A Quick Critique: Vitaly Friedman’s Web Developer’s Handbook Home Page
Over on the SIGIA-L list, (a discussion list for information architects,) I was asked for my opinion on the page design of the Web Developer’s Handbook, a nifty collection of links put together by Vitaly Friedman.
In general, I think the overall layout of the links is fine. The quantity of links on the page isn’t where this site has problems. The spacing seems to work well. If I were to observe users working with the page, I think the layout and quantity of links would stand up quite fine.
Where I think users will have problems is in the actual categorization and naming of the links. Some of the categories work to distinguish their content from the others, such as “Fonts”, “Usability & Accessibility”, and “SEO references”. Others (at least to me) seem a little less distinguished: I wonder if people will know where their target content will be located. “Miscellaneous Tools”, for example is one of the largest categories. To me, it’s always a red flag when something is labelled “Miscellaneous” — especially when it’s a large group. (“Miscellaneous” is synonymous with “Random Crap”. If you’re happy with the label “Random Crap”, then “Miscellaneous” may just work for you.)
Categories can be a problem in most schemes, so one way to solve it is to have descriptive content under each category to explain it. Links, when descriptive, can be very useful. However, I fear that the links on this page really aren’t very descriptive. They are, for the most part, page titles or blog names. For example, under “Usability & Accessibility”, (a category I pride myself in knowing a little about,) most of the links are the names of sites, such as “Access Matters” and “Siteusability.com”.
This is fine if you are looking to find the site. But the only scenario I can think of for that is that you already know the site name (and therefore can find it via it’s URL or Google), I’m not sure that adds value. Instead, the user is forced to pogostick to identify if the content contains what their seeking.
So, I think that if I watched users with the site (the only way I can determine whether it works or not), I’m betting I’d see pogosticking because of the links and categories.
[If you’re interested in us reviewing your site, you might consider attending the upcoming UIE 2006 Roadshow. At each session, we’ll take a look at several sites owned by attendees. Yours could be one of them.]