Yahoo! Design Patterns – Review of a great Source for Interface Designers
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Posted On :
Feb-07-2011
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Article Word Count :
628
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This Yahoo! Design Pattern category solves the most important problem on a website: finding the right stuff! These design patterns present best practices for all sorts of navigation challenges, filter options, pagination, navigation tabs and bars etc.
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A lot of web designers I worked with so far, tried to reinvent the wheel every time faced with a new web project, creating really beautiful and arty stuff – nobody could use on first sight (but I have to admit, the stuff looked really nice!). But nice isn’t the task here, usable is what we want and need!
Re-arranging learned patterns, controls and site structures, some designers might say, is boring, limited and not innovative at all! On the contrary I say! It is probably much more challenging, using the very same controls users know and still creating innovative design.
For that reason I am a great fan of the Yahoo! Design Patterns library. The Yahoo! Design Patterns are a collection of usability patterns or usability best practices for what they categorized as: page layout, navigation, selection, rich interaction and social.
Yahoo! presents more than 50 individual design best practices and tells you exactly when to use them and what problem you will solve with that! Here is what you will find in the different categories:
Yahoo! Design Pattern – Page Layout
In this design pattern category you will find best practices for page grids and general page layouts, keeping consistency over the whole site, delivering a cohesive user and brand experience. With a standardized grid (wireframe grid you keep the site comprehensible for the user while maintaining flexibility for integrating all sorts of dynamic and individual content.
Yahoo! Design Pattern – Navigation
This Yahoo! Design Pattern category solves the most important problem on a website: finding the right stuff! These design patterns present best practices for all sorts of navigation challenges, filter options, pagination, navigation tabs and bars etc.
Yahoo! Design Pattern – Selection
On almost every website, you can select data from a given pool of options. The Yahoo! Design Patterns show you the best practices for different contexts of selection. The date picker is just as represented as the picture carousel which you can see nowadays in almost every online shop (now you know why).
Yahoo! Design Pattern – Rich Interaction
This is a nice one! These design patterns show you how users can interact with your site by using dynamic and animated effects. But not only do the Yahoo! Design Patterns show you what dynamic patterns exist, but also how you get users to use them really and manage the right level of effects without creating an overkill.
Yahoo! Design Pattern – Social
Web 2.0 is everywhere and what has been so special a few years ago, is today rather common practice on many websites – without being labeled 2.0. The Yahoo! Design Patterns tell you a lot about the core principals of social media and interaction among your users. These social design best practices deal with patterns attached to people (e.g. identity, reputation and presence) but also to objects for rating content and sharing stuff what they like, thus making social interaction work.
Thumbs up for the Yahoo! Design Patterns Library
What started out as an internal Yahoo! project is now a strong and powerful source for designing usability. These design patterns are not limited to what the Yahoo! people did and still do on their site, but they are a guideline for all the web designers out there. Of course, the design pattern library contains examples on how Yahoo! uses these patterns. But consider these design patterns more like a concept outline and not a copy paste solution. Two tab navigations can have the same core concept, with completely different designs – thus enabling designers to take these design patterns to create something great, something beautiful AND usable!
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Article Source :
http://www.articleseen.com/Article_Yahoo! Design Patterns – Review of a great Source for Interface Designers_51753.aspx
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Author Resource :
Pidoco.com – Interface Design, Wireframe Software, Interface Design Software, Clickable Wireframes and GUI Prototyping Tool. A GUI Design Interface Software for clickable Wireframes!
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Keywords :
interface design, interface design software, wireframe software, GUI Prototyping Tool, wireframe tool, software prototyping, ,
Category :
Computers
:
Software
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