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But at some point usability is more important than branding. I have never worked for any company or organisation that believed this. Most clients will send you

by dagw 2y ago

But at some point usability is more important than branding. I have never worked for any company or organisation that believed this. Most clients will send you their branding guidelines before sending their feature requests. If they get to choose between adding a new feature, improving usability or making sure everything follows the branding, they will choose the branding every time.

oneeyedpigeon 2y ago
I think you're exaggerating here. I recognise the "branding is more important than usability" approach, but the OP specifically said "at some point". Have you ever worked for a company that forced a design decision knowing it would prevent anyone from using the product? I suspect not; there will always be some point. The issue here is, at what point does usability take precedence. Does input validation fall under "branding" or "function"? IMO, an error modal is nothing to do with company branding, etc. — it's not even part of your document, it's the browser's responsibility. The browser can decide to do something completely different from showing a modal as far as its concerned, so you shouldn't make any assumptions. Your responsibility ends at declaring what valid data is.
- Spivak 2y ago
  It 1000% falls under branding. If you don't make errors consistent across browsers / platforms your support staff will politely but firmly burn your house down. There's no such thing as your responsibility ending and throwing your hands up when you're a company who has to do end-to-end support of your product. Having as little native anything means you go from n sets of documentation to 1.
bee_rider 2y ago
I think the disconnect here is in the interpretation of “more important.” Usability is more important than branding from the point of view of the victims of this kind of over-designed software, the end users. Because they are already being inflicted with a lot of branding, please at least give them conventional error messages.

by dagw 2y ago

oneeyedpigeon 2y ago

I think you're exaggerating here. I recognise the "branding is more important than usability" approach, but the OP specifically said "at some point". Have you ever worked for a company that forced a design decision knowing it would prevent anyone from using the product? I suspect not; there will always be some point. The issue here is, at what point does usability take precedence. Does input validation fall under "branding" or "function"? IMO, an error modal is nothing to do with company branding, etc. — it's not even part of your document, it's the browser's responsibility. The browser can decide to do something completely different from showing a modal as far as its concerned, so you shouldn't make any assumptions. Your responsibility ends at declaring what valid data is.

Spivak 2y ago
It 1000% falls under branding. If you don't make errors consistent across browsers / platforms your support staff will politely but firmly burn your house down. There's no such thing as your responsibility ending and throwing your hands up when you're a company who has to do end-to-end support of your product. Having as little native anything means you go from n sets of documentation to 1.

bee_rider 2y ago

I think the disconnect here is in the interpretation of “more important.” Usability is more important than branding from the point of view of the victims of this kind of over-designed software, the end users. Because they are already being inflicted with a lot of branding, please at least give them conventional error messages.