CategoryUsability

July 9, 2021 — Accessibility is often overlooked or bolted on to the end of a project. Let’s figure out how to implement and advocate for accessibility from the inception of a project to the release or handoff and beyond. Read more…

June 17, 2021 — Image placement on the modern web is highly intentional, helping to communicate the overall purpose of a page or view. This means that nearly every image you declare needs to have an alternate description. Read more…

May 19, 2021 — Everything to keep in mind when designing and building a mega-dropdown, common pitfalls, hover entry/exit delays, trajectory triangle technique and SVG path exit areas. Read more…

May 12, 2021 — In this new series of articles on UX, we take a closer look at some frustrating design patterns and explore better alternatives, along with plenty of examples to keep in mind when building or designing one. Let’s start with an infamous birthday picker. Read more…

April 26, 2021 — Accessibility experts Kate Kalcevich and Mike Gifford introduce readers to “layered accessibility testing”, a practice of using a variety of tools and approaches at different stages in the digital product lifecycle to catch accessibility issues early — when it’s easier and cheaper to fix them. Read more…

March 19, 2021 — Wondering what’s happenin’ at Smashing? Well, we’ve been busy. Here’s a little story of how we removed floating labels, improved performance on mobile, and launched a new series of articles. Oh, and how you can contribute to Smashing, too. Read more…

March 16, 2021 — How do we know which patterns are good, better, best when it comes to accessibility? Is it better to use an established pattern/library or create new ones? With the myriad of choices available, we can quickly become caught up in a web of confusion on this topic. Read more…

November 30, 2020 — In this article, Uri Paz explains how a site complying with accessibility guidelines may still present usability issues when testing with real users. Find out how weaving accessibility best practices with usability testing, can help as many people as possible to fully use your site. Read more…

November 4, 2020 — Internationalization and localization is more than just writing your content in multiple languages. You need a strategy to determine what localization to send, and code to do it. You need to be able to support not just different languages, but different regions with the same language. Read more…

September 7, 2020 — Meet our Smart Interface Design Patterns Checklist Cards, a deck of 100 cards with common questions to ask when tackling a common interface challenge — carousel, table, date picker, autocomplete, filtering, sorting, search, configurator, slider, timeline, map, web forms, reviews and testimonials, onboarding, pricing plan, authentication and many others. Get the PDF deck right away. Read more…