173
Don't write error messages blaming the user. There is no actual benefit to you from doing this.
In the event that someone accidentally triggers these error messages, you damage your relationship with them. Even if you do manage to tell a single malicious user that you know they're malicious, it isn't going to make them like you any better.
All you're ...
150
Tickers are like carousels, but worse.
Since you're asking for disadvantages, tickers are an antipattern because:
The content is unpredictable for users. Users don't know how large the content is, what order it appears in, where it starts or ends, and how long it will take to read all of it.
It either scrolls too slow or too fast. If a reader is focused ...
52
This is just my opinion, but it's an answer.
Tickers, or marquees, where you see them, tend to inhabit small spaces. Whether that's across the front of a cinema, the back of a police car or on a train station sign.
In the real world they offer an advantage in that they can display more information than the display can statically display, but in a smaller, ...
35
It sounds like you need to validate whether a smart watch is the right device for most of these tasks. People who need to evacuate a facility in potential life-and-death situations probably need something less ignore-able, like flashing lights and blaring alarms in the workspace.
List all of the tasks that your app is doing now, and decide which ones are ...
31
Let me post an answer contrary to existing ones. A "login successful" message is not just unnecessary but it's also wrong.
Why Unnecessary
Think if objects/devices you use in everyday life will give you feedback each time you use them: "OK, you're using right key, you can turn the car's engine on", "Welcome back Adriano, this is your house", "Your PIN is ...
27
The first thing you have to find out is, if it's really a troll. Your Contact Form and Feedback Form examples have nothing to do with trolls. It's just a feedback message. The third example sounds like a hacker or script kiddie who's trying something, also no troll.
So for the first two examples, choose a error message that tells what to do, but does not ...
27
Did you consider the Facebook approach?
Facebook shows all new notifications under one label that shows the amount of new notifications as a number: "34 new notifications", the red label on the globe icon.
As soon as users CLICK the globe, users get to see all of the new notifications, while previous ones are also shown, with the difference of being a ...
26
How about pushing the development team to use some logic?
Based on the selected records - let them switch the string of feedback message. For instance, if the user selects only one record to delete, the system should understand it and show a message as 'The message has been deleted'.
If the user selects multiple records to delete, the system should show ...
25
It varies, but for English language...
Generally the time taken to read a flash notice will vary according to the complexity of the information, length of notice, and focus/distraction level of the user.
That said, I tend to use the following informed approach:
1. Flash notices should be short
If a notice is longer than about 1.5 lines, it likely too ...
23
I honestly do not think that this is a UI issue but it has rather evolved into a trust issue. All things considered, you clearly have a good UI because new people are actively checking their notifications.
I am not sure how long your product has been providing meaningless alerts but it was apparently long enough that people are still bitter about the ...
22
Good, practical question. In my experience with working on a booking platform recently, we touched/worked on this. More thoughts:
Why this is probably done: To ensure that the notification reaches the user through some channel or other. There could be cases where a few users ignore SMSs, or a few others do not check emails regularly. Hence, multiple ...
21
Scrolling text can be a barrier to accessibility, so much so that WCAG requires that you provide a control that allows the user to pause, stop, or hide the moving content (SC 2.2.2 Pause, Stop, Hide).
Content that moves or auto-updates can be a barrier to anyone who has
trouble reading stationary text quickly as well as anyone who has
trouble tracking ...
19
I spent some time exploring how other sites deal with downloads, and liked how Google Drive handles them.
Here is a screen shot of two downloads simultaneously happening on Google Drive:
What I like about this method:
While this message box is similar to the Toast idea mentioned in Idea 5, the box is positioned on the bottom of the page, rather than the ...
17
Quick Answer
In your case that color scheme is NOT safe for colorblind people. First of all don't forget that there are different types of color vision deficiency. Let's summarize why your image is not safe (to reproduce this just pick two different on-line color blindness simulators):
Achromatopsia: they see only shades of gray then obviously all boxes ...
14
As a corollary to both @tohster and @Matt Obee's very nice answers, there is an additional consideration:
Tickers remove control from the person viewing the information
Someone who is trying to read content that is presented as a static list can scroll up or down at their own leisure, and are actively engaged in that act. Tickers force whoever is viewing ...
12
Notify the user inside the app, but try to avoid interrupting their workflow.
The Nielsen Norman Group did a study on mobile intranets that touched on this topic. They gave seven strategies that help avoid errors and improve productivity for mission-critical applications. From the article:
"Recognize that, even for the most proficient practitioners, ...
12
There's a third option similar to the one used on this page: the message tray icon that is only activated when it has some content with the corresponding number.
Advantage:
The message tray can contain any type of message or alert: not just a type but any
It doesn't disappear when there is no any alert, it simply occupies the same place, it's a way of ...
11
The simple answer to your question is that first and foremost, they are distractions. This isn't about their utility or importance, but just how they affect the user, which is that by definition, notifications - whether pushed to your phone or flashing on your toolbar - are intended to interrupt them.
The goal of these interruptions be their nature is to ...
11
Proper feedback is one of the most important parts of creating good, intuitive UX. Leaving it be would provide very little feedback and may cause confusion among your users. From my experience in UX testing, the majority of users don't retain the information presented on many "one time" notifications, so its likely that this won't be the most successful ...
10
Meh
Personally, I find this menu in a menu solution irritating. It comes with some inherent missed-click risk that could lead to accidental menu abandonment. It’s something worth testing, but I'd have another option to run it against.
Yuck
I hate to critique other answers in an answer but ...
Drop in panel to modal pop up is far worse. You’re making the user ...
9
The system is clear and it certainly will work.
The only thing to note is that customer B might have less probability than initial A to go, because he might have done other plans.
So instead of B being auto-confirmed maybe B should have a period of time to confirm. If he doesn't confirm in that period of time the opportunity passes to C.
Another ...
9
There are several things I would consider. Is the consultant sharing screen with the client (we don't want him to see that)? Is it something that should be discreet or give the consultant an overview? How does the notification look like on your other channels (if there are any)? Does the consultant know the clients or not? Do clients fill in some query prior ...
8
I have a system where any events worthy of attention are displayed as notifications and highlighted in red on the main tool bar with a drop down menu.
I will pull the phrase "worthy of attention" out, for future reference.
Inevitably they never dismiss the notifications though which causes them to have hundreds.
Have you investigated why the users are ...
8
The best course is to provide multiple options to the user.
Generally you'll want to provide at minimum, the following three options:
Send the notification of activity immediately
Send a summary of activity that occurred for a given time period (1 day, 1 week, etc. - the period should reflect the expected user goals for your website)
Never send any ...
8
The Android docs provide some guideance around toasts, notifications and dialogs.
The main difference between toasts and dialogs is that toasts provide feedback unobtrusively whereas dialogs demand an immediate response.
Toasts
A toast provides simple feedback about an operation in a small popup.
It only fills the amount of space required for the ...
8
More than necessary, I think the word is convenient or recommendable. and of course, the message or its phrasing doesn't need to be the one you mention, as long as there's a clear indication of a change of status.
The change of status is obviously the difference between logged and no logged, and it can be represented by messages (like yours), change of ...
8
Slack handles it nicely. Maybe it will help you.
https://slack.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/201675007-Dock-icon-notifications
8
You should consider checking any color palette options using an on-line simulator such as Coblis (http://www.color-blindness.com/coblis-color-blindness-simulator/), which shows you how images look simulating various color-blindness variations:
It is also generally accepted that to guard against this sort of issue, it can be wise to use shape, contrast, and/...
Only top voted, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible