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thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you
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Every single mediocre in a big company creates "guide" how he sees the UI. Lots of 'em. But UI is a very specific to application, so you cannot give "universal advice - every case should be considered.
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Agreed. But that doesn't mean that every application is free to do it whichever way the developer chooses: In many professional areas, there are established ways for how to do things across a number of competing alternatives. Sort of like a "GUI professional terminology" - if you want to change that terminology you should be fully aware of that and do it with a clear intent.
My honest opinion is that one major reason why *nix failed on the desktop was that developers more or less completely ignored conventions and terminology, and made things the way the programmer thought would be some great idea, without ever asking professionals for their opinion (or if he did, ignoring their answers). Advanced users didn't feel at home; the application didn't "think" the way they did as professionals.
So, take the freedom to listen to domain experts. Don't take the freedom not listening to domain experts.
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I-net is full of such "UI guides", I don't know what a problem topic starter has.  But looking at his questions (where to place controls) he is not even googled it.
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Maybe he was asking for wisdom. Not just google matches.
If you do not distinguish between wisdom and google hits, then you are like that capitalist who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.
When I ask for advice from a person, I am asking for that person's experience, knowledge, judgements and wisdom. Not for his google hits.
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Wisdom?? LOL! So he is so lazy not even googling proper articles, but expects somebody will waste time on creating article? It's at least naive, at most it's stupid. It's too wide topic to ask in this place.
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To me, the epitome of lazyness is "helping" someone by telling them "Just google it!"
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Just like building a building... Form follows function.
Lets say a user has to enter 12 pieces of data. That data comes to them from 3 sources.
I would think that grouping the inputs according to source MIGHT make sense.
I do not believe there is a one size fits all answer. Look at PowerPoint, Excel, and Word. Similar GUI interfaces, and radically different GUI Interfaces at the same time. Put a formula in a table in word. you can do it. Much hard than a formula in a cell in Excel.
Here are some things to consider:
1) What the users want
2) Who the users are
3) Why does the software exist (Hint: to make someones life easier/better=>It's about people)
4) Is it clear what is expected
5) More people are Color Blind than you realize (like myself)
6) How often is it used? (a nice click sound is great on confirmation. But not on confirmation of something that I have to do 1,000 times a day, every day. Imagine a Whoot Whoot sound played on a McDonalds screen after every order is entered. Then imagine a busy lunch with 4 registers going at once)
7) Use it yourself, LIKE your user would
8) use it half way, walk away, come back (like you got interrupted), and figure out how to complete it.
Finally, it is as much art as science. And it also depends on the Platform, and the device.
Many things work fine on a PC screen, suck on a mobile screen, impossible on a DOS screen, horrible on a paper terminal (for those of us who have been through all of them).
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I haven't read all of the replies, so please forgive me if I'm repeating others.
My one overarching general principle is, "maintain the context".
There is nothing worse than being in the middle of a process and forgetting why you're there and what choices you've made.
So, for left-to-right I keep the highlighted context queues on the left and the detail on the right.
For right-to-left, the context is on the right.
For top-to-bottom, the context is on the top.
That kind of eye-flow, that parallels the natural way people read, helps keep the experience intuitive and minimizes user stress.
Oh yeah! In my experience it doesn't happen very often these days, but use contrasting colors for text and background. There is nothing more aggravating than being unable read text that blends into the background like yellow on line green for example.
Good luck to you!
Cheers,
Mike Fidler
"I intend to live forever - so far, so good." Steven Wright
"I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met." Also Steven Wright
"I'm addicted to placebos. I could quit, but it wouldn't matter." Steven Wright yet again.
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See About Face - The Essentials of User Interface Design by Alan Cooper
https://www.amazon.com/About-Face-Essentials-Interface-Design/dp/1568843224
See also Balsamiq - a reasonably decent UI prototyping app at www.balsamiq.com
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Years ago both Microsoft and IBM developed concepts for intuitive interfaces. However, it was Apple Corporation that made interface design into an art form.
With the exception of Apple, developers in the Microsoft and IBM communities appeared to go their own ways as to how to best design an intuitive interface.
I do not know about the IBM side of things but when everyone was demanding standards back in the 1990s Microsoft did attempt to satisfy this demand by promoting a number of standards for development of applications, including design concepts for the interface of graphical applications. Then suddenly the Microsoft Development Community turned on Microsoft making the claim that the company was now trying to dominate the industry.
In any event, user interface design concepts were made available in a variety of ways.
The links below will give you an idea as to what standards were being promoted and most likely are still quite relevant to today's development efforts... (an article on Apple design is the 3rd link)
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms997506.aspx
http://web.cs.wpi.edu/~matt/courses/cs563/talks/smartin/int_design.html
https://developer.apple.com/design/tips/
To research this design area further enter the following search terms into your preferred search engine... common user interface design
Steve Naidamast
Sr. Software Engineer
Black Falcon Software, Inc.
blackfalconsoftware@outlook.com
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Curious to see if IBM's "Common User Access" is available online, I came across a historical version, dated 1989: CUA Basic Interface Design Guide[^], from the age of monospaced fonts, before screen dumps were commonplace so figures are either drawn by hand (drafters did have that steady hand! I am envious!) or drawn by a pen plotter. My printed version from the early 90s has real screen dumps(!) from both Windows, IBM and Motiv - even illustrations in color!
I find in fascinating digging into the "historical" stuff, seeing what we have forgotten and thrown away, and asking why we abandoned it - maybe that was the right decison, maybe we should have kept it.
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I needed to inspect an area of my bathroom that I can't get my head near - I've got a smell of mould and I can't find the source - so I had a brilliant idea: connect my webcam to the WookieTab and use it as a remote camera. The default Win 10 UWP Camera app worked brilliantly, and I was able to see what was under-and-behind things.
But when I wanted to review / delete the footage, can I find it? No, not at all. A quick Google told me why...
When you record Video on a Win10 machine, does it put it in the default Video folder? Nope.
Straight in Documents? Nope.
Does it tell you where it stores it? Nope.
Can you find out in the app? Nope, it opens Settings which also won't tell you ... but will let you change it.
So where does it store video? Under the "Pictures" folder, in a directory called "Camera Roll". With all the static images.
Microsoft! Get your asses together - you created a "Videos" folder and a separate "Pictures" folder for me so bl**dy well use the right one!
Sorry, sorry. Just this continual absence of any form of logical thinking, or oversight in Win10 winds me up each time I try anything new... 
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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OriginalGriff wrote: Win 10 UWP Camera app worked brilliantly
At this point I was sure you made all this up...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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What can I say?
I plugged the Logitech C920 into a USB port, typed "Camera" into cortana and ran the app.
Pressed the "video" button, pressed "record" and started waving the camera into inhospitable places.
It worked, right out of the box for the first time.
Then the problems started...
I think that's my problem with MS: some excellent ideas, but don't always make sure they work properly (or indeed at all in some cases); and can't admit "we made a mistake" and throw away the cr@p ideas even when the evidence that it was a mistake is overwhelming.
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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OriginalGriff wrote: I think that's my problem with MS: some excellent ideas, but don't always make sure they work properly (or indeed at all in some cases); and can't admit "we made a mistake" and throw away the cr@p ideas even when the evidence that it was a mistake is overwhelming.
You got it all wrong. Its intentional. It's just an extension of Microsoft's Programmer Works Initiative. The general idea of the PMI is to pick stupid defaults, so stupid that even a brain damaged chimp would get them right. This creates a need for more MS stack programmers to write code to work around the stupidity, helping to build and maintain a developer base by keeping them gainfully employed. Naturally, they've extended it to the apps themselves as a way of enriching the MS app ecosystem and keeping MS app developers gainfully employed.
I caught onto it 20+ years ago when I first started working with MS tools. They've been unwaveringly consistent since then, keeping me gainfully employed adding workarounds for their stupid defaults. My hat's off to MS and the PMI.. thanks folks 
Yeah, yeah,. I know there's no such thing as the PMI.. it just fits so well.
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And this weeks prize for "conspiracy theory of the week" goes to ... 
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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Is it really a conspiracy if you benefit from it? 
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Now try looking at the "Libraries" in Explorer. Both the "Camera Roll" and "Saved Pictures" folders, which are immediately within the "Pictures" folder, have their own libraries, each containing just that folder. 
Because going one level down into the "Pictures" library would be too difficult for some people to cope with.
And you can't get rid of the bloody things. Try removing them, and Windows will recreate them on the next boot, if not before.
After applications started filling up the "My Documents" folder with junk, and other applications started filling up the user profile folder with yet more junk, I was kind of hoping that "Libraries" would give me some control over what folders I need to dig through to find my stuff.
"These people looked deep within my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined."
- Homer
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OriginalGriff wrote: So where does it store video? Under the "Pictures" folder, in a directory called "Camera Roll". With all the static images.
But what is a video other than a series of rapid static images? 
Marc
Latest Article - Create a Dockerized Python Fiddle Web App
Learning to code with python is like learning to swim with those little arm floaties. It gives you undeserved confidence and will eventually drown you. - DangerBunny
Artificial intelligence is the only remedy for natural stupidity. - CDP1802
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Following that logic, MS would have stored them under "Music" because de haz audio.
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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Marc Clifton wrote: what is a video other than a series of rapid static images
Dang, you beat me to it.
if (Object.DividedByZero == true) { Universe.Implode(); }
Meus ratio ex fortis machina. Simplicitatis de formae ac munus. -Foothill, 2016
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Hi Marc,
Apologies for going off-topic and being curious - but how is it going with studying WPF?
Get me coffee and no one gets hurt!
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Cornelius Henning wrote: but how is it going with studying WPF?
The client was sort of a disaster to work with -- constant changing specs, several (including me) remote developers and no source control, various strange decisions, lack of complete transparency of the project code, etc.
I ended up putting about 3 hours of work into something, only to finally hit a stumbling where I asked "can I see the code for how you implemented this elsewhere?" only to get a response "oh, I've already implemented what you're working on."
I blew a gasket (it was a long time coming), zipped up all my work (since they don't have source control) and sent on its way over Skype (since that was the medium of communication) and told them I hope they have great success with their venture.
Wasn't even worth billing them the 3 hours.
So, WPF? I read some tutorials, basic stuff really, and decided (again) it's not for me. If I'm going to learn something obscure, arcane, and requiring daily chanting and blood sacrifices, I'd rather stick with web development.
Marc
Latest Article - Create a Dockerized Python Fiddle Web App
Learning to code with python is like learning to swim with those little arm floaties. It gives you undeserved confidence and will eventually drown you. - DangerBunny
Artificial intelligence is the only remedy for natural stupidity. - CDP1802
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