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Web
Design Elementals:
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Case Study II | |
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Dell's main page (live site) offers visitors a simple, well-laid out choice of links in the middle of the page that a viewer can use for purchasing a computer, as well as other site links along the top of the webpage. The site's main style point is the blue "Dell" bar across the top of each webpage with the gray navigation above it. This element is common to the entire site and serves to unite all the pages and let the user know that they are in the same website when the go to a new webpage. Other good elements of Dell's website include some of Dell's main links in the upper gray are of the webpage, which are easy for users to find no matter where in the site they are, since they rarely change. Also note that the entire main page fits into the 800x600 screen size, so even people with small monitors can view the site. One problem with Dell's navigation is that as users get into the secondary, or content pages, the number and locations of links multiplies rather quickly. This proliferation of links spread out all over the webpages offers no immediate utility to a new user, who must grow accustomed to the link layout and page design.
As a user goes from one area of the website to another, the links in these areas change but there are no identifying factors to remind a user of where he or she may have seen something that they want to find again in the site. The Dell site does use color effectively to break up the page, however. The division of the page into blue, gray, yellow, and white areas helps the viewer digest all the information that the webpage presents without using white space. This site does have a fatal flaw in it as well. On the laptop page, notice how the user must scroll horizontally to view all the information that is on the page, as half of the laptops available for sale are cut off. This is a Cardinal sin among web design! Never, ever, have a webpage that users must scroll horizontally. This is one of the most hated things in web design today, and ranks up there with pop-up windows and flashing text. What makes this worse is that the main page is designed for small monitors, yet the page with the product Dell is trying to sell on it is not compatible with these small screens. The product pagesare not consistent with the rest of the site, and the site design completely falls apart because of this.
Here are some quotes by random people asked to look over the site.
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