(un)Friendly
User Design Guidelines
Preface
UX design aims to be intuitive, immersive and elegant. This is achieved through a minimal UI style allowing content to be king. User (un)Friendly guidelines attempt to make the user think about what they are doing, highlighting the fact they are on a device that is a separate facit, not an extension of their body. Users need to question the ways in which they interact with the UI to keep the line between digital and real world undoubtedly apparent.
Please can you confirm.
Increase the instances of model contexts. People are used to interacting with interfaces in nonlinear ways, subvert this - Frustrate the user by increasing the number of steps it takes to complete a task. Apply this to subtasks increasingly their complexity to a level that requires their full attention, forcing the user to lose sight of the main task they suspended when entered in the model context.
How well do you know your menus?
Users have become accustomed to a passive navigation experience; achieved through a combination of hierarchical and flat navigational structures.These guidelines encourage a navigational structure that allows the user to rediscover how they are guided through their UI experience. Users should question why they are forced to find their way using a counter intuitive navigational style. Replace hierarchical menus with functions that test the users knowledge of the interfaces they use so often.
Opaque UI
Users should feel the UI fighting against them throughout their experience. Make the UI ask questions of the user and promote a comparison between the experiences they have become so accustomed to. Take away functions that have made their experience seamless and intuitive. Where possible bring users back into physical realm through the removal of these functions to highlight the dependency they have developed for them and improve the distinction between digital and physical.
Explicit Descriptions
Tear away the user friendly descriptions that translate their tasks into functions that the software program provides. Make the user aware of the technical aspects of these functions by explicitly explaining how they are completed and data is stored. To further highlight the current realm they are engaging in.
