[Sigia-l] potential challenge to the dominance of the left nav bar in local navigation

[Samantha Bailey]

Great info, thanks.

Btw, I don't actually hold with the notion that local nav *should* always be
placed on the left or even that this is most usable (even wrote an article
questioning the origins of the practice way, way back:
http://www.webreview.com/1997/06_13/strategists/06_13_97_3.shtml)  but I do
think it's important to acknowledge that it has become, if not a defacto
standard than at least *very* commonly applied.

I'm most interested in this from the perspective that a long standing nav
convention on a major site is being altered to make way for a new approach
to marketing (even if that new approach is in mimicking the "old" print
world) and the implications that has for us as a UI designers. On the one
hand, having a big bag of tricks that includes the ability to be flexible in
the placement of nav so as to accommodate the variety of competing interests
on a website is commendable; on the other hand, the notion that navigation
is a component that can be moved willy nilly (and I'm not saying the folks
at NYT have done this, am more stating this strongly for sake of argument ;)
is one that I find, if not chilling, at least something I want to sit up and
pay attention to/think about.


Samantha Bailey
samantha at baileysorts.com | http://baileysorts.com



----- Original Message -----
From: "Luca Rosati" <l.rosati at kelyan.it>
To: "Samantha Bailey" <samantha at baileysorts.com>; "sigia-l"
<sigia-l at mail.asis.org>
Sent: Wednesday, February 05, 2003 10:59 AM
Subject: R: [Sigia-l] potential challenge to the dominance of the left nav
bar in local navigation


> Hi Samantha,
>
> In Boxes and Arrows, a few months ago, appeared an article about the
> redesign of Audi website. This the link
>
<http://www.boxesandarrows.com/archives/challenging_the_status_quo_audi_rede
> signed.php>
>
> Just regarding the main menu position, at the page 3 of the article, the
> author write:
>
> <blockquote>
> Though there is research about expectations of the location of page
elements
> in a layout, such research does not correlate breaking these expectations
> with actual usability (see: Michael Bernard,
> http://www.internettg.org/newsletter/dec00/article_bernard.html and Jakob
> Nielsen, http://www.useit.com/alertbox/991114.html). That is, while users
> normally anticipate a left-hand navigation, positioning the navigation
> elsewhere does not necessarily result in usability problems.
>
> Don Norman's concept of affordance -the perceived properties of a thing
that
> determine how it is to be used -seems to be a better predictor of
usability
> than conforming to standards or matching patterns to user expectations.
With
> the Audi site, it is clear what is navigation and what is not. Users can
> build a pattern of interaction with the site immediately. Our findings
show
> users have no problem distinguishing a right-justified navigation and tend
> to make generalizations about its function.
>
> </blockquote>
> cf.
>
<http://www.boxesandarrows.com/archives/challenging_the_status_quo_audi_rede
> signed.php?page=3>
>
> I tend to agree to that point of view.
> I think the Normanian concept of *affordance* is more effectiveness than
> heuristics (expectations of the location of page elements in a layout).
> Also for me (and my little experience) the crucial point is not the users
> expectations, but the user capability to recognize an element as what it
is,
> by its function (*prceived affordance*).
>
> I wrote about that a short article, but - sorry - it's in italian:
> <http://www.idearium.it/nuke/article.php?sid=101>
>
> Ciao, Luca
>
>
>
> > -----Messaggio originale-----
> > Da: sigia-l-admin at asis.org [mailto:sigia-l-admin at asis.org]Per conto di
> > Samantha Bailey
> > Inviato: mercoledì 5 febbraio 2003 16.49
> > A: sigia-l
> > Oggetto: [Sigia-l] potential challenge to the dominance of the left nav
> > bar in local navigation
> >
> >
> > Just came across this on Tomalak and think it's worth paying attention
to
> > from an IA/ID and UI perspective. The critical point to note is that
they
> > are changing their UI to accommodate this (this being an effort
> > to give more
> > screen real estate to ads, similar to in the print world).
> > According to the
> > article the plan is to move their local nav from the left to the top. If
> > this proves successful it could have a significant impact on the defacto
> > conventions that have grown up around the left nav (and if it's not
> > successful that could also suggest that the left nav dominance in
> > UI design
> > is really here to stay, although that's a bit more of a reach).
> >
> > Wall Street Journal: New York Times' Web Site Plans Print-Like Ad
Format.
> > The New York Times' Web site will begin displaying half-page
> > magazine-style
> > ads adjacent to its articles, making its online pages appear more
similar
> > to their print counterparts.
> > http://online.wsj.com/article_email/0,,SB1044045107442450944,00.html
> >
> > Thoughts?
> >
> >
> > Samantha Bailey
> > samantha at baileysorts.com | http://baileysorts.com
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ------------
> > When replying, please *trim your post* as much as possible.
> > *Plain text, please; NO Attachments
> >
> > ASIST IA 03 Summit: Making Connections
> > http://www.asist-events.org/IASummit2003/
> >
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