The Old Joel on Software Forum: Part 4 (of 5) - Inductive User Interface

Inductive User Interface - Anyone using it?

<<http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/nhp/default.asp?contentid=28000443>>

Anyone using this stuff?.

Fascinating. This poster (Yours truly) admits doing a fair bit of Microsoft bashing in this forum. Also admit that its more out of having some cheap, B grade fun at Microsoft's expense rather than any real pain. But you got to hand credit to the devil where its due. How meticulous they are. The approach they have described(one task per screen) is quite interesting. The approach probably would work if you have a lot of money so that you can change the look of your screens radically.
It also depends on what kind of software you are making. If you are making software likely to be used by computer novices, then it should be work well.

Has anyone actually altered their screens based on it. ?What was the feedback you got from people ?.

Yours Truly

Karthik
Wednesday, March 17, 2004

The link does not work for some reason. The title is

Microsoft Inductive User Interface Guidelines
Microsoft Corporation

February 9, 2001

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnwui/html/iuiguidelines.asp

Karthik
Wednesday, March 17, 2004

I don't create UIs, but wizard like one task per screen interactions is pretty helpful in ensuring that users don't go into complete panic (and click the back button) when they see a screen filled with empty text fields and unchecked checkboxes of every shape and sizes.

Li-fan Chen
Wednesday, March 17, 2004

Browsed through this article, looked interesting - certainly the comments regarding title clarity.

Thing is, I use Money 2000, the demonstration of the UI design, and I have always have problems navigating the interface to what I want... I always found the Money design rather busy and with few bells and whistles for the power user (as you become adept you want to use it faster).

I'd be interested to hear about people might think about these web-like interfaces.

Joel Goodwin
Wednesday, March 17, 2004

Even though I re-read my posts, I almost always find I've forgotten to type various words. Oh, oh yes, I typed them in my damn head of course.

Joel Goodwin
Wednesday, March 17, 2004

If you look at the released pictures for Longhorn, the Inductive UI approach is used all over.

andrewm
Wednesday, March 17, 2004

http://www.google.com/search?q=inductive+user+interface+site%3Adiscuss.fogcreek.com

And my thoughts summarized here:

http://www.marktaw.com/design/WhyIdontliketheInductiveu.html

www.MarkTAW.com
Wednesday, March 17, 2004

Yeah, I think this concept is really terrible and a step backwards. All the good user interfaces I have ever used have less screens, not more. This is kind of like putting your software into lots of different little modes that prevent you from accessing the feature of other modes at any given time. Really just prevents me from using my own flow and forces me to use the workflow of the programmer.

Oren Miller
Thursday, March 18, 2004

It's been said many times before but wizard style interfaces are excellent for utilities or rarely used programs.

A program that is only used once a tax year is crying out for an interactive interface. One that is used ten times a day should be designed with the power user in mind.

Stephen Jones
Thursday, March 18, 2004

It must be me. I never saw IUI == wizard == more screens.

I see it as a design tool to make you think about your intentions. Do you have a clear idea of what and how the user should perform a certain task? You do? Fine. But if you don't, think again.

If we don't know what to do, how are we going to proceed?

And that bathtub scenario? Two screens, depending on how you are counting; one if I choose to use menus.

Thomas Eyde
Friday, March 19, 2004