Size

Say I have a form with a couple of captions, a text box and a command button. Is it better to make the form as small as possible, to take up less space on the screen, or is it better to spread it out, and take up more room?

Jacob Sheehy
http://www.sheehy.ca

The more I C, the less I see.

That really depends on what you are doing with the form. If it is going to be the main interface to the app I would make it take up some screen real estate. OTOH if it is just a dialog to grab some input I would would make it fairly compact and modal.
Microsoft has some pretty decent tips on interface design in msdn and there are quite a number of books dedicated just to this subject.

Don

Time is the best teacher; unfortunately it kills all its students.

Alright, yeah, I see what you mean....I'll look into it more, I always feel my interfaces are missing something. Thanks

Jacob Sheehy
http://www.sheehy.ca

The more I C, the less I see.

I always think that I should add something to mine as well. One thing I have been experimenting with is changing logos. If it works as planned it will also provide us with an additional revenue stream. Insurers paying us to display their logos to a very captive and targeted audience. I have never had much luck with color or anything like that. I have always felt it was to distracting.
I have had people in the office complain about that. So I started adding pictures to my command buttons. It's not much, but people seem happier for it.

Don

Time is the best teacher; unfortunately it kills all its students.

Interface design is one of the most important aspects of your program. Of course functionality is the other, but if the user can't figure out how to access the functionality via the UI, your app is pointless.

I'm working on some UI customizations that help snaz up the typical VB controls... first installment was the Listbox background stuff in Tutor's Corner (About 3 weeks ago or more)... If you have suggestions on what you'd like to see, I'd love to hear them.

-Hand out.

<font color=green>"On a long enough timeline, everyone's life expectancy drops to zero."</font color=green> - Fight Club