On 1/12/2012 6:54 AM, JonasW wrote:
If someone wants to
know more about usability for the first reading I suggest:
...
Designing the User Interface - Donald A. Norman, The Design of
Everyday Things (not about GUIs, but more about some principle
questions, but a classic book) ...
Funny you should mention this. I majored in Cognitive Science at UC San
Diego at the end of the '90s when Don Norman was the head of the
department, and took classes from him (and of course still have his
book) directly. I think I can say I got a good sense of his outlook on
UI design.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with a parallax scrolling background
from a UI design perspective. It doesn't add directly to the UI, but
neither does pretty graphics; both are orthogonal to usability, though
without attractive graphics most people won't want to use it. In fact
I'd say that it arguably enhances the UI, as the dragging of icons in
the "near" layer is reinforced by a background moving in a similar
direction. As such it creates an illusion that you're looking around in
a larger area.
I get that you don't like it. It's your right. But it's aesthetics, and
trying to claim otherwise is false; there's nothing about it that should
confuse users. Being a slave to aesthetics can harm usability (his
oft-cited example about doors with no handles, or with ambiguous
handles, comes to mind) [1], but nowhere does he argue for doing away
with all aesthetics.
Considering I learned directly from one of the top experts, I've haven't
read many other opinions on UI design, but I would have a hard time
understanding how any "expert" could claim that such an easily
cognitively mapped action as a parallax background could possibly harm
usability.
Tim
[1] This page has a summary that references the anecdote I'm thinking
of: http://www.situatedgaming.com/CISHCIExam/norman.html
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