Nielsen Snipes E-comm Sites, Teams with Macromedia

Posted on June 04, 2002

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by Adrian Roselli (aardvark)

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Adrian Roselli

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User since: December 13, 1998

Last login: January 21, 2009

Articles written: 48

Jakob Nielsen, in a busy week, releases a report criticizing e-commerce sites, and teams up with Macromedia to help them make Flash 99% less bad.

E-commerce Is 51% Bad

The first report, from News.com, describes a study released by the Nielsen Norman Group. The study claims that, from a field of 15 e-commerce sites, in total they met 49 percent of the usability guidelines developed by Nielsen's consulting company.

The L.L. Bean web site scored highest by meeting 66 percent of the guidelines, while Home & Garden had the lowest score, meeting only 38 percent of the guidelines. Amazon.com was left out of the survey, for reasons unknown, even though it ranked in first place two years ago.

Flash May Become 99% Somewhat Bad

Also this week, as covered at News.com, Macromedia and Nielsen announced that they would team up to create usability guidelines that can take advantage of the UI improvements offered in Flash MX. Of course, these are just guidelines, and there's no guarantee they'll be followed by anyone, but there is at least acknowledgment from Macromedia that improvements can be made in Flash.

Some of us here should be familiar with Nielsen's article, Flash: 99% Bad, written way back in October of 2000. Well, as of June 3, it's been updated with a sub-heading, Flash Now Improved, even though NNGroup hasn't actually started working on Flash yet.

Macromedia also has a press release on their site.

Other Reading

A founder of evolt.org, Adrian Roselli (aardvark) is the Senior Usability Engineer at Algonquin Studios, located in Buffalo, New York.

Adrian has years of experience in graphic design, web design and multimedia design, as well as extensive experience in internet commerce and interface design and usability. He has been developing for the World Wide Web since its inception, and working the design field since 1993. Adrian is a founding member, board member, and writer to evolt.org. In addition, Adrian sits on the Digital Media Advisory Committee for a local SUNY college and a local private college, as well as the board for a local charter school.

You can see his personal portfolio at http://roselli.org/.

Adrian authored the usability case study for evolt.org in Usability: The Site Speaks for Itself, published by glasshaus. He has written three chapters for the book Professional Web Graphics for Non Designers, also published by glasshaus. Adrian also managed to get a couple chapters written (and published) for The Web Professional's Handbook before glasshaus went under. They were really quite good. You should have bought more of the books.

While you're reading, a friend of mine has just launched her site, and you should take a look. Kristen Kos, a lovely and talented actress, now has her own site with her acting resume and some new head shots.

4 comments on this article. Log in to add your comment | Rate this article:

Usability for Flash? What??

Submitted by Anenga on June 6, 2002 - 01:59.

I don't completley understand this.

Why is he working with Flash on this? The problem isn't with the software, it's with the developers. I doubt any of the guidelines will help Flash users, I don't think they'll listen. Plus, it seems like they're seperating Flash from the rest of the web mediums. There's HTML, XML/XSL and then there is Flash, seems like Nielson sold out or something...

Macromedia just doesnt' know what it wants to do with Flash. They want it to be the "standard" on the web ("In 10 years, Flash will be more common than HTML!" - Macromedia), and that it's "open". But why aren't there any open sourced software to build Flash Applications? Hell, why isn't there any OTHER software out there to build flash appliactions?! If Macromedia wants Flash to become the "standard" language on the web, they need to open it. Daddy can't keep his little girl forever, she has to grow up.

It's easy to fudge up a website, but it's even easier to screw up a Flash movie/page/whatever. Flash ignores standard usability features on Web Browers. The "Forward" and "Back" on the toolbar become useless and often you can't cut/copy/paste text within Flash websites.

If I was Nielson, I would tell Flash users the following:

Do not replace HTML design with Flash, instead integrate it with Flash. Use Flash to enhance standard HTML websites, not to replace them.
Don't use splash animations/introductions, or cookie if the user has seen it already or not
Adobt standard navigtion features that are on websites today (sidebars, toolbars) - don't create your own navigation scheme

Flash will not succeed over standard HTML pages because:

Bad Content Management; difficult to utilize a good content repository system (i.e. MySQL Database; though I know there are plug-ins avaliable to create database systems
Not an Open Language (Cannot view source, Only Flash sells software to create Flash movies)
Bad Syndication Techniques; which are the future of the web (XML, SOAP)
Not a W3C Standard - see SGML

Flash is Macromedia only?

Submitted by MartinB on June 6, 2002 - 04:59.

Anenga, you might want to take a look at Flash File Format FAQ:

The Macromedia Flash file format (SWF) SDK provides a set of tools for developers to write Macromedia Flash 5 (SWF) files, documentation of the Macromedia Flash file format (SWF), and code to write SWF files. There are two C++ interfaces for writing SWF files, a high-level and a low-level manager. Both interfaces are in the same code base, but are used somewhat differently. The high-level manager presents a simple interface for writing SWF files, while the low-level manager presents an API for writing an arbitrary SWF file.

It's free as in beer too btw

This is how companies like Adobe produce swf-writing software such as LiveMotion.

Completely off

Submitted by sehryan on June 6, 2002 - 06:38.

Anenga, I am sorry to say you are completely misinformed about Flash. As MartinB points out, the file format is open. Has been for a few years now. Adobe makes its own flash creation tool, and there are several others in the market as well (swish comes to mind almost immediately. So your argument for no other apps other than Macromedia isn't accurate. Standard usability features in web browsers now work in Flash MX. If you have paged through an MX movie, and you hit the back button, you will go back IN THE MOVIE. Similarly, you can bookmark specific parts of a movie as well. Contrary to popular belief, Macromedia actually listens to its developer's complaints and requests and tries to correct them. And Macromedia added accessibility to Flash this last go around now as well. Now even handicap people can enjoy Flash. As for content management, Flash has been able to interact with databases and XML out of the box for a while now. The most efficient way is to dump the results coming back from a database into an XML file. Then you work off the XML file. This is nice for one main reason...you can work off of the XML file for both an HTML and Flash version. Flash has come a long way in the last few years, and I hope that this post can start to dispell some of the untruths about Flash that are still floating about.

UK Blind charity takes shot at Flash MX

Submitted by aardvark on June 18, 2002 - 08:22.

The Royal National Institute for the Blind has described Macromedia's attempts to make Flash MX accessible to those with visual impairments as "disappointing." Read the article on The Register, because I can't find anything about it on the RNIB site.

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