There is a long-standing design principle called 'progressive disclosure'. The interface is kept to the basics for the majority of users, with more advanced settings available through the use of an 'Advanced' or 'More' button. It has both benefits and drawbacks. The benefits centre around simplicity for the majority of users. The main drawback is that users may not realize that some features are available.
One particularly notorious application of progressive disclosure was an earlier version of Microsoft Office where the menus shipped in the 'short' version. Users had to really dig (or be told by tech support) how to turn on the full menus. (Coincidentally, TomTom is just now doing the same thing with their in-car navigation systems, but at least the button for making the change is not deeply buried.) In answer to your specific situation, I would not encourage the hiding of the features in unobvious ways. For example, a Adobe Air application I was using (can't remember which) changed the photo area of a message into four menu items when you moused over it. I found this accidentally after about three weeks of fairly frequent use. I am still a big advocate of self-explanatory design - you should be able to tell what something does by looking at a screen shot, not scrubbing over the whole interface with a mouse. (Also, if you have any interest in accessibility, interfaces that *require* mice - that is without keyboard alternatives - violate disability discrimination laws in most countries.) Regards, William Hudson Syntagm Ltd Design for Usability UK 01235-522859 World +44-1235-522859 US Toll Free 1-866-SYNTAGM mailto:william.hud...@syntagm.co.uk http://www.syntagm.co.uk skype:williamhudsonskype Syntagm is a limited company registered in England and Wales (1985). Registered number: 1895345. Registered office: 10 Oxford Road, Abingdon OX14 2DS. Attend our courses on Ajax design & usability, card sorting and web usability: CHI 2010 Conference (Atlanta, Georgia) http://www.chi2010.org UPA 2010 Conference (Munich, Germany) http://bit.ly/8x9NU -----Original Message----- From: discuss-boun...@lists.interactiondesigners.com [mailto:discuss-boun...@lists.interactiondesigners.com] On Behalf Of Gabor Vida Sent: 10 February 2010 09:02 To: disc...@ixda.org Subject: [IxDA Discuss] Can anyone point me to research about hidinginterface elements? A project that I am involved in has raised an interesting debate about reducing clutter in an interface. ... ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... disc...@ixda.org Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
