Learning Journal: Midterm

Mike McMullan

Summary of "Top Ten Mistakes in Web Design" (1 Point)

http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9605.html

Each of numbered points represents a problem designers make when designing websites. Firstly, he states the main problem with search engines takes is that they take queries too literally. They don’t give any leeway for quotes, smelling mistakes, etc. When navigation fails, search is the main backup. Secondly, PDF files wreck the flow of browsing the web. When someone comes across a PDF file they are taken from the format of the website there were on to the design of the PDF reader of their choice. There is little control of smooth scrolling font size ect. Thirdly, not changing colour of the visited links is a bad idea. Users have no easy way to tell where they have gone in the post. Users simple can easily get lost and visit the same page multiple times. Fourthly, block text is a bad idea. When writing on the web the author should break their article into shorter paragraphs making it easier to read. Fifthly, font size should not be set in pixels in the style sheet. When font size is set in pixels browsers are not able to increase sizes of text making it harder for people with vision problems to read. Sixthly, in the title of a web page it should state the name of the site and a brief description of it. If it is of a article state the title of the article and name of the site. Seventhly, advertisements are usually blocked out by the user. After years of dominant advertisements users have trained themselves to ignore banner ads, flashy ads, sidebar add, ect. The only exceptions are usually text ads. Ninthly, opening a new browser window is a bad idea. The browser back button is disabled because they are viewing a new windows, usually the user will not return the site they were previously on. Tenthly, important information should always be shown up front instead useless selling information.

Summary of "How Little Do Users Read?" (1 Point)

http://www.useit.com/alertbox/percent-text-read.html

In February of 2008 there was a study to find out the most used buttons in a web browser. The authors instructed 25 users to go about their daily web activities while being recorded. The study showed the back button as being the third most used button. The second most used button was clicking buttons on the actual webpage. The most used button was clicking on hyperlinks to go to different locations.

In another study author retrieved a dataset detailing a large amount of page views and time spent on each page. In brief with some assumptions users that were on the page for more the 20 minutes where doing something else on their computer or have left. A large bulk was on the page for 5-10 minutes depending on the amount of text on the page. A graph shows as the amount of text increases, the amount of time also increases. A smaller bulk was users spending less than 4 seconds on a page. This usually meant the user new right away they didn’t find what they wanted or it was a 404 page not found or some error.

In another study the authors found on average users who were skimming text usually read 100 words over 4.4 seconds. This would state if a user was skimming they would probably not pick up very much information. The study said the user would only read 20% of the text.

Summary of "16: HTML lists" (2 Points)

http://dev.opera.com/articles/view/16-html-lists/

Lists are used to group related content and to structure content. In modern web development lists are used as a common work horse, having the ability to have styling applied to them. There are three different listen types: unordered lists, ordered lists and definition lists. Each has their own purpose. Unordered lists are usually used for any list that does not need any particular order. For example, a shopping list, it doesn’t matter if a item is changed in the order it still makes sense whichever way you list it. Ordered lists are used to display lists of which needs to be shown in a particular order. For example, baking instructions needs to be displayed in a particular order or they don’t make any sense. Lastly definition lists, they are lists of which associate specific terms and there definitions are shown. For example, if someone wanted to show a shopping list and each items definition they would use this kind of list. The item is shown and then within the item the definition is listed.

The main difference between html lists and text lists is the easibility to change the order of the list. If someone hand coded the list and then had to change the order, the author would have to change the value on every line. With list the order is never changed just the position of the text.

There is also the possibility to nest lists. The author lists a ordered list with in a ordered list. The rest of the article is examples and has no point to repeat.