No left turn!
11 Oct 2010 - 1:33pm
9 replies
365 reads
russwilson
2005
Would love thoughts on this: http://uitrends.com/2010/10/11/no-left-turn/
- Russ
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Hi Russ,
your given scenario and your reasoning seems a little bit far-fetched to me. Basically, you miss that the information to be processed does not only consist of the signage but of the whole environment plus the signage. Hence, this type of signage is actually simply applying pragmatics (in the linguistic sense), i.e.: inform about the significant deviation from the default/obvious (see also: information theory), and not about everything that can safely be assumed to be present in a person's mind or lying open before her eyes/senses. You do see the roads you could turn into when driving, don't you? ;-) The result is actually less cognitive load and therefore: good UI practice.
Cheers,
Sascha
On Mon, Oct 11, 2010 at 21:07, russwilson wrote: > Would love thoughts on this: http://uitrends.com/2010/10/11/no-left-turn/ > [1] > > - Russ > > > (
Hi Russ,
In a road intersection, a "no left turn" sign is typically used when the road cannot be physically blocked off to prevent drivers from turning left because it is used by cross traffic, or it's a driveway to a private road.
Can you give examples where similar parameters exist in a digital interface/platform? When would you instruct a user not to do something rather than exclude the option to do domething they shouldn't?
I agree with Russ. In a digital experience, why would you present an option to the user only to tell them not to choose that option? An elegant design will only present options that are available to the user.It can be argued that users might expect certain functions that they can't use, and those should be displayed as "grayed out". While I am not strongly opposed to to this, I think it lacks elegance. A better solution is to design the UI and create a context that sets the appropriate expectations for users.
My first impressions would include errors-after-the-fact, such as a field in a form which shouldn't be filled out by certain users, but not being alerted until they Submit, or perhaps instructions like "Passwords should be only alpha-numeric" vs. "Passwords should not contain special characters".
But! these seem, I don't know...really obvious?
There may be more to the premise, but I think it needs more elaboration instead of others having to speculate what it means.
Scott
On Wed, Oct 13, 2010 at 11:32 AM, Rez wrote: > Hi Russ, > > In a road intersection, a "no left turn" sign is typically used when the > road cannot be physically blocked off to prevent drivers from turning left > because it is used by cross traffic, or it's a driveway to a private road. > > Can you give examples where similar parameters exist in a digital > interface/platform? When would you instruct a user not to do something > rather than exclude the option to do domething they shouldn't? > > > >
This website may contain a virus... You can do it... But it is not a good idea.
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On Oct 13, 2010, at 12:02 PM, Rez wrote:
> Hi Russ, > > In a road intersection, a "no left turn" sign is typically used when the road cannot be physically blocked off to prevent drivers from turning left because it is used by cross traffic, or it's a driveway to a private road. > > Can you give examples where similar parameters exist in a digital interface/platform? When would you instruct a user not to do something rather than exclude the option to do domething they shouldn't? > >
> >
What exactly is the UI equivalent of a No Left Turn sign?
It feels like we're arguing about a metapnor that doesn't have a ui design equivalent.
Hey Jared - that's a really great point! The nearest I think we can get is here: http://www.getpcmemory.com/pics/windows_xp_installation_format_warning.gif
As UX specialists, we can only really create affordances for our users, but why would we purposely create one that would lead someone "down the wrong direction of a one-way street"? Even in what is probably the only equivalent of a car crash - reformatting your hard drive - there might be a good reason to do it, so we allow it.
//Bill
Hi --
I am going to take a completely different spin on "no left turn" here. Check out the software that UPS created literally called "No Left Turn" -- which helped them to improve their bottom line (see http://www.wired.com/autopia/2007/12/no-left-turn-so/).
In short, you might "literally" have a reason to force people to not take a left turn. For UPS, it saved them a bundle. Plus, they marketed this software design as being green in the Sustainability section of their Annual Report.
OK, it is not a UI or software reason. I am going to call it a business reason for "no left turn", though.
Thanks, Brian
-----Original Message----- From: ixdaor@host.ixda.org [mailto:ixdaor@host.ixda.org] On Behalf Of smitty777 Sent: Friday, October 15, 2010 9:37 AM To: Sullivan, Brian Subject: Re: [IxDA] No left turn!
Hey Jared - that's a really great point! The nearest I think we can get is
here: http://www.getpcmemory.com/pics/windows_xp_installation_format_warning.gif
[1]
As UX specialists, we can only really create affordances for our users, but
why would we purposely create one that would lead someone "down the wrong
direction of a one-way street"? Even in what is probably the only
equivalent of a car crash - reformatting your hard drive - there might be a
good reason to do it, so we allow it.
//Bill
(((P
Hey Jared - that's a really great point! The nearest I think we can get is here: http://www.getpcmemory.com/pics/windows_xp_installation_format_warning.gif
As UX specialists, we can only really create affordances for our users, but why would we purposely create one that would lead someone "down the wrong direction of a one-way street"? Even in what is probably the only equivalent of a car crash - reformatting your hard drive - there might be a good reason to do it, so we allow it.
//Bill