Comments on: Can Your Blog Readers Find Your Hyperlinks?

By: Tim OBrien

Tim OBrien — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 14:48:16 +0000

The other night, I posted that message too much after lights out.

Douglas is completely right about the iPhone hover. In practice it is not a useful link indicator.

The important thing, then, to take away from all this is that all links should have consistent, obvious and multiple indicators.

A different color combined with underline is standard. But this needs to be put into the context of the formatting used on the rest of the page. If the other text has several different colors and uses other text formatting liberally, using standard indicators will not be sufficient.

The indicators should be consistent, if not with the rest of the net, then within that page. Users will not find links if each has a different uniform.

By: Tim O'Brien

Tim O'Brien — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 13:44:19 +0000

Douglas is correct. It was past my bedtime when I wrote that up, so it did not come out the way I meant.

In general, more and more wevsites are coming out with mobile-device friendly versions of their sites. I think that clear and simple color schemes with obvious visual indicators is fairly standard from what I have seen. I do not normally use them on my iPod Touch. Most mobile web pages, for some dumb reason, have the multitouch zoom feature disabled. The zoom is a key accessibility feature for me. (I go into detail about iPhone accessibility features here: http://www.timobrienphotos.com/large-print-ideas/iphone-access/.)

Does anyone use a alternate color scheme when browsing?

By: Douglas T

Douglas T — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 12:00:28 +0000

With the iPhone, you definitely need to identify the links clearly. With the small screen, the more subtle link identifiers would be no help. While it has it’s own version of hover as mentioned above, this isn’t an instant effect, you have to hold for a second. It’s not going to help identify links as someone scans over a page.

Are other mobile web devices like this? Anyone?

By: Tim O'Brien

Tim O'Brien — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 02:19:28 +0000

1. IPhone

The iPhone has its version of hover. I have a Touch, which is the iPhone without the phone.If you touch and hold your finger on a link, a short description pops up. I do not think many people know about this feature.

2. Alternate Color Schemes

Using alternate color schemes (like your own CSS or Accessibar) may mean that using link colors alone is not accessible. Multiple methods would avoid this issue. I use Accessibar to force a gold-on-black color scheme on most web sites. So I would miss links solely indicated by color.

By: Glenda

Glenda — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 01:24:13 +0000

G F Mueden, great expression! A good one to keep in mind.

By: Glenda

Glenda — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 01:19:03 +0000

Douglas, thank you for snafu-ing an iPod for checking the affects of hover and focus. Sounds the appearance of hyperlinks is the best way to indicate them. Concur?

By: G F Mueden

G F Mueden — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 22:54:53 +0000

There is an old, crude expression that applies: “If you love me Baby, make me know it”. The same goes here. However you do it, make it obvious. Don’t be cute, show it. Don’t let your tendency to be clever interfere with getting the message across. Hover should only be used to confirm that this is it.
===gm===

By: Douglas T

Douglas T — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 19:57:58 +0000

They are correct, a site’s hover and focus effects don’t really work on an iPhone. If you’ve zoomed way in on a page, there is a hover-like effect, but that seemed to be controlled by the browser, not by the site’s CSS. A page’s focus can be set by clicking on a link and hitting back for instance, but the focus never really moved once set, so wasn’t helpful for navigation. It didn’t seem to have any equivalent to keyboard navigation on a PC that would allow focus to be controlled.

Learn something new every day… Probably forget something old too, but let’s not go there.

By: Douglas T

Douglas T — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 19:45:30 +0000

I don’t have an iPhone either, but I’d think that focus would work, even if hover didn’t. Don’t know, I’ll have to corner someone with an iPhone and check.

Going in search of an iPhone…

By: Glenda

Glenda — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 19:26:08 +0000

Samantha, would giving your people some quick tips perhaps remind them that usability is as equally important, if not more so, than visual appeal? Good luck!