Week 7: Color and Typography
Readings:
a) Information Design in Technical Communication: (http://orange.eserver.org/issues/1-1/)
b) Web 2.0: http://www.gotomedia.com/gotoreport/january2006/news_0106_forest.html
c) Give Customers Short Paths To What They Want: Brief Series September 29, 2003. “Best Practices For Designing Site Navigation Series” By Moira Dorsey With Harley Manning Michelle Amato, Forrester Research, Inc. (www.forrester.com)
Synthesis from my readings makes me think website design and navigation depend on two primary factors: Who is your audience and what is your site’s purpose?
Clearly, users value content and functionality above all else. Also, the website’s goal or purpose is essential to the design.
To illustrate my point, I’ll offer my experience trying to locate our class reading this week.
“Give Customers Short Paths To What They Want” proved to be an ironical header for an article that was difficult to locate on the EReserves site. Since that was the only article that could not have a live link, (I’m guessing because it is paid for content, copyright issues) it would have been helpful to not have it hidden inside a generic folder called “Groups.” Since I had some time on hand and also because I like to think of myself as a diligent student, I persisted and opened all the other article links till I hit upon the folder and found the assigned reading. From a user perspective, that was definitely a six-level hierarchy. J
Anyway, my point is, I plowed through the navigational issues only because I really wanted to read the article. So the audience needs and wants matters as does the value of the content. But this doesn’t mean websites should take users for granted and not pay attention to functionality and design. This becomes even more critical when you are trying to sell products/services. If users cannot locate what they want to buy in two/three clicks they are bound to look elsewhere. But if the website caters to student researchers/ academic journals, the design aspects take a bit of a backseat over content. At least that’s been my experience. It may change in the future.
Web 2.0 sounds like it may be that harbinger of that change. It says it will have a profound impact on how websites are designed. I'm fascinated by the concept, though, I don’t think I really understand how it all works.
a) Information Design in Technical Communication: (http://orange.eserver.org/issues/1-1/)
b) Web 2.0: http://www.gotomedia.com/gotoreport/january2006/news_0106_forest.html
c) Give Customers Short Paths To What They Want: Brief Series September 29, 2003. “Best Practices For Designing Site Navigation Series” By Moira Dorsey With Harley Manning Michelle Amato, Forrester Research, Inc. (www.forrester.com)
Synthesis from my readings makes me think website design and navigation depend on two primary factors: Who is your audience and what is your site’s purpose?
Clearly, users value content and functionality above all else. Also, the website’s goal or purpose is essential to the design.
To illustrate my point, I’ll offer my experience trying to locate our class reading this week.
“Give Customers Short Paths To What They Want” proved to be an ironical header for an article that was difficult to locate on the EReserves site. Since that was the only article that could not have a live link, (I’m guessing because it is paid for content, copyright issues) it would have been helpful to not have it hidden inside a generic folder called “Groups.” Since I had some time on hand and also because I like to think of myself as a diligent student, I persisted and opened all the other article links till I hit upon the folder and found the assigned reading. From a user perspective, that was definitely a six-level hierarchy. J
Anyway, my point is, I plowed through the navigational issues only because I really wanted to read the article. So the audience needs and wants matters as does the value of the content. But this doesn’t mean websites should take users for granted and not pay attention to functionality and design. This becomes even more critical when you are trying to sell products/services. If users cannot locate what they want to buy in two/three clicks they are bound to look elsewhere. But if the website caters to student researchers/ academic journals, the design aspects take a bit of a backseat over content. At least that’s been my experience. It may change in the future.
Web 2.0 sounds like it may be that harbinger of that change. It says it will have a profound impact on how websites are designed. I'm fascinated by the concept, though, I don’t think I really understand how it all works.
posted by sakina | Monday, February 13, 2006
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