Re: [Usability] Indicating required fields

[Kalle Vahlman <kalle vahlman gmail com>]

2005/9/20, Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>:
> 
> On Mon, 19 Sep 2005, David Zulaica wrote:
> 
> > Date: Mon, 19 Sep 2005 11:57:24 -0700
> > From: David Zulaica <david pseudo-cyb org>
> > To: 'Matthew Thomas' <mpt myrealbox com>,
> >      'Usability gnome conference' <usability gnome org>
> 
> > Subject: RE: [Usability] Indicating required fields
> 
> > The required fields could have a different color border.
> 
> Subject [             ] (required)
> 
> It is ugly but it is accessible and unambiguous.
> Colour alone is not likely to be enough.

Colour can be a good start at least, if it goes away when text is
entered. The colour should signal "hey, here's a field you haven't
filled in yet!" so if you forget to put a value in and the action you
were going to do is not availabe, you'll spot the missing one more
easily as it will have different colour wrt to the filled fields.
 
> I'd be happy enough with the star like what you see on the web as it would
> meet common user expectations, principle of least astonishment.

I'm pretty clueless about accessibility, but I hoped there was a way
to implement the "mandatory" hint without adding text. Your
"(required)" example shows why, the relatively unimportant hint (when
compared to the "what I need to write here" and to the input area)
takes up as much space as the label and entry.

-- 
Kalle Vahlman, zuh iki fi
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