
Should Arrows be Placed Before Link Text or After? - wird
http://www.usabilitypost.com/2008/10/28/should-arrows-be-placed-before-link-text-or-after/
======
nickb
When in doubt, use the real-world for a guideline. In this case, road signs
provide a perfect metaphor. In the case of street signs, arrows pointing to
the right are always positioned after the text and arrows pointing to the left
are positioned before the text. In the case of links, these little chevrons or
triangles almost always point to the right so it's natural to position them
after the link text.

~~~
litewulf
Yes, but what about back links?

I have a site that's "You have done blah. Want to return to previous blah?"
Now where do I put that previous arrow?

(Its made more annoying because I have lots of parallel "You are viewing an
old version. Check out the newest version >>", so we want to stick an arrow in
for visual similarity... but its confusing.)

~~~
nickb
Like this:

«Back ||| Next»

~~~
litewulf
Sorry I must have explained things poorly. There are lots of little blurbs "X
happened, would you like to go look?". Sometimes that go look is a backwards
motion and sometimes its forward. "X happened, « would you like to go back"
looks really strange.

------
Hexstream
Not a very authoritative usability article in my book. It's just the intuition
of some random guy as far as I know. The arguments are scarce and there are no
usability studies to back it up.

Jakob Nielsen has spoiled me.

~~~
axod
It's a conversation starter though surely...

------
petercooper
Intriguingly, I had no opinion on this before going to that page, but after
looking at their examples, something about the "arrow after" examples make me
want to click on them more. It's only an anecdotal data point, but others
comment similarly.

------
ars
I have the same question for checkboxs (and radioboxes): before or after the
text?

