Web Form Design - On the Desktop?
I’m a few chapters into Luke Wroblewskis’ Web Form Design and as with all good books, the first thing it does is change the way you look at the world. While the book is about forms on the web, component layout and interaction is valid on the desktop as well.
Today, I happened to give the OS X Spaces app a second shot. Have a look at the configuration screeen:
The number and layout of virtual desktops is specified graphically via interaction with what I would refer to as “non-standard” components. They aren’t part of the shipping widget library, but I figured out how to use them immediately. This is likely due to their similarity (in size and shape) with radio buttons.
The key design component is that it relies on pre-attentive variables to speed perception. Arranged figures are of appropriate size and shape such that I immediately perceive them to represent desktops. Before I parse a single word or component on the page, I know what I’m looking it.
On the other hand, this too would have been a perfectly acceptable way to prompt for Space configuration:
Among these, which presents a more compelling (and to be honest, “fun”) way to configure your desktop?
Of the two, it’s clear which would have taken much longer to develop. This level of polish however, has come to typify the Apple experience.