[Sigia-l] tabbed design user test

[SilverioP at Cezannesw.com]

Hi Denise,
I suggest you to have a look at Steve Krug's book "Don't Make Me Think".
He devoted an entire chapter to tabs and how to design them.

Main guidelines:
Make default selected tab (the first you came across while visit the page for the first time) apparent.
Make current tab clearly visible and distinguishable from the others.
Use colors to separate contexts properly, especially for two-level hierarchies.
Do not use graphics for the parts of the tabs that varies from tab to tab to avoid download overheads.


Good examples:
http://www.amazon.com of course. Steve Krug found no defects on its tab strip.
http://mitsloan.mit.edu good use of colors, very good feedback. Potentially slower for low-band connections.
http://www.builder.com good use of colors, simple links as second level menu.

Not so good examples:
http://news.com.com good design but potentially slower to download for low-band users.
http://www.kataweb.it an Italian portal. Main tab strip graphically unrelated to content area. Double tab strip not always present, confusing user.
http://www.quicken.com No default tab.

Bad examples:
http://www.imdb.com No feedback about selected tab.

Hope this will help.

Rdgs

Silverio Petruzzellis
Information Architect
Product Management Team
Cézanne Software S.r.l.

http://www.cezannesw.com
mailto:silverio.petruzzellis at cezannesw.com
Tel.+39 0805498411 - Fax +39 0805498430 

Personal Weblog
http://www.zeligplace.com
mailto:zelig at zeligplace.com



-----Original Message-----
From: Smith, Denise (Hewitt) [mailto:denise.smith at idea.com] 
Sent: venerdì 6 dicembre 2002 17.13
To: 'sigia-l at asis.org'
Subject: [Sigia-l] tabbed design user test


Hi all! 

Its me again... 

I'm working with a client's usability person to design the tasks to go through a tabbed e-commerce design.  The tabs are basically for more information like product specs and awards. Any thoughts on problems that are currently known with tabbed designs I should include on my testing?

Thanks for the assist!

Denise Ereka Smith, Information Architect
Idea Integration
Phone: 713.353.4320
Fax: 713.626.2792
E-mail: denise.smith at idea.com


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