Ahh, but is it actually usable by the audience? I had the good fortune to
attend a conference recently where the speakers were folks from the National
Institute of Health, and they have spent a wad of $$$$ on usability testing.
The real kind of studies, where they videotape joe shmoes and watch their
ape-like attempts to navigate various websites.
The results of the study? Pretty wild. Basically, it boils down to this:
Users don't know to click on ANYTHING unless it is colored blue and
underlined.
Users understand plain text
Users understand standard browser Submit buttons
Users don't understand fancy-schmancy pretty-boy buttons
Users do not understand frames
Users like it plain, plain plain!
The most "usable" site styles are those in the Yahoo style, with plain text
links that cascade down to more refined text links.
If you wanna see the details, go to www.usability.gov , and see some of your
tax dollars (That's U.S. tax dollars, so you Europeans get to sponge this
info for free!) at work.
I found a lot of encouragement in this study. And why? As a CF devleoper who
works with Studio, I've found that form follows function in a big way. The
natural result of "command line" coding versus "GUI" coding is that stuff
ends up a bit stark. Quite serendipitious, actually. Those "boring" pages
displaying stuff in a straight table , using basic HTML, turn out to be
right up the usability alley. All that flash stuff, well, heh, poof!
Alan McCollough
Web Programmer
Allaire Certified ColdFusion Developer
Alaska Native Medical Center
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Toby Tremayne [SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Sunday, February 25, 2001 2:29 PM
> To: Fusebox
> Subject: RE: Flash, Harpoon, Balthaser
>
> doesn't that suck? You pull of something really clever - and it's only
> really sexy to a fellow geek. But if you have any kind of artistic bent
> and
> write great flash - everyone thinks you're great....
>
> ....grumble grumble... <grin>
{redacted}
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