Regarding the discussion of the Web, it is often due to the meaning of the vocabulary used. Although people can more or less, no one can accurately define what is web design. Some issues are often discussed, such as visual design and programming, but about their importance in Web design, they are benevolent, and wise is witnessed. Do not talk about visualization and technology, many people think that the creation and organization of Web site content is the most important aspect of web design. With the rise of e-commerce, business considerations have also become an important aspect of the successful design of the site.
For specific projects, all disciplines and other cross-disciplines representing the main aspects of Web design may be needed. Due to many disciplines, such as book intelligence, graphics, programming, client / server technology, user interface design, availability, and other disciplines, Web design has substantially contain many disciplines.
Although we can consider the impact from more than a dozen areas, the four main aspects of Web design are: content, technology, look and economy. The purpose of the content is to tell or persuade users; the purpose of using technology is to achieve reasonable functions; the consideration of appearance provides the form of sites; for most sites, it is necessary to consider the economic benefits of the site. If there is no clear goals and benefits, it is generally not established in this site. Of course, the appearance of the site varies depending on its type. A personal homepage does not consider economic benefits like sites on the site of the mall, and the internal network of a manufacturing company will not consider appearance effect like public network, such as using animation techniques. Because design principles have a big change with the nature of the site, it is difficult to consider the Web design as a whole.
The metaphor of the Web site is a pyramid is very image. The content is the brick block of the building pyramid, and the foundation is based on the appearance and technology, which depends largely on the economic benefits of website construction. As a web designer, we should do our best to design it, but the entire process will be very difficult. The continuous update of Web technology makes the design website challenging, it requires joint operations and a thorough understanding of web media. Even if we are web design experts, we can build a beautiful and practical site, users may also be confused when they face our work. Web designers often spend a lot of time to consider their own needs rather than understand the needs of users. Our web pyramid concept seems to be like a pyramid like a real brick structure - a unplexile grave - so that users can't find the door very confused. Does the user understand the point of the site? Although the difficulties encountered by web development are different from the challenges encountered by the ancient Egyptian, it is not a very easy thing to build a practical, delightful and able to accept the internet era.
It is difficult to establish a web site. Although some core technologies such as H T M L is easy to master, developers will still make a lot of mistakes. This is mainly due to the lack of developers' experience, the chaos of the process and the unrealistic schedule. Because time limitations and lack of experience, developers often take extremes, do not consider subsequent steps, and attempting to be in place, directly. For example, some web professionals start building a site directly from the appearance. Try to do a page with a visual design tool before considering the next step, resulting in the design page colorful, looks like a beautiful brochure. Today some sites that pay attention to the appearance effect are often developed with Macromedia Flash, and their effect is like playing some movie heads, but not introducing the movie. In addition to displaying the skills of the creator's design, this kind of realization of site goals is all helpless. For those famous sites, this may be its intention, but what about other types of sites? Those sites that are first considering the appearance effect often difficult to update, in addition to the dazzling effect, there is no main technology, lack of function, and the speed of download is extremely slow. Many people refer to this site called brochure software (B R O C H U R e W A) or title software (I N T R O W A R E), mainly because the functions of these sites are not more rich than those brochures, entertainment software or movies. Of course, another extreme case is to focus on implementation technologies, and those sites are the latest and best technologies, but usually lack a whole design. The appearance looks very awkward, and the interface is also very confusing. Sometimes these sites take a design way known as "Christmas Tree". Once the basic function is achieved, the developer has begun like a Christmas tree with a color ball or paper-cut, and do everything you can use G i F picture to modify the page, and finally it is in vain. In this case, the appearance is relatively secondary position. Similarly, in the case of "appearance first", technology is used to show the developer's skill rather than meeting the needs of the user. Too much to use Java Applet and plug-in and require the browser to support the latest version of D h T M L, X M L or C S S, which is a "technology first" sign. The pursuit of "technology first" site attempts to use unique design, using the latest version of browser, often lack support for site functions.
1.3 design for user
As mentioned above, a mistake in WE B is often designed for designers, and the designer's needs are considered rather than actual users. If the designer ignores the user's needs, the process model cannot guarantee the quality of a site. Be sure to remember the important principle of WE B design:
Rules: Designers are not users.
The designer is not understood by the user. As a designer, you have direct knowledge of WE B sites. Where do you know where information is and how to install insert. You have the optimal screen resolution and browser settings, and more. You have to accept the following facts, many users don't understand your seriously designed sites like you, and their interest is even different from you. Taking into account the importance of users' interest and expectations, the surface directly allows users to design as if they hope. It is appropriate. But if you take into account another basic principle, then it is not a good idea:
Rules: Users are not designers.
Not anyone is or must be a WE B designer. Just like the film viewer to guide a movie according to the movie to guide a movie, only because the user browses the many sites, the idea they can design the site is stupid. Users often have a lot of unrealistic questions and expectations about sites. Users will not consider some part of the WE B site separately. In short, users do not have a comprehensive understanding of WE B as designers. That is to say, the key to successful and easy-to-use WE B design is to think about it from the perspective of users. Use the user-centric design requirements to place the user first. But what can we talk about users? Is there a typical user? Is there a representative Internet user, and should we design a site for him? May not, but we should consider general features when designing sites, such as response time, memory, and other cognitive and physical capabilities. Review of cognitive science helps us understand the basic ability of users, which will be discussed in Chapter 3. Remember, the user has a commonality when it is common. Things that look simple to a user can be difficult to another user. Designing sites with commonly owned users may not meet all users' requirements. A powerful user may feel that there is too much restriction, and novice will feel too difficult. Users are individuals with certain common capabilities and features. When the site focuses on commonality, it should also consider personalities, as indicated by the principles of the following. Rules: For the user's common design, it should be considered different.
Benefits and availability
A good WE B site is useful for users. Validity includes two meanings: usefulness and availability. Useful means that the site is potentially meet the needs of user needs. Availability refers to a specific target by means of a user's operation through a site. For example, consider a site that provides online banking services. If it provides the ability such as balance of payment balance inspection, transfer, fund payment, etc., it can be said to be useful. However, the site may also fail completely, and it provides the function that may be confusing and unable to use. Obviously, if a site cannot work properly, or if it is very bad or even there is an error, it is not a good site. The efficiency of the available sites is very high, easy to learn, satisfactory when the user's goals are realized, and there will be no errors.
1.7 appearance problem
Although a good site must have a good feature and a simple navigation system, these features cannot be recognized immediately. The appearance of the site is often the first to be noticed. Although a good taste is impossible to force, it is almost impossible to predict, but we know that good web design is directly related to the taste of the site appearance, and the first impression depends on the online site. As shown in Figure 1 - 6, users do not require any pre-knowledge, it may subjectively think that the second site (front end) is more worth browsing than the first one. The appearance of the site will affect the user's views on the site. The appearance site will be subjectively considered to be better than the difference in appearance, at least the first eye is this. Therefore, there is a rule:
Rules: The appearance will significantly affect the value of the site when the user begins.
Note that the appearance may be important in obtaining user trust, this is very important in online transactions. Consider which site you will choose to trade in situations you choose to do. Remember, trust is not only related to the site, but also to the initial impression of third party recognition or the company's reputation.
Comprehensive impression value
The appearance is important, but when the user continues to use, it will gradually reduce the attention of the appearance. When a user leaves a site, he will have a comprehensive impression - the general feeling of the site access is successful. In general, this feeling may be positive, negative or neutral. Consider a case that users hate a site. Why does this cause this? Does the user find it difficult for the site? Is the site access speed very slow? Is the site runs very bad or often wrong? Whether the site is designed very bad? Any one of the above can lead to a negative evaluation of the site when leaving. It may be initially affected by the appearance, and the final impression is from content, appearance, technology, and availability. Comprehensive impression values may be largely related to whether users have achieved destination during access. In this way, although the appearance is dominant in the first impression, the resulting impression is complicated, and it can be reviewed as the following rules: Rules: The integrated impression of the site is integrated with the extent, content, technology, usability, and user satisfaction. influences.
Although the comprehensive impression value is not just including the user's appearance evaluation of the site, this does not reduce the importance of WE B look, color, background, text, image, and page style can be used to increase the performance of the page. Users who do not support graphic browsing and computer environments do not talk about, and the visual effect is destined to be more interesting. Don't focus on site-specific appearances or those that can be downloaded, just consider which more pleasing at the abstract level. Even if the design is more than content, function or fast download, it should also be pleasant in the design, so as not to fail. If the graph is not important, why is the information system -g o p h e r on the primary Internet in the early Internet? G o P h e r is easily used, supporting hyperlink connections, with rich content. But because it does not support graphics, the appearance is very bad, so it is soon being transcended by WE B. Although there are some radical molecules to think that we b is excessively decorated with buttons, backgrounds, and graphic elements, if not, WE B will appear very dull, lack of vitality. WE B can be designed or designed for art, on the same site, different pages have different purposes, and thus require different appearances. Of course, excessively emphasize differences will affect availability. In this way, designers should consider adopting consistent page styles, sizes for easy browsing. Text style also affects the availability of the page. In the past, due to the limitations of WE B technology, the text control is limited, and new technologies such as C s s provide more control. Basically, the use of graphics, color and background is largely affected by the user's experience. For example, the abuse of the graphic affects the speed of WE B, even with low-bandwidth design principles, the situation may become very bad, such as color and images that cannot be displayed properly, which will not preview the user. Although the appearance of the site will greatly affect the user's evaluation, be sure to pay attention to only focus on the appearance. A user who likes or does not like a site has many reasons, such as from simple taste to content. If you are not interested in the ski board, you may have a high appearance of the Snow Snowboard. Similarly, some people may not be interested in your Rose Garden. Further, if the graph is pleasing, their performance is very bad or downloaded, and the user will still not like it. Remember the class ratio of the pyramid, you can't focus on a certain aspect of the built.
1.8 Form and function balance
The key issue for Web site design is the balance between forms and functions. Under the influence of modernism, many designers insist on the form of things to meet its functionality. Considering that the form is one of the foundation of the WE B pyramid, the function is one of the other foundations. A bad function is troublesome. Site may run very well, but you can't stimulate users' inspiration. In contrast, if the fruit is in form, it is limited, and the user will be disappointed. There is a clear and continuous relationship between forms and functions. Simply put, the form of the site should be directly related to its intent, if the site is commercial, its appearance may be very beautiful, and there is a considerable amount of multimedia content, if these content can help achieve our goals. Conversely, if the site is simple things, such as online banking, it may pay more attention to practical forms. Of course, it is necessary to determine the suitability of the site, require clear definition of the functionality of the site. Unfortunately, most WE B sites cannot be well understood, and unable to clearly link the form of sites with features. The contradiction between forms (art) and function (technologies) may continue, although the only position of designers is designed for users. The form and function are not necessarily contradictory. In most time, they have complementarity. A good design will make the site more features, however, too many features will cause the appearance and feeling. Considering the portal, a portal, such as Ya H O O!, E x c i t e or other large-scale e-commerce sites. These sites have their commonality, specific appearance, but no website will only depend on a certain aspect of appearance or technology. However, some designers regardless of the importance of balance, and the graphical user interface principles used by WE B are tidy, lack of creative and commercial strategies. If all sites are consistent, how can I remember a site and help build the company's brand? For the highly critical consistency of availability, they will return to the market. For commercial considerations, designers want to create differences between different sites - inconsistency is the market for evokes to pay attention. However, what should be different? Consider a true clothes: Yes should make the luggage rack, door handle, cash, or the fitting room is different from other stores, or should it focus on the difference between the clothes itself? Although every part of the store will deepen the impression of the store, the answer is still obvious, the difference in clothes is the most critical. WE B is completely, should not focus on small pieces of graphical user interface - they are just interface, but should pay attention to content and tasks. However, in most cases, designers try to build a brand of sites through unusual interfaces. Rule: Do not use the interface to build a brand.
It is impossible to create a brand with a button. How can they remember the shape, color or action of the button? User Access Site is not to express tribute to the button you designed, but to achieve the user's purpose. WE B design should not ignore this fact.
