Linked by Thom Holwerda on Wed 7th Nov 2007 13:39 UTC
This is the fourth article in a series on common usability and graphical user interface related terms [part I | part II | part III]. On the internet, and especially in forum discussions like we all have here on OSNews, it is almost certain that in any given discussion, someone will most likely bring up usability and GUI related terms - things like spatial memory, widgets, consistency, Fitts' Law, and more. The aim of this series is to explain these terms, learn something about their origins, and finally rate their importance in the field of usability and (graphical) user interface design. In part IV today, we focus on 
Permalink for comment 283362
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
Recent Original Stories
Recent Comments
Headlines
Random Comments
Random Stories
Random OS Link
Member since:
2005-07-01
Which begs the question: why doesn't that happen more? Every GUI I use seems to blithely ignore Fitt's law and it's descendants, giving me thin strips floating in the middle of the screen to target, be they the resize bars along the edge of a window or frame, or the items in a menu - many's the time I've been caught out by the wrong sub-menu popping up as I search for the menu item I really want. Then there's those fiddly icons, small toolbar buttons and the save action within mere pixels of the save as... action.
And all this applies universally to Windows, Linux, Mac and pretty much everything else. For an over-used term, Fitt's law seems to be sadly under-used.