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What Makes a Good Web Design?
Grand Master Math asks: "I'm currently redesigning my website and I have checked out tons of various web sites, gone from link to link, etc...to find the best web design techniques, layouts, and features. Wow Web Designs proved to be a pretty useful site, as it showcased virtually 'the best of the web' in design and creativity. I was wondering what the Slashdot community has to say about web design and what the best web design should implement and address. From browser compatibility, to simplicity and complexity, and customization to user interaction, what should a perfect web design incorporate?"
Too often, people get too gadgety when they design software. Keep it as simple and as direct as the functionality and purpose of the site allows you to. Gimmicks are worthless. The best web designs get out of the way and promote the presentation of their content. Once you've taken into account the structure of your content, half the battle is over.
Whats more important?
The "look" of the website, or the "content"?
Glammer up garbage, and its still garbage. Glammer up content and you've got a blockbuster site.
Just a tidbit to think about when redesigning.
BTW - Cliff, you realize that this is a "need hits on my website" article dressed in "AskSlashdot" clothes, right?
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Good web design is like good music or good writing. It's only good insofar as it meets the desires and expectations of the audience. My wife and I think Son Seals and Koko Taylor are The S**t. The 18 year old young women in our WSD are bored with them. They like (boring, rhytmless, tuneless :-) techno.
Some people LIKE lots of Flash, animated buttons and dancing bologna on the screen. I like clean and simple. Each is appropriate for different tasks.
The question is, as always, "What problem are you trying to solve?"
The man who never alters his opinion is like the stagnant water and breeds Reptiles of the Mind -- William Blake
Don't EVER put music or other noise on your web page that plays without user interaction. There is nothing wrong with a button that says "play" but if you make noise happen as soon as the page loads then your page sucks and I don't care how pretty or useful it is otherwise, I will close it immediately and never load it again.
The problem is, just which page is making the noise?
You really can't go wrong if your website follows those three principles. There are hardware concerns, too (make sure your servers and your connection is up to the expected task).
Light a fire for a man and he'll be warm for a day. Light a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
1. World Wide Web Consortium is thy God. Thou shalt have no other gods.
2. Flash is evil, and of the devil. Flash is blaspemy.
3. Javascript can be useful for on-page functions that don't necessarily require a server call, but remember your page still still fundamentally work with no javascript enabled.
4. Images should be used for illustrative purposes, not to show you found a neat image and *never* as a background.
5. Images should be small and reduced to webpage resolutions.
6. Content shouldn't be laborous to read. Black on white text is the best, but at least always make sure to use contrasting colors.
7. Style sheets should always be used (see number 1) but make sure that necessary style pairings (such as colored tables and the text within) are defined in the same scope. A page-declared table color and text/css file declared table text color could cause problems if your style sheet file doesn't load.
8. Design for non-compliant brower protocols *only* if your business depends on it. Private sites should *always* be written to the HTML specs (see #1) all browsers be damned.
9. Do not covet they neighbors hyperlinks. Links should be used in *context* and not in a random listing. Don't say "you can find a link about greyhound adoption *here*." Instead, write either "There is a lot of information about *greyhound adoption*" or "*Greyhound Puppies Inc* has a lot of information about greyhound adoption." All of this results in a page more useable by non-traditional browsers. (see number 1)
10. If you change the color of links, you should make sure that the default colors (blue, purple, red) will show up on your site. Another reason not to use picture backgrounds. Also, don't ever *ever* reverse the color scheme... cool (blue-like) colors for unvisited links, purple or red-like (hot) colors for visited links.
Frankly, I think you're asking the wrong crowd.
Of all computer users, the Linux crowd is the least qualified to comment about design. Oh sure, there are exceptions, both among Linux users and among Slashdot readers, but just read the comments that have already been posted. The common thread is that people wouldn't want to sacrifice content for a flashy web site, and that just shows their ignorance. These people don't realize that good design does not involve compromizes. Good design is about presenting the content in such a manner that the appearance enhances the content presentation, not distracts from it.
Besides, look at the state of 99% of Linux software, especially the open source stuff. User interfaces are the last concern of the developers. It's obvious to me that the majority of Linux developers and users really don't care, or just don't know anything about, good design. But, I guess I should cut them some slack, since it's very hard to be a good programmer and a good designer. Yet I'm disappointed that most developers don't try to get good design ideas from others.
So yes, Virginia, you can have your cake and eat it too, provided that the web site is designed by a real graphic designer. Such an individual has both training and experience in creating designs that work.
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
Especially since you NEVER need to use frames
I dispute that: there's a certain very well-defined set of circumstances in which using a frameset is beneficial. Although I agree that 99% of the frameset usage on the web is inappropriate, in certain circumstances framesets can be used for efficient navigation and still look good - the main advantage of frames is that they only need loading once - it's a frivolous waste of bandwidth to put the same graphical navigation bar on each page, for example (not that I'm a huge fan of graphical navbars).
Still, the rule for frames is: If in doubt, don't use them.
The difference is that you can make links open in a new windows by control-clicking (or whatever) on them. But if the developer forces all links to open in a new window, how do I (who doesn't want a new window) make it not open in a new window? I can't -- the developer has overridden that option.
To provide the user with choice (which is one of the most important things that a website developer can do), it's important to not force particular UI styles on users. Give them choices. In this case, the only way to do that is by not opening links in a new window.
-Waldo Jaquith