Good Usability » quick tips

Short and simple sentences

David Hamill — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 08:50:51 +0000

When you’re writing for the web, try to keep your sentences under 20 words in length. Your content will be easier to read this way. This is because it’s easier to read a few short sentences than it is to read one big one.

Write a long sentence first

It’s often quicker and easier to write the sentence as you normally would and then change it after you’ve finished. Look for commas, semi colons and instances of the word “which” as opportunities to begin a new sentence.

You will rarely need to use more than one or two commas in a sentence. Have a go at splitting your sentence in two if you find you’ve got more than two commas in it. You might need to reword it a little.

It’s not always possible

Sometimes your sentence will need to be longer than 20 words. If so that’s fine. As long as you’re trying to keep your sentences short then you’ll be making a big difference.

Do this so as to not write badly

When people try to sound intellectual, they often use the term “as to” when something like “of” would be better. Using “as to” often complicates the sentence unnecessarily. It’s not just an extra word that’s the problem. An extra word won’t make a massive difference. The problem is caused by the extra thought required to translate the sentence back into plain English. Here’s an example:

The results should be clearly structured with a relevant title and also a brief description as to what is contained in the listing…

Yes very clever, but the following sentence is easier to read:

The results should be clearly structured with a relevant title and a brief description of what is contained in the listing…

All I did was remove the word “also” and replaced “as to” for “of”. I haven’t dumbed this sentence down at all. I just made it easier to read and understand.

Favour simple over short

Don’t make your sentences complicated just so that you can lose a few words. A long simple sentence will often be easier to read than a shorter complex one.

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Using a:focus in CSS – quick tip

David Hamill — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 08:00:15 +0000

In web design, we often automatically think of blind users when we talk about web accessibility. But a lot of disabled users are not blind. Some people will use a keyboard to navigate your site despite being able to see the screen. Unfortunately browsers aren’t that great at highlighting the link that is in focus.

Helping keyboard only users

You can help your keyboard only users by applying a clear visual property for a:focus within your stylesheet. When your users tab through the links on your website, they will then be able to see which ones are in focus.

Tab through the links on this page with your keyboard to see what I mean. Here’s the CSS I use:

a:focus{ color:#fff; background: #C40064; }

Form fields

You can also use this effect on your form fields. Just don’t expect it to work in Internet Explorer. The Focus pseudo class only works on the tag in Internet Explorer.

What are quick tips?

My quick tips are bits of advice Iâ€™ve given lots of times, but theyâ€™re not really worth writing a big article about.

Good site search – quick tips

David Hamill — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 20:34:08 +0000

There’s a few quick tips here but they’re all on site search so I’ve kept them together.

Provide a box not a link

If you want people to see your site search then don’t provide a ‘search’ link on every page. Instead provide the search box itself. Your users are more likely to notice it, so it will be used more.

No search is better than a bad search

If your search sucks, then lose it. Take it off the page. Some people will spend ages struggling with a bad search engine. If they can’t find it with search then they often think it doesn’t exist.

Take the Google logo off

If you have some sort of Google powered search then don’t put a Google logo on it. Some people will mistake it for a web search.

What are quick tips?

My quick tips are bits of advice I’ve given lots of times, but they’re not really worth writing a big article about.

Writing numbers – quick tip

David Hamill — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 23:35:01 +0000

When you include numbers on your website, use numerics rather than spelling out the word. It’s quicker for your user to digest. It also works better when the number is the main thing your user is looking for.

Try it out for yourself. Go to the Wikipedia page on Tigers and find the approximate number of cubs in a litter. It’s quite difficult to find because the page is big. But now try to find the average number of hunts a tiger makes before it tends to get a kill. It’s even harder because the figure is written as a word and you’re scanning the page for a number.

Phone numbers

You can improve the findability of phone numbers even further by making them bold.

What are quick tips?

My quick tips are bits of advice I’ve given lots of times, but they’re not really worth writing a big article about.