The most common web design mistake is to design for the exception, and to ignore the obvious. That's because designing for the obvious is boring, while designing for the exception is fun.

网站设计中最常见的错误是：只顾着设计特殊部分，却忽略了常规部分。这是因为设计常规部分让人感到乏味，而设计特殊部分却非常有乐趣。

Some years ago, I was involved in designing content management software. We spent a lot of time designing breadcrumb trail navigation, which tells the reader where a particular page sits in the overall classification.

几年前，我参与设计了一个与网站内容管理相关软件。我们花了大量时间设计“breadcrumb trail[当前位置]”导航系统，该系统可以告诉用户所浏览具体页面处于所有类别中的那个位置。

Another feature we wanted for the software was multiple classification of a particular piece of content. This caused significant problems for the breadcrumb trail design, as there could theoretically be two or more breadcrumb trails for content. Anyway, it was a bit of a challenge, and we really enjoyed working at it.

一条具体内容中能够包含多级分类，这是我们为该软件设计的另外一个功能。但是这给“breadcrumb trail[当前位置]”导航的设计带来了大麻烦，因为理论上一条内容可能包含两个或三个“breadcrumb trail[当前位置]”。然而，这仅仅是个小小的挑战，我们也十分乐意能去解决它。

Nobody actually questioned whether breadcrumb trail navigation was genuinely useful. It just seemed like a great idea. We were sure that everybody would love it. It turned out that it was a feature that the vast majority of people ignored. Everybody I have talked to since, and every report I have read, has stated that breadcrumb trail is, at best, a like-to-have feature.

实际上没人真正怀疑过“breadcrumb trail[当前位置]”路径导航的实效性。这似乎是一个好消息。我们确信人人都会喜欢它。但事实上，大多数人都忽略了这点。我所交流过的人，我所读到的报道，都称“breadcrumb trail”最多不过是我们自认为不错的特征。

"The resistance to using breadcrumbs is perplexing," states Dr. Eric Schaffer, CEO of Human Factors International. "They increase efficiency. They support site learning. They reduce the user's "where-was-I?" memory burden by providing a list of recently visited pages. They make it easier to cross levels of the navigation decision tree within the browse environment."

“人们不愿意使用‘breadcrumb’这点真是让人费解。”人因软件咨询公司（Human Factors International）的CEO，Eric Schaffer博士说道，“使用breadcrumb可以提高效率，帮助用户更好地了解站点，并为用户提供已浏览过的页面信息，使用户不必苦苦回忆：“刚才我浏览了哪里？”；它们还使得在浏览环境中穿越不同级别导航目录变得更为简便。”

"But users don't use breadcrumbs spontaneously," Dr. Schaffer continues. "Studies show that, too. Not surprisingly, the picture is not so black and white. Super users DO use breadcrumbs. You do, don't you? And you use them because they are efficient. They make sense."

“但用户不会主动地使用“breadcrumb”， Schaffer博士继续说到，“调查研究也表明了这一点。这倒不奇怪，因为事实不会像图像那样黑白分明的。高级用户会使用breadcrumbs，当然，你也会使用它，不是吗？因为你发现它们确实十分有效，能起作用。”

This is the New Economy, and we're not supposed to be bored, are we? We're all supposed to be doing challenging work that fulfills us and moves our career forwards. We all want to design for the "super users" because this sort of design stretches and challenges us.

当前正处于新经济时代，我们可不想让工作和生活变得枯燥乏味，不是吗？我们应该从事那些能够达成我们计划的，有助于我们事业发展的，并且带有挑战性的工作。因此，我们都希望为“高级用户”做设计工作，因为它拓展空间大，并具有挑战性。

There are far more ordinary people out there than super users. These people want to be lead through a simple process so that they can complete their tasks quickly and with as little mental effort as possible. They like a website such as eBay, which under a big heading called "Find" asks: "What are you looking for?", and then gives you a nice wide search box, with a button beside it labeled "Search".

但是，更多的普通用户远不像高级用户这样。他们期望能迅速地完成任务，并且不要过多的耗费脑力，因此，过程一定要简单。比如，在eBay网，一个名为“搜寻”大标题下面会问道：“您想找些什么？”紧跟着的是一个漂亮宽大的搜索框，边上是“搜索”按钮。

The obvious is very often boring to the designer. When I tell designers about the "stupid" things people do on websites, they often laugh in disbelief. For example, lots of people click on the search button without placing text in the search box. They do this because they think the search button is actually a link to the search page. So, when someone does that on your website, what should you do? Bring them to a dedicated search page.

网页的常规部分对设计者来说常常是非常枯燥的。当我告诉设计师们有关人们在网站上做的“蠢事”时，他们总是一笑而过，并且不相信这是真的。比如说，当很多人还没在搜索框内输入内容时，就点击了搜索按钮，因为他们误认为这些按钮是连接搜索页面的。所以，如果有人在你的网站上这么做，你应该怎么办？我认为，应该为他们提供一个专门的搜索页面。

Every time you add something to a webpage you potentially make that page a little less clear. Go through your website and list all the parts that you think are really cool; the parts your friends are really impressed with. Remove them.

每当你向网页中添加内容的时候，网页的内容就开始慢慢变得零乱起来。所以，一定要好好浏览一遍你的网站内容，找出你和你朋友都认为确实很棒的部分，然后删除不尽人意的内容。

What impresses you most is likely unnecessary to the successful completion of the core task. Your goal should be to design a website that even an adult can understand.

其实，最能给人留下深刻映像的网站是这样一种形式的网站：人们不需要成功的执行某个核心任务便能够达到他们所期待的效果（因为没人愿意做什么任务，即使是很简单的任务）。你的设计目标是：让所有人对你的网站一目了然。

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