OAuth2 is the protocol that enables anyone to log in with their Facebook account. It powers the “Log in with Facebook” button in apps and on websites everywhere. In this article, Zack Grossbart will show you how “Log in with Facebook” works and will explain the protocol behind it all. He’ll look at two examples: why Spotify uses Facebook to let you log into the Spotify mobile app, and why Quora uses Google and Facebook to let you log into its website.
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In this article, Margarita Klubochkina will show you that Improving your billing form can make the user experience much more intuitive and, as a result, ensure user convenience and increase confidence in your product. It’s an important part of web applications which you can improve quickly and easily using simple features sush as suitable autocomplete and name attributes for autofilling, VanillaMasker to separate card digits, or Halter font for easy comparison.
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The best error message is the one that never shows up. It is always better to prevent errors from happening in the first place by guiding users in the right direction ahead of time. But, when errors do arise, well-designed error handling helps teach users how to use the app as you intended. In this article, Nick Babich will examine how the design of apps can be optimized to prevent user errors and how to create effective error messages in cases when errors occur independently of user input.
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Passwords are written off as inconvenient and unavoidable, but due to a combination of sensors, encryption and seasoned technology users, authentication is taking on new (and exciting) forms. In this article, Drew Thomas will show you that it’s OK to rethink common password habits, and it’s acceptable to use common sense and due diligence to create usable, secure and error-free authentication – passwords or otherwise. Most other interaction patterns have been updated over time, but no one wants to mess with password authentication. It’s time to change that!
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In this article, Colleen Roller will show us that defaults are powerful because they provide a way for users to passively decide, thereby easing the difficulty and effort associated with decision-making. Also, that providing a default option is not always appropriate. Sometimes, it’s better for users to make an explicit choice — especially when they are more likely to follow through with a decision and be more committed to taking action on it. It’s imperative to understand that the design matters. UX design professionals have a responsibility to understand how design itself influences — and sometimes even drives — user perception and behavior and, therefore, decision outcomes. The decisions we make as designers matter.
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By inserting a single element in your markup, you can tell any web browser to render an interaction control, and you can completely modify that interaction – from a text field to a checkbox to a radio button – by simply changing a keyword. Now imagine a world where creating these interactions means also creating custom interaction controls, and you begin to realize how taken for granted inputs really are. That’s what the HTML 5.0 specification was intended to solve, by expanding the concept of the text input to allow for specific data types, such as numbers and email addresses, as well as rich interactions, such as task-specific on-screen keyboards and date- and color-pickers.
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Konstantin Lebedev used to work at Mail.Ru, which had a Flash uploader that was rather good, but still had some problems. He and his team realized that they needed to build something new and different. This article covers all of their steps in creating what they considered to be a better tool for the job. Here’s a list of features that they wanted to have with a new approach to this problem!
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A record number of shoppers are turning to their smartphones to research potential purchases. Meanwhile, the bigger question — are those same users willing to complete the purchases on their mobile device? — is quickly being answered. The US, for example, saw an 81% spike in mobile e-commerce (m-commerce) sales in 2012, comprising a $25 billion market.
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Error pages for form-field validation are dreadful. You’ve just filled out 20 form fields, yet you get the same bloated page thrown back in your face because a single field failed to validate. I clearly recall the often loud sighs of despair during our last usability study each time a test subject encountered a validation error page.
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In this article, we’ll provide guidelines that have been crafted from usability testing and actual complaints made to customer support personnel by disgruntled users.
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