Purpose

To make sure that the style guide(s) and usability guidelines identified as part of usability requirements are adhered to during development.

Benefits

• Style guides embody good practice in interface design.
• Following a style guide will increase the consistency between screens.
• Using a style guide can reduce the development time.
• Following general usability guidelines will improve the quality of the interface.

Method

1. For a Graphical User Interface (GUI) such as Windows, develop and adhere to a GUI style guide based on good GUI design principles (see the recommended books).

   For web pages, develop and adhere to a style guide based on good web design principles (there are also books on web usability).

2. Developers should also be familiar with and apply general user interface guidelines, for example see the guidelines in the RESPECT Handbook.

3. Someone familiar with the style guides and usability guidelines should review the user interfaces to check for conformity with the guidelines.

Next steps

Evaluate early working prototypes.

Last updated 8-Feb-00