autocratic for the people.

The Discoverability is Gone.

I complained awhile back that the Office 2007 user interface overhaul was a step backwards, because it throws out users' prior knowledge of Office and will bury tech support hotlines in questions until expensive retraining is performed.

Well, it seems Microsoft has figured that out as well – their Office UI team representative / whipping boy Jensen Harris has lately noted as much. But their solution to this problem is so over-the-top stupid that I'm surprised it didn't affect the company's stock price.

They made a one-page, printable cheat sheet explaining how to use the new Office UI, which they expect people to read first, and then stick up on their cubicle wall for further reference. No kidding. So the UI team's response to the complaint "no one can figure out this crap UI" boils down to "well, read the manual first."

It should not surprise you to hear that mountains of empirical data indicate that nobody reads manuals. As a result, most interaction designers learn early on that discoverability – the ability of users to figure out how to interact with a program – is an absolutely critical component of a successful UI. (In fact, dropdown menu bars, absent from this new UI, are generally considered the single most important method for promoting discoverability.) The Office UI team has completely deluded itself if it thinks anyone is going to read this cheat sheet, or for that matter if it thinks users are even going to get it from their IT departments.

To reiterate, these guys are clowns.

posted by avixe @ 10:05 PM