80
votes
Accepted
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
Replace the panel A with buttons “to rooftop” and “to garage” instead of “up” and “down”. Now elevator 1 is reserved for special floors and most people use elevators 2-4.
- 3,323
68
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
On further thought, another solution could be to implement a singular, digital wall panel where users can indicate to which specific floor they are intending to go, much like the ones found in many ...
- 1,061
59
votes
Accepted
Is it good practice to allow users to navigate simply by hovering on a menu item without clicking?
This seems full of usability issues, as well as possibly performance issues loading interim unnecessary pages (e.g., user moves mouse across tabs to access one several over). To start, if there's user ...
- 606
44
votes
Accepted
QR vs Barcode vs Custom Code
You can add quite a bit of visualization to your QR codes, see for example https://github.com/x-hw/amazing-qr
Some examples of that page:
If the QR code will be shown on a screen you can even use an ...
- 546
42
votes
What is the reason for moving the start button to the middle in Windows 11?
The interview in the Wall Street Journal gives the answer from the Diego Baca, Microsoft's principal design director. When asked about a placement of the Start button he said:
I do remember we wanted ...
- 481
33
votes
Intuitive dialog for choosing whether to close and lose changes or keep editing
All the information in the other answer about colors, contrast, etc. is valid from a general design perspective. But words matter a lot. In particular, users may get very confused about "this ...
31
votes
Is it good practice to allow users to navigate simply by hovering on a menu item without clicking?
This is annoying.
Ignore any hypotheticals we can't judge in the gif. There's still an enormous usability problem. There are a lot of buttons and whatnot at the top of the browser (or even above that ...
- 607
28
votes
QR vs Barcode vs Custom Code
I prefer the custom solution because ... well, because it's custom and gives us aesthetic and emotional design options
If this is your graphical solution and your collaborators prefer a practical ...
- 13.9k
27
votes
QR vs Barcode vs Custom Code
Let's look at each of your options in-depth.
Barcode
Pros
✓ Well-established technology. Can be used with many types of hardware.
✓ Familiar; recognizable.
✓ Requires minimal image processing.
Cons
× ...
- 19.2k
25
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
In an office building where I worked, they solved a similar problem by making panel A a bit less obvious than panel B. Panel B was right out in the open, on the wall between two of the elevators, ...
- 351
19
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
My thoughts would be to consolidate both sets of buttons into a single panel and draw focus to the primary action buttons.
Roof
UP
DOWN
Car Park
- 291
19
votes
Accepted
Intuitive dialog for choosing whether to close and lose changes or keep editing
Actually, the content of the question should be understandable just by looking at the two images and without any explanation. But, personally, it took me a while to understand the images were related ...
- 13.9k
16
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
This is a people problem.
This can be fixed by using some scotch tape and a piece of paper which reads:
Please use this panel only if you need roof or basement access, or need extra space for a ...
- 5,619
15
votes
QR vs Barcode vs Custom Code
As your team (and other commentators here) concluded, I would go for the QR code.
Most Pros and Cons regarding QR codes have been already mentioned here, but one relevant detail hasn't been shared ...
- 151
15
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
The variant:
If this is not clear - this is bad solution.
Comments:
Of course this is just a mockup.
Add accessibility icon at Panel A as most people respect this mark and will not use marked ...
- 2,145
15
votes
Is it good practice to allow users to navigate simply by hovering on a menu item without clicking?
Having content-obscuring changes happen at all on "hover" is an accessibility bug, so this is a non-starter. Not only may it be difficult or impossible for users with particular ...
14
votes
What is the reason for moving the start button to the middle in Windows 11?
Unless one of us here at UX SE is the person who made the decision on this design, we can't really be sure.
There is some information on design choices made in Windows 11 in this post from their blog:...
- 5,004
13
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
The heart of the problem is that people going to every floor except the roof & basement will on average get better service by pressing both buttons. Any modification needs to remove that incentive,...
- 231
10
votes
What is the reason for moving the start button to the middle in Windows 11?
Well, beyond the fact that there's a better adaptability for devices with a touch-pad as mentioned in the question, I see other specifications regarding design.
In the same way the question refers to ...
- 13.9k
9
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
I think this is especially tough because the combination of these issues:
E1 is the only way to access the roof and garage
E1 is the main intended elevator for for wheelchairs/strollers/accessibility
...
- 191
8
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
Solution1
No hardware modification required. Just add two software rules:
full priority to the destination floor selected inside the elevator 1 when at the garage level or at the roof level
full ...
8
votes
Intuitive dialog for choosing whether to close and lose changes or keep editing
The dialog isn't using proper wording. When the dialog has text saying "close this dialog" in it, it's referring to the dialog, not the Edit Content screen. The buttons say "don't close&...
- 4,930
7
votes
Accepted
What's the generic term for meaningless interactivity?
This is sometimes referred to as 'excise'.
Alan Cooper in the classic software guide About Face refers to the larger term Excise whenever you have extra decorations, extra interactions, and the like:
...
- 22.8k
6
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
Many of the proposed solutions involve combining the panels or relabeling Elevator 1's controls. The problem with this is accessibility: anyone who needs the larger car (especially if they are not ...
- 411
6
votes
Is it good practice to allow users to navigate simply by hovering on a menu item without clicking?
I'm curious what are the websites where you have seen this pattern emerge. To my knowledge this is not common.
I'd see this is unexpected and likely problematic. Imagine for instance if a user ...
- 10.5k
5
votes
QR vs Barcode vs Custom Code
This might not give you an answer directly but some more to think about.
Where are the codes being placed? Is it a sticker? Is it shown digitally on a screen? How big will it be? Can it easily be ...
- 2,268
5
votes
Is it good practice to allow users to navigate simply by hovering on a menu item without clicking?
I think it's a derivative of the mega menus hovering effect where it's a fairly common pattern:
What is different in the example of the question is that each menu has vertical submenus and this makes ...
- 13.9k
5
votes
Intuitive dialog for choosing whether to close and lose changes or keep editing
Another option here is to modify the original cancel button in some way (I’ve had success in the past with turning it red, and replacing the text with “Are you sure?”), and requiring a second click ...
- 407
4
votes
QR vs Barcode vs Custom Code
It is a good idea to look at history and see what was done then to learn lessons from the past.
I strongly urge you to NOT use barcodes or bland QR codes for identification or categorization of ...
- 2,301
4
votes
How to avoid the "local elevator" problem?
I think the functionality of the elevators and two panels are fine. The issue is with user behavior.
You have two sets of users:
Users who are in a wheelchair or want to go to roof or basement.
Users ...
- 141
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible