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Everyone would agree that usability is an important aspect of Web design. Whether you're working on a portfolio website, online store or Web app, making your pages easy and enjoyable for your visitors to use is key. Many studies have been done over the years on various aspects of Web and interface design, and the findings are valuable in helping us improve our work. Here are 10 useful usability findings and guidelines that may help you improve the user experience on your websites.

Heuristic evaluation (Nielsen and Molich, 1990; Nielsen 1994) is a usability engineering method for finding the usability problems in a user interface design so that they can be attended to as part of an iterative design process. Heuristic evaluation involves having a small set of evaluators examine the interface and judge its compliance with recognized usability principles (the "heuristics").

useit.com: Jakob Nielsen's Website Jakob's column on Web usability

These are ten general principles for user interface design. They are called "heuristics" because they are more in the nature of rules of thumb than specific usability guidelines.

Did you know that the images of faces that capture people's attention can be used to guide people around a website or an ad? I thought it was obvious! However, when I was representing Objective Digital at ad:tech Sydney 09 last week I mentioned it to people, and they were amazed! I realised it was worth posting about it!

Primeiros princípios do Interaction Design Os princípios que se seguem são fundamentais para o desenho e implementação de interfaces eficazes, quer seja para os ambientes GUI (do inglês Graphical User Interface), Interface gráfica do utilizador ou para a Web (Internet). Ultimamente muitas aplicações web têm espelhado uma falta de entendimento por muitos destes princípios do design de interacção. Porque uma aplicação ou serviço aparece na web, os princípios não mudam, acima de tudo torna-se cada vez mais importante aplicar estes princípios

Not-for-profit, charity, non-governmental organization (NGO) . . . most of the names emphasize what these organizations are NOT. And when we study .org websites, it's obvious that they differ from the clear value proposition offered by commercial websites. Typically, you visit sites because (a) you like what they have and (b) you'll pay money to get it. Not so with non-profit sites. Non-profits must clearly communicate their value proposition if they want to attract volunteers and online donations. Sadly, such communication is the sore point in the non-profit user experience.

Interaction Design Solutions for the Real World The following principles are fundamental to the design and implementation of effective interfaces, whether for traditional GUI environments or the web. Of late, many web applications have reflected a lack of understanding of many of these principles of interaction design, to their great detriment. Because an application or service appears on the web, the principles do not change. If anything, applying these principles become even more important.