John On Web Stuff » usability http://blog.geekyjohn.com My take on web things. Sometimes witty. Sharing of stuff. Tue, 06 Apr 2010 11:26:48 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 Form Usability and UX goodness http://blog.geekyjohn.com/2010/04/form-usability-and-ux-goodness/ http://blog.geekyjohn.com/2010/04/form-usability-and-ux-goodness/#comments Tue, 06 Apr 2010 11:26:46 +0000 John http://blog.geekyjohn.com/?p=228 When we’re designing forms there are some simple things to keep in mind with regards to the UX and usability side of things that will make them that much better for our audiences.

Good Usability has two very useful articles about validation and preventing issues on web forms, well worth a read.

Alistapart has an article regarding inline validation that shows us the wonderfulness of using real-time inline validation vs. validating by submission. By giving people an indication that their input is correct (or not) while they are filling in a form results in a far greater success rate and of course there is a much better experience for users.

I also came across an excellent article at UX Matters about not putting hints inside text boxes. In a nutshell: when a text field has content — whether example content or actual content — users will often perceive that field to be filled in and skip over it.

Some other excellent websites to read where UX/Usability is concerned:

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]]> http://blog.geekyjohn.com/2010/04/form-usability-and-ux-goodness/feed/ 0 Don’t Click Here – Placing Links in Context http://blog.geekyjohn.com/2009/01/dont-click-here-placing-links-in-context/ http://blog.geekyjohn.com/2009/01/dont-click-here-placing-links-in-context/#comments Mon, 12 Jan 2009 01:27:18 +0000 John http://blog.afterlight.net.au/?p=95 If you’re interested in reading this article, click here. On second thought. Don’t. It’s a common usability problem. Links that don’t mean anything. How are you using links on your website?

Don’t Click Here – Placing Links in Context | Build Internet.

A short article to let us know it’s ok to not tell people to “click here”. If the links are clear enough, the user doesn’t need to be told where to click!

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]]> http://blog.geekyjohn.com/2009/01/dont-click-here-placing-links-in-context/feed/ 0 Userfly: Usability From Your Actual Users http://blog.geekyjohn.com/2008/12/userfly-usability-from-your-actual-users/ http://blog.geekyjohn.com/2008/12/userfly-usability-from-your-actual-users/#comments Tue, 09 Dec 2008 03:17:53 +0000 John http://blog.afterlight.net.au/?p=76 Chris Estreich, a senior engineer at classifieds site Oodle today soft-launched a new site aimed at web developers called Userfly. Using JavaScript, Userfly captures and records browsing data from your visitors and lets you plat it back as a movie later. The site is really rough — this is a very beta release — and probably isn’t quite ready for any press coverage, but I was so impressed by the demo (and had a lot of fun playing with it), that I couldn’t resist. SitePoint » Userfly: Usability From Your Actual Users.

Very cool site if you want to optimise your site’s usability.

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