Choose the Proper Screen-Based Controls 541 SOME THOUGHTS ON POOR SCREEN DESIGN

Step 7: Choose the Proper Screen-Based Controls 541 SOME THOUGHTS ON POOR SCREEN DESIGN

Following is a collection of control design inadequacies whose most endearing qualities are that they really, really aggravate the author.

Why do interface designers insist on collecting state codes through drop-down list boxes, when all other name and address details are collected through text boxes? I’m merrily typing away my “mentally programmed” name and address when I encounter the state field and come to a screeching halt. Do I reach for the mouse? Open the drop-down list box with the keyboard? I stumble, grumble, open the drop-down list box, find my home state, Arizona, and select it, thinking all the while how glad I am I live in a state whose name is near the top of the alphabetized list. My condolences go out to friends in places like Illinois and Texas who’ll have to scroll to their state name. I return my hands to the keyboard and forge ahead to zip code. Why, I’m now thinking, do they need my zip code? They now have enough information to determine it — but that’s another story.

Why am I often penalized by American systems for living in the United States? Back to the name and address again; now I must indicate country. Can I type USA?

Nope, back to a drop-down list box. Opening it, I stare at an alphabetized list of countries within which, I quickly realize, the United States of America lies well submerged. I look at the system’s owner (a large hotel chain) and, because 95 percent of their hotels are in the USA, I estimate that the overwhelming majority of guests must be American. Have these people ever thought of another sequence like, perhaps, frequency of use? Or a combina- tion of frequency and alphabetical with the several most frequent possibilities at the top?

I guess not, I think, wondering if I should move to Australia to avoid this nonsense. “They’re getting even with you for living in Arizona,” you may be thinking, and this may be true. My friends in Illinois and Texas are double-whammed, however. Why do they clear one critical piece of information when they re-present a screen? With another hotel system, I encounter a “sorry, no room at this inn” for the days I’d

like to be there. I select a different hotel and glance at the booking screen. The dates I previously entered are still there as well as the room type. I click “send.” You didn’t tell us whether your trip was for business or pleasure, their error message sternly advises. (Can’t

I also have pleasure on a business trip, I wonder?) I glance at the top of the screen. The radio buttons designating business or pleasure have magically been cleared, but nothing else on the reservation screen has changed. If I’m looking for another hotel on the same dates as just a moment ago, would I now be doing it for business instead of pleasure (or vice versa), I wonder. Perhaps some hotels are only for business, others only for pleasure — a worthwhile subject for usability research...

Why do they give me a small command button and surround it by acres of white space? Are they afraid it might be too easy to find? Don’t they really want it pressed? Are they testing my perceptual-motors skills? Is an anorexic button beautiful? Have they ever heard of Fitts’ Law? Undoubtedly not!

542 Part 2: The User Interface Design Process