All Questions
3,215
questions
33
votes
5
answers
6k
views
Should I use country flags in language selection fields?
My users can create content in different languages, and I need to provide an option to choose the language when they enter new content.
Right now there are only 5 languages (en, fr, de, pt, es), and ...
- 806
27
votes
13
answers
4k
views
Is it better to prevent a forbidden action or display an error/explanation message?
There are multiple examples, so I'll pick a specific one to focus the question.
Let's say a user can have specific characteristics (or permissions):
Admin, Virtual, External, Financial, etc.
To ...
- 7,732
103
votes
10
answers
13k
views
'My Account' or 'Your Account'?
I want to put a link to an account page in a toolbar. What person should I use to refer to the user's settings? Should I call it 'My Account' or 'Your Account'? I've seen both is use, and I'm not sure ...
- 6,154
74
votes
12
answers
37k
views
Is clockwise or counter-clockwise rotated text easier to read?
When rotating text with css, should it be rotated clockwise or counter-clockwise? Is one more readable than the other?
Counter Clockwise: — ...
- 965
68
votes
29
answers
8k
views
Examples of placebos in UI design?
This is purely a curiosity question but one I thought would be a bit interesting. Is anyone aware of placebos in use on popular web sites or applications? Either intentionally or unintentionally?
...
- 41.7k
68
votes
8
answers
18k
views
As a programmer, how do I move into User Experience Design? [closed]
I've been a developer for over 6 years, mainly working in the web context, and generally distributed applications, services, and also front-facing apps. I got into programming originally through ...
- 783
61
votes
5
answers
10k
views
What research is there suggesting modal dialogs are disruptive?
It seems "Everyone" knows they're highly disruptive for many situations but often times clients don't. Particularly in desktop applications this form of dialog is often misused, often disrupting a ...
- 40.7k
58
votes
12
answers
84k
views
How should large table columns be handled on a responsive design?
Related to This Question, I'm interested in what I should do with a responsive design theme where the users have control over the columns which are displayed in a tabular, data rich page. Users are ...
- 797
55
votes
5
answers
28k
views
Default gender, "Male" or "Female"
Should our default gender when selecting male/female on the dropdown list be based on the local sex ratio (if a country have more female than male then female is the default value)?
- 2,999
50
votes
11
answers
12k
views
Has user testing found that the "three horizontal bars" for main menu on mobile is commonly understood?
"Three horizontal lines" aka "hamburger icon" seems to be becoming a convention for the "main menu" button, especially on mobile sites:
Has anyone done any user testing of this convention, or got any ...
- 863
48
votes
12
answers
9k
views
Pros/cons of splash-screen with articifial loading delay
My firm has developed a small, domain-specific desktop GUI application. Being small, it loads fast (practically instantly) and initially presents a "home" screen, which in this app, is a kind of ...
- 583
47
votes
3
answers
19k
views
Do users understand the browser back button?
You hear a lot about not breaking the back button on websites, but can you assume that most users know and use the back button?
Is it redundant to add a JavaScript or HTML back button/link on a page?
...
- 725
46
votes
6
answers
5k
views
Can we do better than CAPTCHA?
There are a variety of different forms of CAPTCHA and other strategies in order to prevent spam. To briefly list a few:
Simple math or word questions.
Obfuscated text.
JavaScript-based CAPTCHAs.
...
- 10.3k
32
votes
11
answers
11k
views
Is there a usability reason for centering a website's content area on a page?
A lot of websites these days have content area's which are center-aligned: User Experience Stack Exchange is an example.
However some sites are left-aligned, e.g. Adobe Support Community, Area 17, ...
- 2,116
25
votes
6
answers
10k
views
The notification tray at the top of Stack Exchange sites: what is it called? And are there other good examples of this?
I'm trying to clean up notifications for a client site and was wondering if the notification pattern that Stack Exchange employs has a name that I can use to search for more examples.
- 403
23
votes
8
answers
11k
views
Should we provide "back" button for mobile website?
In mobile website for all smartphones (iPhone, Android, Blackberry, Windows phone 7), should I provide a "Back" button inside the webpage even when the browser has functionality to go to back?
Edit - ...
- 4,862
22
votes
5
answers
2k
views
What is the important aspect to consider when deciding where windows interaction buttons should be placed?
In most windows desktops the minimize, maximize and restore buttons for a window are placed in the windows decoration on the top right. However, MacOS and now Gnome in Ubuntu have placed those buttons ...
- 1,245
17
votes
6
answers
7k
views
How to become a User Experience Designer?
I am a UI designer and developer and have been designing websites for aound 10 years. I want to get into user experience design. I know how to do a design, but I am lagging the terminologies and the ...
- 171
124
votes
9
answers
11k
views
Should you always minimize cognitive load?
The title says it all. I enjoy reading UX questions and answers from Stack Exchange's hot network questions, and I often see people justify their answers by saying it minimizes cognitive load.
I ...
- 1,181
117
votes
14
answers
18k
views
Why don't we auto-save for users instead of having them save manually?
With the advent of Apple moving to auto-saving in its newest release Lion, should everyone start adopting the convention of auto-saving?
At first it is definitely awkward and the user can feel like ...
- 13.5k
99
votes
19
answers
73k
views
Search Vs. Filter- what is the difference
From the view of the user (not from a technical view)- What are the main differences between searching and filtering data, in order to get specific results?
i.e.- in both cases the user is looking ...
Ido
97
votes
2
answers
33k
views
Why is Google using a (new) 2 step Gmail sign in process?
I am not asking about the two factor authentication process where the user needs to enter both a password and a one-time-password.
Gmail recently (I don't know from when exactly) changed their login ...
- 1,186
92
votes
13
answers
36k
views
Is there a problem with using black text on white backgrounds?
Why do a lot of websites use a text color other than #000000 black when the background is white?
For instance, this text will be displayed using a dark grey:
.post-text {
color: #333;
}
Have ...
- 2,507
83
votes
16
answers
19k
views
Do you need a search button with a search box?
On websites with a search box, should you add a button they can click on, or will users understand a search box like on this site?
The target group is not very technical, such as women aged 40-60.
- 2,297
75
votes
13
answers
55k
views
What is the best way to deal with very complex forms?
I'm trying to give the best experience to users of a very huge system (like a CRM). It has a lot of forms and much of these have a lot of fields. My doubt is about if I should use a single column form ...
- 1,023
58
votes
8
answers
23k
views
Is 'Home' button still a must?
I was wondering if the 'Home' button is still a must on a website menu, or are users already used to clicking on the Logo?
There is a qustion on ux.stackexchange.com about this topic - Home button vs ...
- 5,020
52
votes
8
answers
58k
views
What are some alternatives to "hover" on touch-based devices?
Came up recently in a 37signals podcast:
http://37signals.com/podcast#episode18
The straightforward, "brute-force" solution is to just use the first touch on a UI object as the hover.
http://...
- 2,540
51
votes
7
answers
27k
views
How long should a temporary notification (toast) appear?
For our intranet application we have little notification messages (toasts) that indicate successful operations like "information saved," "logged out" etc. Most of them are not important enough to ...
- 40.7k
40
votes
3
answers
69k
views
What is the best practice for data table cell content alignment
We are currently working on a windows based application where users capture data. Some data is captured in a table where other data is captured in text blocks. Im currently faced with the dilemma of ...
- 732
32
votes
5
answers
4k
views
Should Android and iPhone UI be different?
I'm not completely new to developing apps, but I'm at a point where I'm trying to develop something and deploy it on several mobile platforms. To only concentrate on two major ones, suppose I'm ...
- 421
31
votes
7
answers
26k
views
Why would a web site hide the log out button?
I have recently observed many sites that do not have a log out button. Either it's not there or hidden somewhere so that you have to find it. Why do you think this has been done? Does it apply to ...
- 1,167
31
votes
4
answers
3k
views
How do you create or select an icon for a feature?
How do you work out what icon type or image you need for a feature?
There's been quite a lot of very small questions here in the form of "What is a good icon for feature X?".
Instead we should be ...
- 1,162
23
votes
9
answers
6k
views
Responsive web design Vs Separate website for Mobile
Responsive Web design is buzzword these days. which means to create a same website and optimized for all devices.
There are also some website which convert the desktop websites into Mobile website
...
- 4,862
21
votes
9
answers
14k
views
Should radio buttons be pre-selected?
I am working on a re-design for a eCommerce site and they have a section where they offer a free gift card if the user makes a purchase over $1000. The idea of the gift card is to get users to ...
- 43.7k
18
votes
5
answers
6k
views
UX style guide techniques
I've recently started a major redesign for a large web-based financial tool. To aid future development, I'm planning on generating a UX style guide that outlines best practices for things like forms, ...
- 2,158
17
votes
5
answers
2k
views
Would it be bad design (and unsafe) to put password guidelines next to a login box?
Different websites have different password requirements
Some are content with a combination of just lower case words
Some require a combination of lower case and upper case words
Some require ...
- 43.7k
12
votes
6
answers
11k
views
Should registration be optional on an e-commerce site?
I am developing an e-commerce web site which will sell tourism services (airport transfer, accommodation, excursions, etc.). I am on a path here that I need to decide if I will provide a membership ...
- 275
595
votes
12
answers
243k
views
Why is the mouse cursor slightly tilted and not straight?
Is this a legacy thing or does a tilted cursor serves a purpose? I can tell that, the angle provides a totally vertical left edge which helps when highlighting text but what else apart from that?
...
- 4,069
215
votes
13
answers
45k
views
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 ...
- 5,705
78
votes
7
answers
18k
views
Re-thinking "hover" functionality with touchscreens in mind
Take the following page as an example (possibly in Firefox only):
As you hover over each search result, an "+ Add to Firefox" button appears.
However, that idea of the button appearing upon hovering ...
- 883
77
votes
8
answers
9k
views
Preventing a user from pasting from the clipboard into a mandatory form field
In my online checkout process I, like many checkouts, have a field for the customer's email address along with a field to confirm the email address. They are both identical text boxes and accept email ...
- 953
58
votes
7
answers
70k
views
What should be the default option of a required dropdown list?
Given that there is no logically default animal from the list of animals below, what should be the "Default Value" below, according to best practice?
<label for="animal">Animal (required):</...
- 681
54
votes
6
answers
65k
views
What are the best practices for tooltips on mobile websites?
What are the best practices for tooltips on mobile websites? I'm designing the mobile version of a website for customers' accounts (where they can see their latest bill and settings for their accounts)...
- 813
54
votes
10
answers
33k
views
All capital titles: good or bad?
What is the recommended use for all capitals titles? For example:
THIS IS A TITLE.
The website http://camvine.com/ has all capital titles, e.g. MARKET SECTORS.
Good, bad?
- 2,163
47
votes
17
answers
15k
views
Should the OK/Cancel buttons be aligned right or centered?
Where should I put the OK/Cancel buttons on my dialogs? At the bottom centered or aligned right? I've seen both and I personally don't care, but I want to create a consistent look across my ...
47
votes
13
answers
5k
views
Can ugly be good UX?
It's heresy I know, but look at DrudgeReport.com. It's raw, hand written HTML, it's plain, boring typography, it's something any UX or Graphic designer would scoff at if you handed it across their ...
- 40.7k
44
votes
8
answers
38k
views
Should hyperlinks be blue?
I've built a site where all hyperlinks have the default colors: blue for links, purple for visited links. They turn red on hover.
I believe that always using blue for hyperlinks is a good thing, so ...
- 563
41
votes
4
answers
19k
views
accordions vs tabs
What is difference between accordions and tabs from the UX point of view?
This is repost from this thread on SO: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5690589/difference-between-accordion-and-tabs
(I ...
- 1,052
40
votes
6
answers
12k
views
Disabled submit button on form vs allow submit then show errors?
We have a few different forms as part of a web-based medical application. These forms have quite a few fields - 10-20 depending on the form. Each has at least 5 or so required fields. We currently ...
- 1,747
33
votes
5
answers
5k
views
Any Research on User Experience Perceptions of Native Apps vs Web or Hybrid Apps
My organization is looking at developing mobile applications, we have a wealth of web development resources. There are many factors to consider in making the decision of how to develop this ...
- 2,023