Recently I enjoyed reading Steve Krug's Don't Make Me Think, The Second Edition. For those of you who are Web design practitioners, I strongly recommend that you pick up a copy and go through it.
After reading through it, one of the lessons that stuck with me was the benefits of leveraging established user interface design: Fancy word for recycling what's known to work.
In some sense this flies in the face of innovation. Innovation is good, as long as it is done in a way that minimizes the user's mental exercise to learn and get accustomed to it. If the learning curve is too steep, or even worse the interface is not guiding users where to begin, it will fail. In other words, the center of innovation should be human, the users.
After reading through it, one of the lessons that stuck with me was the benefits of leveraging established user interface design: Fancy word for recycling what's known to work.
In some sense this flies in the face of innovation. Innovation is good, as long as it is done in a way that minimizes the user's mental exercise to learn and get accustomed to it. If the learning curve is too steep, or even worse the interface is not guiding users where to begin, it will fail. In other words, the center of innovation should be human, the users.
