Re: [Usability] HIG: Fixing the sort arrow direction guideline

[Thorsten Wilms <t_w_ freenet de>]

On Sun, 2009-05-17 at 08:58 -0400, Celeste Lyn Paul wrote:
> For those who want to know more about this proposed change, here is a common 
> rational for the arrow position in Windows, Mac, and the web:
> 
> v users perceive arrow as bigger on top so the list should contain the 
> "biggest" items first (decreasing, e.g. reverse alpha, 10-1)
> 
> ^ users perceive arrow as smaller on top so the list should be sorted by the 
> "smallest" items first (increasing, e.g. alpha, 1-10)
> 
> Also, the language "natural" order is very strange, does the GNOME HIG mean 
> "logical" order? There should never be a table that isn't sorted in some way. 
> Usually a good default is the first column is increasing by default unless 
> there is a better column to sort by.

So the traditional triangles can be read as pointing in sorting
direction, or to indicate where large and small are.

A while ago I drew some alternatives. One was a little A and Z, but that
only makes sense for names, not size or date. Another one can be seen on
http://thorwil.files.wordpress.com/2007/05/list_view_01_a.png

Small to large bars, in a triangular shape, but one that doesn't point
up or down. Of course, just 2 bars could do.


-- 
Thorsten Wilms

thorwil's design for free software:
http://thorwil.wordpress.com/