[Sigia-l] DHTML Menus and Usability

[David Heller]

>> David Heller wrote: Users understand menus.

>The axiom is: Users TOLERATE menus.

Paula, how can you say this in this way. I totally disagree and
completely disagree,and since you give no explanation I have to infer
that you don't have anything to back it up with.

I just did testing ... Users UNDERSTAND menus and more importantly are
successful at using them. The word tolerate means nothing if toleration
means that they find their actions and information and still feel that
they are in an enjoyable space, which is the results of my recent tests.

What doesn't work is the creation of menu taxonomies that are made up
w/o any previous context. But the reality is that 20 years of File Edit
View has trained almost every user who works on a computer how to use
menus. I've actually had users ASK for menus.

Look, menus aren't perfect in their standard ID as we know them. There
are better models to work with and I wouldn't use menus in any
information based application at this point, but an interactive
web-based desktop app? Please ... It is more than fine it is necessary.

-- Dave