent to change user behaviour without their permission or consent ethical?
There are a lot of UX designer being hired in the e-commerce space at the moment, and no doubt many will have experience competing or conflicting interests when it comes to business and sales-driven ...
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What is the psychology behind laying out slabs at different angles for cyclists and pedestrians?
In the UK, we have many paths that are shared by pedestrians and cyclists, with a dividing line down the center to show who should be on which side of the path.
I noticed that at the end of such ...
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Design process : which is the best moment to include developers in the process of software development?
I'm a UX designer in a small software development start up.
Until now, I've always worked with developers since the beginning of interface creation, because I don't want to lose time working on many ...
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What's the best way to show you can scroll on mobile devices?
I'm trying to find the best method of showing users on mobile devices that they can scroll in a <div>.
As iPhones/iPads don't have scrollbars, I will need an indicator to show that you can ...
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Why rounding odd font sizes to even?
Today I started implementing a design that had some copy text with font size 17px. My fellow web developer told me that we should round that to 18px and more in general that we should not use odd font ...
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Real-life UX: What's wrong with our coffee maker?
At Stack Exchange, we have a very expensive espresso machine - professional quality.
However, we are having a persistent, companywide problem with its use.
It seems that after using the wand to ...
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Do user experience practitioners ever have to worry about code?
To me this is a simple question – of course not. But on several questions and answers lately I need to fight for this opinion. I might be wrong, so I need to know. Do user experience practitioners ...
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Traffic lights: "yellow" is progress, not state
When thinking about how (real-world) traffic lights work, I wonder if there is a more intuitive way to display the yellow light. The meaning of Green and Red are states:
Green: Ok, you can go!
Red: ...
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Why are most pens (that we use to write) blue in color? [closed]
Not a curiosity. I have emailed several ink and pen&pencil production companies and until now I didn't get any kind of logical answer. The question is why most pens contain blue color rather than ...
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How to handle pre-4.0 versions of Android when designing a layout?
I'm designing the UI for an Android app taking the Google User Interface guidelines into account for my Android 4.0 phone.
The current concept looks like this:
How would I go about supporting this ...
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Analog Clock or Digital Clock to tell the time
I am designing a website where a clock has to be placed in the website to tell the time.
I have to choose between an Analog Clock and a Digital Clock assuming both take up the same space on the ...
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Do product-based sites NEED review capability?
One of my newest projects is enhancing the user experience for a well-established industrial product site. (Instead of Home Depot's variety, think "huge variety of locks in many sizes, shapes and ...
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Why do alarm clocks not all come with 5/7 day alarms for the working week?
In all the advances in usability why do alarm clocks still wake us up on Saturday? Why not only Monday to Friday instead of being set every night?
Do we have to rely on our mobile phone if we want ...
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Background for black and white chart
I have a plot where I stack the color white and black as values by month.
I would use white as background color but the data is black and white as the color is. I'm using blue which I don't like.
Any ...
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How does user interface design fit in a development process?
In a software development process where does the user interface design fit?
If we take an agile approach for a small team (2 juniors, 2 seniors, a Team Leader and a web designer) what normally should ...
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How to showcase UX work?
Presenting your UX design on the portfolio is more than just showing off some screenshots of the wireframe or finished graphics. I am just wondering what your thoughts are on the ideal way to display ...
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What is such a presentation of music cover art images called?
Can someone guide me what is the design pattern used in the below image?
What is it called?
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Rationale behind off-center trackpads?
Many laptops come with an off-center trackpad as seen below:
What's the rationale behind this design? Has any research been done into what end-users prefer?
As my personal and very subjective opinion,...
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What's the optimal seat arrangement for a self-driving car?
Take your average mid-sized sedan layout (though this is the view of an SUV, it should illustrate the idea for anyone who has never been in a car before.):
You have a driver's seat and a passenger's ...
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What are some best practices to follow when designing for users completely unfamiliar with computers?
In User Testing in the Wild: Joe’s First Computer Encounter, a researcher for Mozilla encounters a 60 year old man who has never used a computer and describes what it was like to have him use a ...
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Why does the Xbox controller have non-symmetrical analog sticks?
The image below shows the controllers of the three eighth-generation consoles (Xbox One, PS4, Wii U).
As you can see, both the PS4 and Wii U controllers have symmetrical analog sticks, which seems ...
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UX vs Product Design, what's the difference?
I've notice that more and more people who used to call themselves UX Designers are now calling themselves Product Designers. I have a rough feel for the differences but I'm struggling to find any good ...
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Design pattern for sorting / ordering items in card view
In a table design pattern there is usually a 'primary' key value which all the other values can be sorted by, and it is easy to sort or order the rest of the attributes associated with the item.
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Should input fields be cleared out when the user selects them?
I have a few input fields in my form with some default values (numbers). Please note, they are not just placeholders, i.e. they can be used as is, if they are not changed.
I was wondering if I should ...
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Is it crucial for a UX designer to understand the principles and concepts behind Object Oriented Programming?
As a designer and sometimes coder myself, I have been exposed to the idea and principles behind Object Oriented Programming, and having a knowledge in this area definitely helps when it comes to ...
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Ways to improve readability of recipe ingredients?
I am building a recipe website and I'm trying to improve the readability and scannability of the ingredient lists. I've tried a bunch of different options but I'm not sure what is best.
Here are some ...
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Board game design: Which design is clearest to indicate failure?
I'm trying to design a board game (and am not an artist) but want to ensure that I've got some practical aspects designed appropriately for the layout of a card. I tried asking on boardgames....
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What is the current pixel width standard for a website's content area?
I know that previously it was 960 pixels, but lately I have had clients wanting me to push the envelope further and prompted me to do some research on the matter.
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Are material flat buttons distinguishable?
Blue colored texts are known to be links everywhere and users know they can click on them.
How about Google Material Flat Buttons?
In material design, colored text with enough padding is known as a ...
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