In most cases I would say that ok/cancel dialogs that challenge a user’s intention are anoying and unnecessary. There are time however when I’m thankful that UX designers consider challenging my actions, to wit:
Thank you Mail.app I would rather not open the one thousand eight hundred seventy six emails that I inadvertently highlighted just before I hit the enter key.
“We have to admit, the old download manager totally sucked.”
Beta is beyond retro-cool. Remember the late 90′s? Recalled by some as, “The Golden Age of Beta”, is it being eclipsed?
With a health dose of web2.0 badges screaming: “BETA!”, anything could happen.
–I am so starting a band called The Beta Band, no wait that one’s taken…how about The Beta Bubble?
UPDATE: This is how to own up to being in beta. (thanks Jimmy)
Add to Porfolio?
Well, they do say buy low, sell high… I doub’t that was the intention here. (See the bottom of the image, the story is about the U.S. Government bailout of the morgatge companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
When websites evolve and acquire new features it is important to handle “default cases” well. When I registered for the site in this image, the site’s designers had implemented a very basic personal profile, screen name, email and password; later they added additional details such as “Full Name”.
As an early registrant in the system, my account had no “Full Name” associated with it so the “My Account“ interface needs accommodate for a default case of a “user of the system who doesn’t have a full name”. How’d they do? Every been greeted in real-life like this: “Hi None”.
When a simple 10 minute exercise in thinking and writing up a few ideas turns into a two week delay in action, maybe the environment precludes the generation of the message. Can simple applications like WriteRoom make you more productive? You don’t need to write the next, great novel to appreciate the powerful, liberating experience of letting go and focusing on the task at hand.
The example above from Remember The Milk’s sign-up form points out how easy registering for a product or service should be. It looks so easy, but in reality making it seem easy take experience, empathy and real work.
As a result, you’re probably not going to find the answer to the question “How do I design a great registration form?” in a single blog post. (At least not one written by me.)
So where to look then? Let me suggest that you check out some of the insightful writing of Luke Wroblewski. I’ve read Luke’s articles before on his site, Functioning Form as well as Boxes and Arrows, and A List Apart—he’s worth reading.
If you came here looking for information on creating well designed forms, I’d suggest you read the articles linked here and then give his new book a spin.
By Luke Wroblewski. Rosenfeld Media, May 2008.
Reviews of Web Form Design
By Luke Wroblewski. Wiley, June 2002.
Have a suggestion for an article or book you think I should read about web form design? Leave a comment, I’d love to hear what you think.
