01 July, 2008
Please, when designing UI's make the most important things on a page so you don't have to scroll for them. Not everyone has giant screens, and even for those of us who are lucky enough to be rocking the world at giant resolutions, we may not like to have the browser maxed out to the full screen resolution.
Think of the actions on the page and group everything so you don't have to max out your browser window to reach the most used elements on the page. For example, I'm typing this post in wordpress, and arguably the most important things are giving it a title, content, then saving it right ? Nice and easy your eye follows a visual flow, and you didn't have to go for the scroll bar.
Blue - common eye track/data entry path
Red - mouse movements
Now lets refine the thinking a little more. Same deal with gmail, open it up, compose a message. Notice there's two send buttons, one at the top of the page not more than 100-200px away from the compose email link ? So where you last clicked was likely exceedingly close to where you need to click next. OR if you happen to be writing a novel and have scrolled to the bottom, you don't have to scroll back up to the top, as there's a send button there also.
Now, try posting a message in Basecamp without scrolling - and without cheating by having lots of vertical pixels. If you're running a giant screen size drop your browser down size to what mere mortals use, notice the distance from where you clicked on messages, to the send button ? (Particularly if you've got a couple of companies of contacts to click through!)
Do more than a couple of messages a day and question to yourself, why is arguably the least important things in a message (milestone, attachment) taking up valuable real estate forcing me to scroll.
No one likes a bitchfest, so being a little constructive - why not use that blank space on the right of the message pane to pick your people and send. Even better, have the people field as a text entry area with auto complete items to cut down on clicks. Keep all the important functions clustered above the fold and cut down on the scroll and click!
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