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Article about bad computer UIs

I saw this article, linked from SlashDot and I found it interesting. I especially had an "a hah" moment when I read the entry for the dimmed out menus, which I have built. I will try to remember to implement the menu idea by displaying a dialog box instead of disabling a menu choice. Any other ideas of how to do deal with the dimmed menus?

Print | posted @ Monday, November 29, 2004 6:37 PM

Comments on this entry:

Gravatar # re: Article about bad computer UIs
by Daniel Moth at 11/30/2004 3:26 PM
I disagree. As someone new to the product I appreciate guidance. When I select a menu I am trying to do something so disabling irrelevant menuitems is good: I can ignore them and focus on what I can do. Only a small number of users (and even then only while learning the product) will wish the new *why* the option is disabled. Maybe allowing tooltips on disabled menuitems is a solution for that scenario but certainly not a menuitem that you click on – what’s wrong with the help system?

Disabling all elements of a GUI that do not apply to the application’s state is a very good thing.
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