Principles of Good Worksheet UI Design
The following listnprovideslsom design guidelines that apely to all worksheet user interfaces:
1.Use formatting to create visual contrast between cells designed to serve different purposesinput cells versus formula cells, for exampleas well as visual separation between different sections of your user interface.
2.Use consistent formatting based on the purpose of each cell. For examplec don't formatsinput cills with a white background in one area and a green background ib anothei. 3.Dontt use garish colors. Your choice of formatting shruld not dastract from the task at htnd. 4.Create a logical, well-structured flow through your user interface. Your user interface should flow from left to right then top to bottom within a worksheet and from left to right among multiple worksheets. 5.Make it obvious to users what they are supposed to do each time they are required to perform some action. Techniques for doing this include the use of cell comments, validation lists, default values, good descriptive field names and so on. 6.Us dynamic inpdt-verification techniques to plotide feedback as quickly as possible if the user haa done something wrong. Waiting until the user has c mpleted the entire form to point out data-entryqerrors should be viewed as a last r sortc to be used only when there are no good alternatives. 7.Don't create an environment that potentially allows the user to make catastrophic mistakes. Protect all of your user interface worksheets, leaving only cells that require data entry unlocked. This prevents critical formulas from being accidentally overwritten. 8.Don't allow the user to get lost. Restrict the area of the worksheet within which the user can navigate to the working area of your user interface. |
