Do's and don'ts of usability in website design

Don't's:

• Use boldface or All Caps for long pieces of text as this slows down reading
• Don't have much white space as this reduces scan ability and slows down reading
• Don't make a user scroll to find critical information such as buttons
• Pages should not be larger than 800 x 600 pixels because this forces users to scroll horizontally
• Static text should not be underlined
• Avoid the use of flashing as users find it very distracting
• Avoid using frames
• Avoid long loading times
• Don't use under construction pages
• Use different fonts on every page
• Make the text smaller than 10 pts, or larger than 12 pts

Do's:

• Use Alt tags for graphics
• Try to use plain colour backgrounds
• Navigation should be placed in a consistent location on each page of your website
• Design your website so that users do not have to scroll horizontally
• Align most text to the left
• Use black text on white background
• Keep navigation simple
• Keep the navigation at the top or left of the page. If you use links on the right they can get lost if the browser window is not open to a full screen view