CIS 524 Discussion Responses
Collegeman
CIC524Discussion2ResponseReqs.docxDiscussion post
"Menu Selection and Organization" Please respond to the following:
· Describe the considerations that you would take into account when selecting the menu style for an application and why. Support your response with examples.
· Imagine you have been asked to help a novice designer effectively organize his menu content in an application. Provide the novice designer with the advice you feel would be most helpful when organizing content for menus. Support your response.
DI post states the following:
I would advise the novice designer to ensure the primary navigation should have limited options to provide an interactive organized display (Hidayat & Purwanto, 2015). It is also essential to organize content based on the priority value and important content to come first for the first impression.
Questions to be answered:
1. In other words, limited options so that the user can feel empowered without becoming confused coupled with prioritized choices in those options.
2. So, does that mean that someone that is not a novice designer should approach men use differently?
3. On a priority scale, would you rush a product to make delivery date with a poor menu or push delivery back? What would be the ramifications?
JN’s post states the following:Top of Form
Greetings Class,
Several considerations to take when selecting a menu style are the following: Visibility, Informative, Coordinate with users by themselves, and manipulating menus should be easier for users. (Ajermani, S., 2018) Visibility is important because the menu items/images should coordinate with the function, it should also be easy to read for large and small screens; having a menu too large would not be visually helpful - adding sub-menus will help with the problem. Informative menus are easy to understand and explain what is occurring within that menu, like the "tools" option should indicate tools available within that menu. Coordinate with users by themselves, this means a developer should not be designing a brand new menu that's never been seen before, it should follow general menu builds and not be too complex. Manipulating menus should be easier for users, this is generally important for mobile type applications that utilize touch for navigating menus; menus should not be too small or too hard to read or touch to guide through.
The most helpful piece of advice for a novice user is to "simplify the user journey" (Smith, A., 2019). A menu should be extremely easy to understand and should follow a general guide. Assist the users in completing whatever task or goal they are trying to accomplish. Utilizing Top level menus to avoid clutter will help the user keep focus and guide them on the path they are taking.
-John
References: Ajmerani, S. (2018, September 19). 4 Key Areas to Consider when Designing a "Menu" for your Mobile App. Retrieved from https://tweakyourbiz.com/technology/4-key-areas-to-consider-when-designing-menu-for-your-mobile-app Smith, A. (2019, November 19). Top 8 Mobile Navigation Menu Design for Your Inspiration. Retrieved from https://uxplanet.org/top-8-mobile-navigation-menu-design-for-your-inspiration-8a2d925bffc0
AZ’s post states the following:Top of Form
or this scenario, let's say the application is selling apparel. A menu style that would support desktop and mobile viewing is two-dimensional mega menus. Two-dimensional mega menus provide a sleek overview of items with clickable graphics and pictures. Apparel websites like BCBG use two-dimensional mega menus, ensuring simplicity in engaging the user for purchase. When opened in the mobile, it displays one item at a time in a scrollable design. Of course, the website would include sequencing with the seasons in trend as the main display, unless user searches for specific choices using familiar phrasing such as "size " in simultaneous menus. The layout can cover many styles depending on the website's themes and tools like WordPress. Also, a user logs in for purchases, so a form fill-in is required to personalize the shopping experience. A menu style depends on how the designer wants the user to interact with the system and what is being marketed (Shneiderman, Plaisant, Cohen, Jacobs, & Elmqvist, 2016) .
For a novice designer, I would recommend looking at similar popular websites to get a good idea of the layout for the menu setup. Ask questions. Some questions to ask are, how do I want a user to interact with the menu? What is it I am trying to accomplish with this menu? How do I want my display to look? What actions are needed from the user to access information from the menu? Is this menu friendly for mobile and desktop use? Do pop-up menus serve a purpose for the user? Also, I would recommend looking at guidelines to create universal usability for menu items ensuring ease of use and simplicity.
Source:
Shneiderman, B., Plaisant, C., Cohen, M., Jacobs, S., & Elmqvist, N. (2016). Designing The User Interface: Strategies for Effective Human-Computer Interaction (2016th Custom Ed.). Boston: Pearson.
