Another Cool Interface

[Jerry]

This one was brought to my attention by Blue Dragon.

It is really cool!  An interface without mouse clicks:

http://www.dontclick.it/

[Brad Nunnally]

Yeah once I get around to actually creating my own website I want to make a version of it using this type of interface, if I can figure out how they did it. I think it would be kinda of interesting. Just think navigating with a mouse that doesn't have any buttons. Almost gets us one step closer to pointing at stuff we want rather than clicking on it.

[Bryan]

This is one of my personal favorite websits.  Made me wonder how desgining interfaces for the handicapped would be.  And when I say handicapped I mean deaf/blind etc

[raptor]

That always has interested me too Bryan. Ha, too bad they don't make web sites for your type of handicap.

[Ahmed]

You can do it without flash by using javascript onMouseOver on whatever element you wish to use in your UI.

Its a pretty big paradigm shift though, will take a while for people to get used to a clickless internet, and if that ever happens then a time will come when making websites with clickable buttons will be in fashion :)

[Ahmed]

Here's another such one, i like this one better.

http://www.global.yamaha.com/design/index_f.html

[Jerry]

ModernDayDarwin wrote:
This is one of my personal favorite websits.  Made me wonder how desgining interfaces for the handicapped would be.  And when I say handicapped I mean deaf/blind etc

Dr. White and I have been talking about ways of introducing accessibility into 275/321. One idea I had was to purchase some screen reader software and have one member from each team blindfolded and use another team's software in a Usability test.  :lol:

[Bryan]

I think that would actually be really freakin cool! There are so many different aspects of the design process that would change.

[raptor]

I do see a potential problem of this type of interface.  User foregiveness is very low in my opinion. The click has always been a way to signify YES this IS what I want to do. For instance people like my father (the everyday user) would go nuts if the screen started changing when they moved the mouse.    I believe I read somewhere that most average and novice users move the mouse to where they are looking as they explore a screen.  My father is the biggest advocate of this if he was looking around, moved the mouse over an option, and it changed what he was looking at, he would go nuts.

I honestly feel you need the click, it's the "is that your final answer" of GUI's

[Jerry]

raptor wrote:

I honestly feel you need the click, it's the "is that your final answer" of GUI's

How about adding gesture reconition?  For example you can have circling with the mouse pointer to indicate a choice.

[Bryan]

The only problem with that is...at what point are you just trading one evil for another? Sure you aren't clicking...but circling the mouse? that might might actually have more recognition problems than a mouse does.  Not to mention the ergonots of the world going nuts over that little wrist movement.  While I think these things definately have their place...they shouldn't be over used.

[Tyler]

I wonder though if it's worth fixing something that in my opinion isn't broken.

I don't believe that clicking inherently is any obstacle/problem when developing UIs.  I think the bigger problem lies with designs that just don't make any sense and are not intuitive in the slightest.

And, I do agree that most people explore with their mouse.  I see people relatively frequently click on each sub menu of the start button in windows even though it's unnecessary.

[Peter Motyka]

I tend to move my cursor around like mad when scanning the content of a web page or navigating a UI.  Perhaps it is a nervous habit that I picked up to occupy my hand since quitting smoking...  This would drive a gesture-based UI bonkers.

Also, I like to carry my cursor along text as I read it, much like using your finger as your read a book.  This is especially useful for badly designed websites that allow text to span the entire width of a maximized window on a high-resolution display.  In such instances, 3 or more sentences can occupy a single line and be difficult to read.

All in all, I'm a bit of a UI purist.  I like clean simple designs without graphical ornamentation.  Who else finds a console-based ncurses GUI downright sexy?