Web 'Rules' Changing?

sempf writes "Lots of things have changed since we started this HTML. The IMAGE tag was a nice change, and multimedia with plugins like Flash provide a new look. What interests me the most, however, is the change in two of the hallowed GUI 'Rules' - the three click rule and the 7 +/- 2 rule. The Three click rule (which states that any page in a site or function in an application should be accessible in three clicks) was just debunked by Josh Porter in an article called Debunking the Three Click Rule. The 7 +/- 2 rule states that a user should never be presented with more than 5-9 choices at any given point in the site or application. James Kalbach has an excellent article debunking that rule at Dr. Dobb's Journal. Worried that there will be no more 'rules'? Never you mind - the Government has come up with New Rules for us to follow."

Comments

Rules?

[Pingular]

Never you mind - the Government has come up with New Rules for us to follow
It clearly states on the website that they're guidelines, not rules.

Re:Rules?

[Chalybeous]

It clearly states on the website that they're guidelines, not rules.

... and they're not all that new, either. I seem to recall that Jennifer Niederst wrote about government accessibility guidelines in her book, Web Design in a Nutshell (O'Reilly, 2001).
Not that I do much web design myself, but I bought this book instead of HTML for Dummies purely on the basis that I resented the idea of purchasing a book that implied I was stupid. I was actually pleasantly surprised that Niederst's book was written for the intelligent individual, at a level accessible to beginners.
Of course, I might be wrong - that book is about 40 miles away, in a box in my parents' attic, so I can't check to see if I remember right about any chapter on accessibility guidelines. But I liked it so much that I've gone on to buy O'Reilly books whenever I need a useful reference, like the time I considered switching to Linux. And when (if?) I get around to making a website, you can bet I'll be using WDiaN as my guide.

Anyhow, that went a little OT. YMMV, of course.

Rules

[Rumagent]

Imo, a good webpage should follow these two rules:

1. Have actual content.
2. Make content easily available.

But maybe I am just old...

Origins of 3-click rule...

[chhamilton]

The 3-click rule is actually based on a little math, and doesn't just come from nowhere. The question is this: given a finite number of leaves (end destinations), how should a menu be arranged to minimize the average amount of time required to access any leaf? The assumptions are that each 'menu' (level of the tree) takes the same amount of time to read/load/listen to, and that each final menu choice is equi-probable. Under these conditions, continuous optimization shows that a tree with exp(1) = 2.718... branches per node is optimal. Thus, the choice of 3 options per menu level is usually chosen.

Again, this rule is based on some fairly strict assumptions, and realistically, an optimal menu layout (in terms of minimizing clicks) may conflict with a logical menu layout (in terms of hierarchichal ordering).

Re:Different times.

[catenos]

If you can have at most three clicks... and only seven choices at each point... then your site can hold only 7 ** 3 == 343 pages!

Just for completeness: Your math is wrong.

With 3 clicks you have 4 levels. The first (which you see without clicks), and the three following. The maximum number of pages you can have, given that there are no cross-links is:

level 1: 1 page, links to 7 pages of level 2
level 2: 7 pages, links to 7*7=49 pages of level 3
level 3: 49 pages, links to 49*7=7^3=343 pages of level 4:
level 4: 343 pages, no links (3 clicks reached).
sum: 400 pages.

So your calculation was only for the 4th level alone.

Another side-note: Since the rule states 7+-2, you are allowed 9 links at most and so the overall maximum is: 1+9+81+729=820 pages.