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Making Usable Websites
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Related Links
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Making Usable Websites:
Print Vs. Web
Newspaper designers have a huge canvas to play with. Their
designs can be striking and yet intricate and pack much more
impact than a web-page; especially because the entire double
page is in your face in a fraction of a second.
- Dimensionality
- Print is 2-D
- Web is anything from 1-D to N-D. It is a scrolling
experience
- Navigation
- In web N-D follows from Navigation. Dong is more
memorable than seeing.
- In print navigation is ultra-simple. It is turning
a page
Hypertext navigation is a major component of web design
requiring decisions like
- appearance of links
- how to explain where users can go and where each link
will lead
- visualization of the user's current location
- information architecture
- Response Time, Resolution and Canvas Size
Print is immensely superior to the web in terms of speed,
type and image quality, and the size of visible space.
These differences are however not fundamental. The bandwidth
is expected to grow by 50% every year and huge screens are on
the anvil.
However, for the next ten years or so, the differences will
remain and will dictate restrictions on web design.
Less graphics, smaller graphics, shortest text (since it is
unpleasant to read online), less fancy typography (since you
don't know what fonts the user has installed), and less
ambitious layouts (for smaller screen sizes).
It is predicted that by 2008 all computer users would prefer
reading the web over printed pages. Then anything that is
great in print design is likely to be lousy web design.
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