This one pops up a lot - I love the design and poster aspect. I am always amazed how many of these 'Laws' trace back to Nielsen Norman Group data and research over the years. Many UX trends are even named after them! Jakobs law... Norman Door. UX professionals are being greatly influenced by this focused observer set. Maybe just my opinion, but modern UX and HCI theory is being held back day by day due to a set of gentle rules. Specifically, 'Rules' from exposed patterns across user experiences in Broadcast and other non-interactive media.
Me not being a "traditional or natural" designer, I like to have a set of best practises recipes or laws. These laws might be difficult to constantly hold in your head. I think this is a PERFECT starting point for AI to "bulk check" some screens.
Honestly I would map it to a short-cut, like I map "format source code" to a shortcut. If you building business software a set of laws or (shortcut mapped to them) can be really useful as a sanity check.
In fact I just did that:
- Downloaded the UX Laws as a screenshot
- Downloaded a screenshot of a dashboard (a userform might have worked better)
- Asked ChatGPT and Claude to do a review with those laws in mind and then to create a new mockup based on those recommendations
Project 1: CMMS Dashboard For Maintenance (fast food chain)
I liked the earlier page in this series, but this one feels kind of half-assed. Consider many of the first entries, like this one:
"Cognitive Bias - A systematic error of thinking or rationality in judgment that influence our perception"
That's not a law! It's barely even a useful concept in the form presented here!
Instead of being a useful collection of rules a UI designer/dev can apply, this just feels like the author picked some terms, looked up their definition in the dictionary, and threw it all together so he could sell posters.
Thanks for sharing this. After nearly a decade of being "full stack", I've only now been diving more and more into UI and have barely touched the surface of UX.
Slightly off-topic, but are there any resources for common UI designs/patterns especially for mobile/webapps? e.g. hamburger menus, toast notifications, etc. I've been looking for a site that's organized, comprehensive and with visual examples.
In a UI course I took at uni (~2009) we had Jennifer Tidwell's book which was pretty much exactly what you're asking for, though not catered for mobile due to smartphones just having come out. Seems like her most recent edition has a lot of mobile focus though:
There seems to be an infinity of bullshit sites with a two lines explanation of this and at most an acknowledgment that there exists an study from the 1980s that found it. Just like this one.
But the name doesn't seem to appear on any serious site, that would include a reference to the paper or describe what is in it.
Me not being a "traditional or natural" designer, I like to have a set of best practises recipes or laws. These laws might be difficult to constantly hold in your head. I think this is a PERFECT starting point for AI to "bulk check" some screens.
Honestly I would map it to a short-cut, like I map "format source code" to a shortcut. If you building business software a set of laws or (shortcut mapped to them) can be really useful as a sanity check.
In fact I just did that:
- Downloaded the UX Laws as a screenshot
- Downloaded a screenshot of a dashboard (a userform might have worked better)
- Asked ChatGPT and Claude to do a review with those laws in mind and then to create a new mockup based on those recommendations
Project 1: CMMS Dashboard For Maintenance (fast food chain)
- Dashboard old: https://imgur.com/a/R3wrMpr
- Dashboard new (Claude): https://imgur.com/a/cYq4gE8
Project 2: https://swellslots.com (Surf Forecast App, arcade look and feel)
- Forecast old: https://imgur.com/a/W3daZrP
- Forecast new: https://imgur.com/a/kNi2Nvg
"Cognitive Bias - A systematic error of thinking or rationality in judgment that influence our perception"
That's not a law! It's barely even a useful concept in the form presented here!
Instead of being a useful collection of rules a UI designer/dev can apply, this just feels like the author picked some terms, looked up their definition in the dictionary, and threw it all together so he could sell posters.
Nothing wrong with using Claude Code or Loveable but I am yet to see something truly beautiful and unique from them yet.
Slightly off-topic, but are there any resources for common UI designs/patterns especially for mobile/webapps? e.g. hamburger menus, toast notifications, etc. I've been looking for a site that's organized, comprehensive and with visual examples.
https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/designing-interfaces-3r...
“Productivity soars when a computer and its users interact at a pace (<400ms)”
But the name doesn't seem to appear on any serious site, that would include a reference to the paper or describe what is in it.