[Design] Fwd: [Bug 4520] An alternate way to time in event detail view

[Mimi Yin]

Thank you Mike for the link.

I think the main difference between interaction design for  
information-intensive web sites and desktop software design is that  
basically EVERYTHING in the UI is clickable, editable, selectable and  
eventually draggable (except for the chrome behind the tool bar  
buttons). This is in contrast to many web pages (especially earlier  
ones) where 95% of the real estate was non-interactive text.

There are also other more subtle ways we can clue users into what's  
editable and what's not editable. For example, every time you create  
a new item, the focus goes immediately to the Title field where you  
can type in the Title of the item. The web, especially in the early  
years when Jakob Nielson first developed these guidelines was  
interaction-poor and needed to rely on clear persistent visual cues  
to guide users to the right hot spots for links.

Nonetheless, the spirit of what he's saying is correct and there's no  
disagreement there. But I think the context of the design needs to be  
taken into consideration whenever we apply heuristics.

:o) Mimi

On Nov 4, 2005, at 1:39 PM, Mike Carroll wrote:

> At 02:02 PM 11/2/2005, you wrote:
>
>> Mimi Yin wrote:
>> > 2. Text summary of the date/time information that only turns into
>> > editable fields when you click into it. (Mostly a space saving  
>> device
>> > for when we add more attributes to the detail view for tasks and  
>> email)
>>
>> This is something I really dislike in our current design.
>>
>> At least on Windows and Linux the standard way to show text that is
>> editable is to show it in a text control that looks like a text  
>> control.
>>
>> We have several fields in the detail view already that look like  
>> static
>> text. The only way users are going to find that they can make them
>> change into edit controls is by accident.
>>
>> --
>>   Heikki Toivonen
>>
>
> Jakob Nielson gives "Design Guidelines for Visualizing Links" in  
> one of his Alertbox articles: http://www.useit.com/alertbox/ 
> 20040510.html
>
> "Users shouldn't have to guess or scrub the page to find out where  
> they can click."
>
> Similar guidelines may apply to fields in the Calendar design.
>
> ++hobbitt
>
> ----------
> Mike Carroll, Pete Townsend, Washington USA
> http://www.druidlabs.com
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