On 10/11/05, Richard Bennett-Forrest <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
What I was referring to, is that HTML is structural and contextual
mark up, and individual visual user agents (web browsers) are mostly
free to display HTML however they wish. The point being, publishers
provide the data, and the user (or browser) decides how to view it.
I'm not trying to be argumentative, but I'm still not sure I agree with this. Browsers are not really free to decide how it's displayed - they CAN yes but ... they are supposed to adhere to a standard by the w3c. HTML/DHTML/_javascript_ ... they were all designed to let
publishers layout and present information and interfaces. When one of the browsers would parse something in a way that wasn't standard - publishers went crazy (that was the whole browser wars of the mid-late 90s).
XML is interface/layout free ... but HTML/CSS/DHTML/JS and the like are all very much about letting the publisher define how his information is presented.
Pop-ups arguably fly in the face of this, as they dictate a specific
user interface.
They simply open a new window. I realize this alters the 'user interface' ... but so does a non-popups link. If I click a non-embeded link to a MOV file, the stuff I was reading goes away .. thats dictating how my interface works just as much.
From the other side, it also breaks standard user interface
guidelines in that it isn't immediately obviously whether a hyperlink
will open in the same window, or in a pop-up window. Windows which
open themselves are also bad UI.
Well I disagree in that last bit there. Bad UI is whatever is counter-intuitive for the user.
here's an example. just before I started vlogging I was building out some test pages. I had a test page with a quicktime movie (it wasn't mine I was just testing my database stuff). I asked my co-worker to watch the video ... she opened the test page url and clicked the link. Quicktime took over, the web page vanished and the player was there. She audibly gasped and slammed the back button. She did this 3 more times before she closed the window and said "fucking make it stop doing that".
So if a user base is expecting a popup and they dont get one that too is bad design. Granted that was a user test of one person ... but you get the idea. If the person had planned on reading the text blog below a post or the comments as the video loads ... and when they click the button that page vanishes, that's counter-intuitive.
But you are right that pop-ups can very easily the most annoying thing on the web. Using them effectively is tricky. To know what good ui is for a given application really requires a usability test with real users.
I think that in the end people get used to the way their favorite websites work and either solution is ok if its done well.
- Dave
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