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Whitespace killed an enterprise app

uxdesign.cc

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Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#141

Post by pantalaimon »

danielvaughn wrote: post #14
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #4

Hallelujah. It's not just enterprise apps, either. I've seen more than a few consumer app redesigns that just seemed to tack on the "clean", "minimalist", "whitespace" ethos, without really having a clue of an understanding of how users actually used the product. I think this is a big factor in what killed slashdot. They did a big redesign years back that added a lot of whitespace but actually made it incredibly diff…

God yes, the older reddit interface was so much better. I don't give a shit how pretty the UI is.

The thing is that the new interface can take seconds to load whereas the old one was instant.

How is this an improvement?

Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#142

Post by magicalhippo »

varikin wrote: post #27
duxup wrote: post #8

One point: >Are there things my users really don’t need to see right now? If you don’t know, ask! ASK! ASK! ASK! For the love of god please ask your users. I worked for a company with a big clunky enterprise app. It got redesigned numerous times and rolled out with big fanfare. Nobody who used for any significant amount of time was involved in any of the redesigns. It was horrible every time with numerous changes jus…

> ASK! ASK! ASK! Except users lie all the time. They don't know what they need or want. People are horrible at being logical about what will actually help them. Watch them work. Watch a bunch of people work. Test and prototype changes and watch more people work. And watch them work at their desk or where ever they work.

I often find that it's not that they lie, it's that they're often trying to come up with solutions and present those, rather than explaining the root problem.

But yes, watching them work is invaluable. First time I visited one of our clients, I noticed two issues that I had no idea of:

1. All users had dual-monitors, and maximized our application across both. Our application is MDI still. This was a very bad fit for dialogs that were (for historical reasons) had the default position set to center-of-application, rather than center-of-screen. Try reading a dialog split right across two monitors. So when I got back I immediately did a pass to make them all center-of-screen.

2. When doing the main data entry, they didn't look a the window they were entering data into, but rather the source material. Thus any additional controls or dialog would mess up their workflow big-time. That's when it really hit me why the user interface for that window was rather clunky...

Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#143

Post by nottorp »

rossdavidh wrote: post #18

For every case where there is excessive whitespace, I see 10x where there is way too much clutter, and not a single place where one can click (for example, to bring the browser's window back into focus) without activating something. This sounds like a problem of not talking to your users enough, not a problem of too much whitespace.

Click? Those people don't have time to click, they use the keyboard.

Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#144

Post by sevensor »

aidenn0 wrote: post #113
tenaciousDaniel wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes exactly. CL is probably my favorite website on the internet, for the sheer reason that they have virtually not changed at all since they first launched over 10 years ago. It's fairly incredible. I can't think of another website that has done that.

http://rinkworks.com/

This still exists?! It's still being updated?!?! So much more content than when I last checked it, which would have been 2004 or so. My faith in the internet is restored.

Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#145

Post by jimbobimbo »

This quote (below) reminded me a story...

    “There should be a minimum amount of furniture (rules, boxes, dots, and other guide rails for traveling through the typographic space) and a maximum amount of information.”

    – Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style
A company I know of, had rolled out major UX changes in their bug tracking system. One of the changes was complete removal of all borders on text boxes on bug entry screens. Imagine a page filled with text boxes, with not a single clue of where they are except labels above them. Users literally revolted. The change ended up becoming an option just for that company.

Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#146

Post by tabtab »

thirdsun wrote: post #95
dictum wrote: post #11

I feel like the author really wanted a scapegoat for a process that was flawed from the start (redesigning a product without research, empathy with users, feedback, gradual introduction with small test groups etc.) Too often I see UX issues blamed on visual choices — the whole everything must be flat movement of 2013-2018 is one example — when there are deeper issues that can't be extracted into a pithy recommendatio…

Exactly. Proper white spacing shouldn’t be the problem of any redesign. Also consider that users often have a tendency to rebel against change. Habits and routines are hard to overcome and the actual might be that features and data simply aren’t in the same place they used to be, regardless of if that new location is much more reasonable. I saw it again and again: Users memorize hard-coded paths to certain functions…

No, you don't really need much white space. Use thick lines to show boundaries. They do the job of visually segregating things without wasting screen real-estate.

White-space became a "thing" because of the increased use of touch-screens, such as iPads and smartphones. The space helps avoid fingering mistakes. However, if the vast majority of users are using a keyboard and mouse, it's an anti-feature. People started copying the trend without thinking about and road-testing the practicalities of it. Unlike the Kardashians, science works.

Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#147

Post by folkrav »

renjimen wrote: post #45
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #4

Hallelujah. It's not just enterprise apps, either. I've seen more than a few consumer app redesigns that just seemed to tack on the "clean", "minimalist", "whitespace" ethos, without really having a clue of an understanding of how users actually used the product. I think this is a big factor in what killed slashdot. They did a big redesign years back that added a lot of whitespace but actually made it incredibly diff…

Spotify. These days it's so hard to organise or browse your own music collection.

I keep hearing this but I find Google Play Music to be way, way worse.

Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#148

Post by noir_lord »

mruts wrote: post #25

A great example of a really nice information dense app is the Bloomberg terminal. Maybe it’s ugly (a lot of people say this, but I personally don’t think so), but all the right design choices have been made. High Contrast, monospaced fonts, extensive keybindings, absolutely no wasted space. And, most essential, it’s not a web app. I used to work at a portfolio analytics company who’s explicit goal was: to have all of…

I liked the bloomberg style so much I ripped the fonts out of some Bloomberg software and use them as my terminal font :).

It's an attractive font.

Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#149

Post by NeedMoreTea »

phkahler wrote: post #133
varikin wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ASK! ASK! ASK! Except users lie all the time. They don't know what they need or want. People are horrible at being logical about what will actually help them. Watch them work. Watch a bunch of people work. Test and prototype changes and watch more people work. And watch them work at their desk or where ever they work.

>> Except users lie all the time. They don't know what they need or want. People are horrible at being logical about what will actually help them. That's a bit harsh. IMHO people don't know what's even possible, so they can't tell you what the solution is. Sometimes they can tell you what bothers them about what they've got even if they don't know what would be better. The rest of your comment it good though. Watch t…

They often gloss over how they might use an app, or use it differently to described when doing real, live work with real data instead of test scenarios. Just as I would likely gloss over much of what I do when I drive a car, as I no longer think about it. Sometimes they use something differently to how their supervisors think they do. Maybe they found a handy shortcut or unintended timesaver, maybe relying on a side effect or unused field.

Best to watch a few at all levels of seniority, if at all possible, to fully understand how to deliver what they might need. Then dig into the issues, shortcuts and timesavers or bottlenecks they currently have.

Re: Whitespace killed an enterprise app

#150

Post by glun »

varikin wrote: post #27
duxup wrote: post #8

One point: >Are there things my users really don’t need to see right now? If you don’t know, ask! ASK! ASK! ASK! For the love of god please ask your users. I worked for a company with a big clunky enterprise app. It got redesigned numerous times and rolled out with big fanfare. Nobody who used for any significant amount of time was involved in any of the redesigns. It was horrible every time with numerous changes jus…

> ASK! ASK! ASK! Except users lie all the time. They don't know what they need or want. People are horrible at being logical about what will actually help them. Watch them work. Watch a bunch of people work. Test and prototype changes and watch more people work. And watch them work at their desk or where ever they work.

While they might not know what they need, they definitely know what won't help them.
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