

Human Interface Guidelines - macco
http://elementaryos.org/docs/human-interface-guidelines

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erikpukinskis
This is really fantastic. Apple/Google/et al are putting immense resources
into surfaces and textures and really subtle animations that are expensive to
compute, expensive to design, and expensive to implement. There are usability
gains there, but they are rare and usually small.

I love that the Elementary HIG puts emphasis on choosing the scope of what you
ask users to do, on writing style, and on a bunch of very basic usability
concerns. There's a misconception that because we have Retina displays and
silky animations we're somehow in a more advanced state usability-wise than we
were decades ago, but many of the interaction design lessons of yore have
still not been widely adopted.

~~~
Someone
That makes it sound as if they are unique in discussing the basics.

However, reading

    
    
      https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/UserExperience/Conceptual/OSXHIGuidelines/TerminologyWording.html
    

and

    
    
      http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/confirmation.aspx?id=2695
    

I find that both go into the basics, with (focusing on writing style) such
phrases as "Use User-Oriented Terminology", "Remove redundant text", "Create
Succinct Labels for UI Elements", "When necessary, use bold in the control
labels to make the text easier to scan", "Avoid the extremes of the 'machine'
voice (where the speaker is removed from the language) and the 'sales rep'
voice", and "Avoid large blocks of UI text"

Both text also advice the use of professional text writers for UI text:

 _" Using text consistently and clearly is a critical component of UI design.
In the same way that it’s best to work with a professional graphical designer
on the icons and images in your app, it’s best to work with a professional
writer on your app’s user-visible text. A skilled writer can help you develop
a style of expression that reflects your app’s design, and can apply that
style consistently throughout your app."_

 _" Comprehensible text is crucial to effective UI. Professional writers and
editors should work with software developers on UI text as an integral part of
the design process. Have them work on text early because text problems often
reveal design problems. If your team has trouble explaining a design, quite
often it is the design, not the explanation, that needs improving."_

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sjolsen
I find it strange that they give measurements in terms of pixels. When pixel
density ranges from 96 pixels per inch to 200 pixels per inch and beyond on
consumer hardware alone, pixels simply aren't an appropriate measurement for
UI purposes. I don't mind display optimization, but it should be exactly that:
optimization. Put another way, I prefer appropriately sized, blurry UI
elements over crisp UI elements I have to use a magnifying glass to see.

I also take issue with the stance against configuration. The one thing that
I've found most frustrating about using computers in recent years is that I am
constantly losing control over my programs to the headlong pursuit of
"minimalism." Now, I don't mind simple interfaces. I don't even mind defaults
geared toward the… technically challenged. What I _do_ mind is being unable to
decide how my computer behaves and how I interact with it, being effectively
_forced_ to use my computer in whatever way the developers of my current
software stack have deemed best for most of their users—or, of course, switch
to another software stack entirely. The latter approach doesn't exactly scale.

Now, I suppose there's a third option: dig into the internals of the
unconfigurable tools looking for dconf settings or configuration files I can
hack at to give me back location bars and the ability to manipulate windows
with the Alt key and the mouse. Of course, this is rather difficult when the
developers have been _actively discouraged_ from writing the documentation
that would make this a relatively straightforward endeavour. Instead, I'm left
first trying fruitlessly to Google any and every permutation and phrasing of
what I want to accomplish, next hoping that Gnome Tweak or the equivalent has
a _fix_ for the recently nerfed functionality, and finally considering for a
moment searching manually through the program source for what I want before
deciding it's really not worth my time, at which point I usually just throw
the program out entirely and install the most bloated KDE-based alternative I
can find.

/rant. I realize Elementary is designed to be as functional as possible in the
hands of the non–power-user majority, but I wish it didn't come at the expense
of power-usability. One can of course substitute in more powerful third-party
programs for the simple system defaults, but one then loses system
integration. I would love to see a project like Elementary cater to both
groups of users, since I (like most self-described power users) belong to both
groups, depending on the task at hand, but developers only ever seem
interested in targeting one group or the other.

~~~
OhSoHumble
This is my concern as well and I have the same concern when it comes to OS X.
I want a system that simplifies common tasks and makes everything look pretty
while not compromising customization. That's why I use Linux - I want the
power to have it my way.

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PointerReaper
Good work!

Could be better, as no accessibility for people with disabilities referenced
at a technical conformance level: this needs to be a part of the guidelines.

Keyboard access (e.g.,
[http://www.linuxfoundation.org/collaborate/workgroups/access...](http://www.linuxfoundation.org/collaborate/workgroups/accessibility/ia2/ia2_implementation_guide#keyboard-
access)) should be a part of the overall guidelines, even without annotation
to support of accessibility. This should include visual focus, as well as well
defined default keyboard shortcuts, where supported by the operating system,
window manager, or application conventions.

At a deeper level, concepts of textual representation of the user interface
via Name, Role, State, etc. need to be conveyed. Language used in this guide
that is heavily visual centric should be considered and revised if it leads
end developers to ONLY think of visual situations, or encourages them to
ignore accessibility.

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tucosan
This looks really useful!

The only thing that put me off and made me mistrust the quality of the content
of a design related how-to, is the typographical choices made for such a text
heavy site. A font size of 14 px and a line-height of 2 em simply don't work
in this specific layout. Legibility suffers and could be improved by sticking
with a more consvervative line height of, ie. 1.5. - 1.7 em

The content itself I can't wait to evaluate though.

~~~
digisign
I don't care for full justification either.

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frankydp
This is an incredible well thought out guide.

I can see this type of thing being a very popular site if written about
different UI frameworks. With examples.

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nitrogen
OT: the elementaryos.org home page could use some more visible navigation to
screenshots. I have no idea what "Journal" means without clicking it.

Also, is Luna trademarked by Microsoft?

~~~
aroman
re: screenshots, definitely agree, those are coming with the relaunch of the
website with the final release of Freya.

As for Microsoft owning "Luna"... not that we're aware of. They've certainly
never contacted us about it.

~~~
nitrogen
I suppose I should say that I really like the concept of elementaryOS, and it
would be nice if it were easier to get to know it through the web site.

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macco
Although I don't use ElementaryOS, I think there HIG is really great. The best
I could find.

~~~
aroman
Thanks! Was a nice surprise to see this on the HN front page. I'm on the core
team — what's holding you back from using elementary OS?

~~~
macco
Nothing in particular. As a matter of taste I like gnome 3.14 a lot. The
activities screen works very efficient for me - and I run arch.

But still, kudos for the great work.

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GuiA
Is there a single PDF available?

~~~
amadeusw
It's not exactly what you're looking for, but here are PDFs for Windows and
OSX. Most UX guidelines are common to all operating systems.

[http://www.microsoft.com/en-
ca/download/details.aspx?id=2695](http://www.microsoft.com/en-
ca/download/details.aspx?id=2695)
[https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/UserEx...](https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/UserExperience/Conceptual/OSXHIGuidelines/OSXHIGuidelines.pdf)

~~~
GuiA
I'm deeply familiar with all the existing HIG; I actually contributed to
Gnome's a long long time ago. The reason why I wanted a PDF was so I could
read it offline on my tablet and see the differences with existing documents.

