On Thu, Apr 10, 2008 at 9:28 PM, Don Habas <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > The question we're struggling with is since most of these fields are > very common, how much explanation is needed in the validation > message...
On Apr 11, 2008, at 11:13 AM, Alexander Baxevanis wrote: > I would highlight the field that fails validation and I'd put the > following message next to it: > > "This doesn't look like a [first name|last name|city]. Maybe you > made a spelling mistake?" I'd think the message should be as explicit as possible -- if validation failed because there was a number in the field, the error should say something like "Sorry, numbers aren't allowed here - please try again." Alexander's approach is friendlier-sounding, but could leave users wondering why the data they entered didn't "look like" a first name. It seems more likely that the user would have accidentally entered invalid characters, and an explicit message would be more likely to help them identify what went wrong. Of course, you may still have issues with users such as this one mentioned by mathematician / songwriter / satirist Tom Lehrer: > I am reminded at this point of a fellow I used to know who's name > was Henry, only to give you an idea of what an individualist he was > he spelt it HEN3RY. The 3 was silent, you see. ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
