Never Let the Coder Design

Web sites depend on creativity, originality, and usability. None of this is important to coders. I will say this once so I don't have to repeat myself: If the coder takes the reins over design decisions, your web site will fail... miserably. It will be incredibly simple, difficult to use, and be perfectly optimized to work how the coder wants to to work. As a designer, you should know what people want. A coder knows how to make your visions work. I have worked with many coders before and I found that many of my design decisions were brushed aside for what the coder thought was "easier." I looked at his proposal for several minutes and finally asked what that text box was supposed to do.

"What, you don't know? This is the login interface! I took out all of the clutter. Now all they have to do is type in their login number and press enter! Easy, right?"

The simple fact is that you will find yourself trying to justify all of your design decisions if you let the coder choose how the site looks. This article wasn't created solely to bash the coder's design ideas, though. Let's go over some tips that you will want to know when designing your web site:

- Judge your usability by pretending you are a 5-year-old and new to the internet (Assume no one knows how to use your site!)
- Try to find the purpose of a page by clicking on a random link, covering your eyes, and finding the first word that comes to your attention on the page
- Make sure all pages work in all browsers!
- Know your audience and design for your audience

The last point on that list is the most important. That point is also one of the hardest ones to get past. One of my web building ventures was making a blog hosting site. Despite never really getting off the ground (or finished), it proved to be a great learning experience. For example, allowing people to totally visually demolish their personal page seemed like a horrible idea. However, much of the appeal of websites like Myspace is the ability to totally customize and personalize a page. The basic point is that you will have to force yourself to make design decisions that may seem inane, but will bring in a greater audience in the longrun.


Jim Gordon
6/20/07

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