Sometimes we have to use pop-ups — so we might as well do them right. This article will show you how to make them more accessible and reliable while simplifying their implementation.
Topic: Usability
Designing for Context with CSS
The medium is the message: Imagine providing unique information exclusively for people who read your site via a web-enabled cell phone — then crafting a different message for those who are reading a printout instead of the screen. Let your context guide your content. All it takes is some user-centric marketing savvy and a dash of CSS.
Helping Your Visitors: a State of Mind
Even the simplest website is harder to figure out than a catalog or magazine. We all know how to “use” a catalog: start at the front cover and keep turning the pages. But with every new site we visit, we have to “learn” how it works, how its “pages” turn, how to find what we’re looking for. Text that takes visitors’ needs into account can help guide them through the maze.
The Perfect 404
No matter how carefully you design and structure your site, visitors will sometimes request missing, moved, or non-existent pages. A well tempered 404 error page will plunge these visitors back into the flow of your site. Ian Lloyd shares strategies for crafting the perfect 404.
Tackling Usability Gotchas in Large-scale Site Redesigns
Redesigns can solve old usability problems while creating new ones that must be solved in turn. From the lessons of the ALA 3.0 redesign comes this quick study in remapping content without frustrating readers.
Keeping Navigation Current With PHP
Turning unordered lists into elegant navigational menus has become a new favorite pastime for many web designers. A dash of PHP can add intelligence to your CSS-styled menu.
Slash Forward (Some URLs are Better Than Others)
Some URLs are better than others: easier for visitors to remember, easier for designers and developers when it comes time to change the technology that drives the site. Waferbaby neatly and briefly considers the effect of web addresses on usability, design, and ease of maintenance and technological transition.
A Backward Compatible Style Switcher
You asked for it, you’ve got it: an Open Source alternate style sheet switcher that actually works in Netscape 4. No, really. Daniel Ludwin shows how it’s done.
Reading Design
With so many specialists working so hard at their craft, why are so many pages so hard to read? Unabashed text enthusiast Dean Allen thinks designers would benefit from approaching their work as being written rather than assembled.
Information vs. Experience
The conflict between presentation and structure reveals two views of the web. Which one’s winning?
