[Sigia-l] OK/Cancel madness..and other ergonmic issues.

[Lee Hsieh]

imo, any 'decision making' functions on the screen should follow patterns used in other common devices(eg, back/forward, previous/next, < undo...). this also follows the pattern, at least in western hemisphere, to read left>right, top>bottom and the action for moving forward at the end of the page would be in the farthest lower right while actions for stopping/going back would be to the left.

For those of you suffering wrist/shoulder pains while using the mouse, you might want to check out an 'Air' mouse.  Logitech makes a really nice one and it's great for general surfing and releasing your hand from a fixed position.  Also recommend swithing mouse usage between left/right hands throughout the day.  It really helps a lot and doesnt take much practice to get the hang of it with your non-dominant hand.  Invsting in a good chair and adjustable-height desk also helps.  Steelcase has one with a treadmill!

Lee


sigia-l-request at asis.org wrote:

> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 3
> Date: Fri, 9 Nov 2007 08:42:12 -0500
> From: "Matthew Nish-Lapidus" <mattnl at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Sigia-l] OK/Cancel madness [was Canberra IA Cocktail
> 	Hour]
> To: "Jonathan Baker-Bates" <Jonathan.Baker-Bates at lbi.com>
> Cc: sigia l <sigia-l at asis.org>
> Message-ID:
> 	<5b242f430711090542x7e243a8dyd0b168bbb76485f2 at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
> 
> Or, when you absolutely need to confirm an action, why OK and Cancel?
> How did Cancel become the opposite of OK anyway?
> 
> I'd take a page from Mac OS and actually label the buttons with
> choices that make sense.  Save/Don't Save, Continue/Stop/Don't
> Continue, Quit/Don't Quit, Delete/Don't Delete .... those options make
> a lot more sense than a generic OK/Cancel.
> 
> As for placement, I tend to believe in putting the positive action on
> the side that's closer to the edge of the window/area and highlighting
> it.  It could be either right or left depending on the alignment of
> the buttons on the screen.  Either way, it's easier for a user to hit
> a button that's close to the edge than one that's sort of randomly
> aligned in the window, people tend to automatically go to the edges of
> a window.
>