: Is there a short authoritative reference of basic design rules and principles? As a web developer, I often find myself working with different non-professional self-called designers. In such situations,
As a web developer, I often find myself working with different non-professional self-called designers. In such situations, I often have to explain them the most basic rules and principles about the design in general and web design in particular. It is boring and unpleasant, especially if the self-called designer replies by "I never heard about those rules; prove that you're right".
Is there an authoritative reference (and not a blog of some unknown guy) which lists the basic rules and principles that every designer must learn at the very first year in college?
Remark: I thought about finding a good manual, but the designers I work with are usually unwilling to read books, so it's not a solution. I would rather imagine a website with a list of rules with a short description for every rule and the detailed links for people who want to go further or understand the reasons behind a precise rule. This being said, I'm also interested in books if they are accessible and easy to quote later in mail to illustrate what I've said during the discussion.
Example of rules I'm talking about:
In typography, the text cannot be underlined, unless it's an hypertext link on a web page. See 25 Rules of Setting Type (pdf), pt. 9; also Basic tips for more fashionable typography.
In design, dark gray text on black background may be difficult to read.
In web design, you can't predict the size of the text, pixel by pixel, in browser, since it depends on the installed fonts and browser accessibility settings.
More posts by @Caterina889
3 Comments
Sorted by latest first Latest Oldest Best
I thoroughly recommend reading the book Universal principles of design ( www.universalprinciplesofdesign.com/ ). It covers 125 design principles (in the current revision, 100 in the previous one), looking not only at software and web design but covering a wide range of design areas, although all are good to be aware of.
Each topic has a single page of description, and a single page of visual examples. Each item has a little panel that lists seminal works on the principle and gives further reading.
It's easy to dip in and out of and for those perhaps less aware of the existence of these design principles, it's an eye-opener.
The first two of your three examples are covered in this book (under principles of Highlighting and Legibility).
If you need a defined set of rules for your designers to do their job, then the solution is really to find better designers.
It sounds like you are trying to have graphic designers design web sites. If the graphic designers are not web designers, then this will be a problem going forward no matter how many rules-of-thumb you give them. It's an issue of knowing the medium one is working in and a lot of graphic designers aren't familiar with the medium of HTML, CSS and JS as much as they should be.
To answer the specific question, there's no master list of proper usability, interface and accessibility guidelines, though there are plenty of sources out there. Research/Google terms such as:
user interface
pattern libraries
accessibility
usability
human interface guidelines
I don't know whether this question should be closed or not
we have lots of similar question on
this site you can check all of them
one by one there are lots of good
resources to start with :
Composition web design rules
Correct set of principle design
What is the single most influential book every designer should read
Tips and sources for programmers who must or want to learn graphic design.
What is a good sequence of projects to learn design?
Is there an authoritative reference
(and not a blog of some unknown guy)
which lists the basic rules and
principles that every designer must
learn at the very first year in
college?
i guess if your designers will master in basic they'll surely move to something upgraded, but sadly in this design world we have only basic which automatically turn to advance when we have specific/solid knowledge of basic with time and experience.... this field is endless
Example of rules I'm talking about:
It seems that you just need a kind of set which you can follow always with your work, it is also boring sometime if we work out of track that make us count rather than following a particular set always.
Other use full links/Books:
The Principles of Beautiful Web Design Second Edition from site point
9 Essential Principles for Good Web Design From PSD TUTS+
Web Design Principles Checklist
30 Useful Web Design/Programming Books
20 Do’s and Don’ts of Effective Web Design
100 do and donts in web design PDF
12 Design book Just creative
Popular Design books
30 Delightful Graphic Design Books
10 Essential Free E-Books for Web Designers
Hope this will help......
Terms of Use Create Support ticket Your support tickets Stock Market News! © vmapp.org2024 All Rights reserved.