Hi Daniel and others of course,
Could you please explain what is wrong then? If Jacob (who is heavily criticized btw by other researchers) would look at http://sc40.sfo.collab.net/ what would he say, besides putting out some vague notions and referring to an expensive report? Please say so, and critisize things one by one... I believe the design I made is really usable, even when style is completely turned off (this would be a great test, right?).Those are sensible points. There is a lot more to usability than that though. I've compiled a nice list of resources:Why do I like it much more than the current website?
Because big images, big text gives a more secure feel to it. Even if the
project is huge we don't need to show the users a frontpage with dozens
of different items and a lot of space. Big objects look as if they were
closer to the screen.
http://website.openoffice.org/tryouts/dcarrera/usability.html
And just commenting on the project leads they lack knowledge on Jacob Nielsen without really commenting on current designs yourself using arguments based on scientific research in Interaction Design makes no sense to mee at all. Are buttons too small in your opinion referring to Fitt's law, or do you think the information architecture isn't that transparent as it should be? Do you think some area should be available within one click? Don't you think the current site is well browsable using text2speech browsers? Do you think people think it's a too good product when the website looks too nice and maybe expectations might be too high for an opensource product? Or is it looking too commercial? Are images making the site too slow?
There are a million things to consider when talking about a good website, and therefore I tend to use mostly my intuition. I am able to write a thesis about usability, but I can't (yet) argue for every design decision. Some choices were merely aesthetical choices, but these indeed influence usability again... The thing that the presentation box has a shadow puts the layer on a higher level, giving it visually more importance. And besides these points, even aesthetics matter. When a site looks better, people tend to find it a less hard stay. Not that this is an excuse for bad usability on other aspects.
g.,
Maarten
ps. And btw good usability is more than just checking a W3C accesibility checklist...
--------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
