6 ms·

I don’t know much about web design so I ask from a place of ignorance: has this been done well? Standardising components sounds like a good way to improve effi

I don’t know much about web design so I ask from a place of ignorance: has this been done well? Standardising components sounds like a good way to improve efficiency and safety but I imagine if it is done badly it could do the opposite. I’m always skeptical of big government initiatives, so I am interested to hear how those in the know grade the gov in this example.

SoftTalker 3y ago
Any site design will look stale after five years, no matter what standards you follow. It's just an unfortunate reality, there is no way off of the wheel unless you are like Craigslist and deliberately reject all convention.
- ics 3y ago
  I wish this wasn't such a commonly shared opinion. Too defeatist, in my view. Craigslist is spartan, sure, but there are less extreme examples such as McMaster-Carr. They've had the same design more or less since 2010 at least and it is usually considered both functional and tastefully current. I think in the early 2000s they had a different design which was fine, and they obviously skipped the whole "web 2.0" era of design.
  - SoftTalker 3y ago
    You're right, there are a few exceptional sites that manage to have a "timeless" look and I'd probably put McMaster in that category.
  - nextaccountic 3y ago
    > there are less extreme examples such as McMaster-Carr. They've had the same design more or less since 2010 at least and it is usually considered both functional and tastefully current. This? https://www.mcmaster.com/ https://www.mcmaster.com/ On desktop, sure. But they don't work in mobile. And that's easily 80% of the troubles of modern design: to avoid building everything twice, today people write "responsive", "mobile first" websites that, on desktop, tend to have an excessive amount of whitespace and other issues (see for example the old vs new reddit layout) What's being demanded of websites in 2023 is just much more difficult to do well than what people wanted in 2010.
    - domh 3y ago
      It is my first time going on mcmaster.com and it's working great on mobile for me (Android, Firefox). It feels snappy, good button sizes, great filtering options, no dead ends in flow until login to purchase. Top marks from me!
    - sverhagen 3y ago
      It isn't immediately clear to me what about that website isn't working on Mobile, as it seems to look pretty decent for me? (Firefox on a Galaxy phone.)
    - bryanrasmussen 3y ago
      thirding the mobile experience for me looks great on first try. I mean really really good.
    - syndicatedjelly 3y ago
      What are you talking about? That site looks great on an iPhone SE. Are there some issues? Sure. That doesn’t mean throw the baby out with the bath water, redesign to whatever’s trendy today, and kick the can down the road.
  - 2OEH8eoCRo0 3y ago
    Speed never falls out of fashion. They're not the prettiest to look at but pleasant to use.
- asoneth 3y ago
  I am disappointed any time "modernize" comes up as one of the priorities on a redesign, especially for enterprise products. Most enterprise software does not gain much from looking "modern" and like all fashions the more modern the UI the more quickly it becomes dated. In extreme cases of very large products whose owners want them to look exceedingly modern it can be like painting the Golden Gate Bridge: by the time they finish implementing the last components and icons, the ones that were implemented at the beginning of the project are already due for an update. The job security simply isn't worth the maddening repetition.
- amatecha 3y ago
  Yeah, you should see the Canada.ca design system[0]. It's ultra-boring, but it works, and has been the same for a very long time (and I'd be happy if it doesn't change much at all). Having such a simple design standard makes it so I can hit the website of any government service and understand how to "parse" the site and find my way around. I never have to relearn a totally new design language and information architecture, which is huge for me, as I cannot stand having to "re-learn" sites every couple years! [0] https://design.canada.ca/ https://design.canada.ca/
- blitzar 3y ago
  If you write html properly - in 5 years do a minor tweak to the css and you have a new fresh look.
  - bryanrasmussen 3y ago
    how will that help you keep employed though, better to have the css as part of your JS so any redesign is months of tiring work to earn those big consulting bucks! /you may get the impression I'm bitter.
    - blitzar 3y ago
      Me too my friend, me too. (btw your solution is needlessly complicated and way too much hard work - easier to sit with the client, exhale deeply then say "A full redesign? Thats quite a big project and its a lot of work, are you sure?" offer a fixed rate contract assuming 100's or even 1000's of person-hours and deliver (after a polite overrun of a few weeks) the updated css.) /you may get the impression I'm bitter and cynical.
      - bryanrasmussen 3y ago
        >btw your solution is needlessly complicated and way too much hard work it's not my solution, it's the solution I'm suffering through because our styling, as determined by external company, is handled via Chakra UI meaning that redesign requires JS work.
- high_5 3y ago
  This is a discussion about governmental sites. I don't use them because I want to but because I have to. So, current fashion and appeal are second to usability. There are some fundamental laws and limitations on how people process the presented information and that SHOULD be taken into account in designing a public service. Ideally, there is an interest in both parties (state and citizen) that their interaction is correct in order to fulfill their obligations and ensure their rights. Also many of the interactions with governmental digital services happen only once a year. I've been in helpdesk supporting people on a webapp with an obnoxious interface that they had to use 3 to 4 times a year to fulfill their project report in order to get paid for their project work. The UX was so out of the conventions that people hated it with passion and I had to help the laggards to use the application.
- pjc50 3y ago
  "Stale" is good for government websites. If you've got to interact with a form regularly as part of a legal requirement it is good that it never changes and looks exactly the same time every time you load it across a decade.
nicbou 3y ago
In this case a design system standardises forms and form components and that's very valuable. This means that every government website taps gets to learn the same little design lessons at once, from browser compatibility to keyboard navigation and accessibility. gov.uk nailed this, and it makes their website very pleasant to use. They share a lot of their UX research so it benefits a lot of other people including myself. I'm also a big fan of writing guides that teach people to write simply and clearly. It's sorely missing where I live.
nine_k 3y ago
I'd say that a good design should not look modern. It should look timeless.
- tacitusarc 3y ago
  That’s a pretty nice quip but not necessarily meaningful.
  - high_5 3y ago
    But it is meaningful. The websites are being interfaced with pretty much timeless clients - people. We interact with the world with our body and process it with our brain. The world has the same physics laws all around the world, so it's consistent. The virtual world is becoming anything but that. At least public services should become more consistent and change more slowly upon the most necessary changes.
- UberFly 3y ago
  It should lack both space and time to reach web 6.0 perfection.
- xyst 3y ago
  Which site is considered “timeless” to you?
the_mar 3y ago
gov.uk til.gov
code_witch_sam 3y ago
i'm not sure i would call this a "big government initiative." this is pretty cheap, obvious stuff. you might pull an off-the-shelf component library for a demo app or even a startup, but the value of building in-house/from-scratch in government, especially military, cannot be understated. the web ui ecosystem is rife with security risks and accessibility footguns. it looks fine to me. it's a design system, not rocket science.
encomiast 3y ago
It does quite a few things well especially around helping website developers comply with section 508 accessibility requirements. They also do a lot of user testing a research which is reflected in the guidance for the various components. For example something as simple as asking someone to enter their name can be nuanced when dealing with a large diverse population: https://designsystem.digital.gov/patterns/create-a-user-profile/name/ https://designsystem.digital.gov/patterns/create-a-user-prof...

SoftTalker 3y ago

Any site design will look stale after five years, no matter what standards you follow. It's just an unfortunate reality, there is no way off of the wheel unless you are like Craigslist and deliberately reject all convention.

ics 3y ago
I wish this wasn't such a commonly shared opinion. Too defeatist, in my view. Craigslist is spartan, sure, but there are less extreme examples such as McMaster-Carr. They've had the same design more or less since 2010 at least and it is usually considered both functional and tastefully current. I think in the early 2000s they had a different design which was fine, and they obviously skipped the whole "web 2.0" era of design.
- SoftTalker 3y ago
  You're right, there are a few exceptional sites that manage to have a "timeless" look and I'd probably put McMaster in that category.
- nextaccountic 3y ago
  > there are less extreme examples such as McMaster-Carr. They've had the same design more or less since 2010 at least and it is usually considered both functional and tastefully current. This? https://www.mcmaster.com/ https://www.mcmaster.com/ On desktop, sure. But they don't work in mobile. And that's easily 80% of the troubles of modern design: to avoid building everything twice, today people write "responsive", "mobile first" websites that, on desktop, tend to have an excessive amount of whitespace and other issues (see for example the old vs new reddit layout) What's being demanded of websites in 2023 is just much more difficult to do well than what people wanted in 2010.
  - domh 3y ago
    It is my first time going on mcmaster.com and it's working great on mobile for me (Android, Firefox). It feels snappy, good button sizes, great filtering options, no dead ends in flow until login to purchase. Top marks from me!
  - sverhagen 3y ago
    It isn't immediately clear to me what about that website isn't working on Mobile, as it seems to look pretty decent for me? (Firefox on a Galaxy phone.)
  - bryanrasmussen 3y ago
    thirding the mobile experience for me looks great on first try. I mean really really good.
  - syndicatedjelly 3y ago
    What are you talking about? That site looks great on an iPhone SE. Are there some issues? Sure. That doesn’t mean throw the baby out with the bath water, redesign to whatever’s trendy today, and kick the can down the road.
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 3y ago
  Speed never falls out of fashion. They're not the prettiest to look at but pleasant to use.
asoneth 3y ago
I am disappointed any time "modernize" comes up as one of the priorities on a redesign, especially for enterprise products. Most enterprise software does not gain much from looking "modern" and like all fashions the more modern the UI the more quickly it becomes dated. In extreme cases of very large products whose owners want them to look exceedingly modern it can be like painting the Golden Gate Bridge: by the time they finish implementing the last components and icons, the ones that were implemented at the beginning of the project are already due for an update. The job security simply isn't worth the maddening repetition.
amatecha 3y ago
Yeah, you should see the Canada.ca design system[0]. It's ultra-boring, but it works, and has been the same for a very long time (and I'd be happy if it doesn't change much at all). Having such a simple design standard makes it so I can hit the website of any government service and understand how to "parse" the site and find my way around. I never have to relearn a totally new design language and information architecture, which is huge for me, as I cannot stand having to "re-learn" sites every couple years! [0] https://design.canada.ca/ https://design.canada.ca/
blitzar 3y ago
If you write html properly - in 5 years do a minor tweak to the css and you have a new fresh look.
- bryanrasmussen 3y ago
  how will that help you keep employed though, better to have the css as part of your JS so any redesign is months of tiring work to earn those big consulting bucks! /you may get the impression I'm bitter.
  - blitzar 3y ago
    Me too my friend, me too. (btw your solution is needlessly complicated and way too much hard work - easier to sit with the client, exhale deeply then say "A full redesign? Thats quite a big project and its a lot of work, are you sure?" offer a fixed rate contract assuming 100's or even 1000's of person-hours and deliver (after a polite overrun of a few weeks) the updated css.) /you may get the impression I'm bitter and cynical.
    - bryanrasmussen 3y ago
      >btw your solution is needlessly complicated and way too much hard work it's not my solution, it's the solution I'm suffering through because our styling, as determined by external company, is handled via Chakra UI meaning that redesign requires JS work.
high_5 3y ago
This is a discussion about governmental sites. I don't use them because I want to but because I have to. So, current fashion and appeal are second to usability. There are some fundamental laws and limitations on how people process the presented information and that SHOULD be taken into account in designing a public service. Ideally, there is an interest in both parties (state and citizen) that their interaction is correct in order to fulfill their obligations and ensure their rights. Also many of the interactions with governmental digital services happen only once a year. I've been in helpdesk supporting people on a webapp with an obnoxious interface that they had to use 3 to 4 times a year to fulfill their project report in order to get paid for their project work. The UX was so out of the conventions that people hated it with passion and I had to help the laggards to use the application.
pjc50 3y ago
"Stale" is good for government websites. If you've got to interact with a form regularly as part of a legal requirement it is good that it never changes and looks exactly the same time every time you load it across a decade.

nicbou 3y ago

In this case a design system standardises forms and form components and that's very valuable. This means that every government website taps gets to learn the same little design lessons at once, from browser compatibility to keyboard navigation and accessibility. gov.uk nailed this, and it makes their website very pleasant to use. They share a lot of their UX research so it benefits a lot of other people including myself. I'm also a big fan of writing guides that teach people to write simply and clearly. It's sorely missing where I live.

nine_k 3y ago

I'd say that a good design should not look modern. It should look timeless.

tacitusarc 3y ago
That’s a pretty nice quip but not necessarily meaningful.
- high_5 3y ago
  But it is meaningful. The websites are being interfaced with pretty much timeless clients - people. We interact with the world with our body and process it with our brain. The world has the same physics laws all around the world, so it's consistent. The virtual world is becoming anything but that. At least public services should become more consistent and change more slowly upon the most necessary changes.
UberFly 3y ago
It should lack both space and time to reach web 6.0 perfection.
xyst 3y ago
Which site is considered “timeless” to you?

the_mar 3y ago

gov.uk til.gov

code_witch_sam 3y ago

i'm not sure i would call this a "big government initiative." this is pretty cheap, obvious stuff. you might pull an off-the-shelf component library for a demo app or even a startup, but the value of building in-house/from-scratch in government, especially military, cannot be understated. the web ui ecosystem is rife with security risks and accessibility footguns. it looks fine to me. it's a design system, not rocket science.

encomiast 3y ago

It does quite a few things well especially around helping website developers comply with section 508 accessibility requirements. They also do a lot of user testing a research which is reflected in the guidance for the various components. For example something as simple as asking someone to enter their name can be nuanced when dealing with a large diverse population: https://designsystem.digital.gov/patterns/create-a-user-profile/name/ https://designsystem.digital.gov/patterns/create-a-user-prof...