At 10:26 2017-06-06, "Brant E. Layton" dcci@futureone.com wrote:
One more point for the desktop application: Navigation.
I've worked with many applications that are intense data entry - and the best ones can be 'driven' entirely from the keyboard. You don't have to reach for the mouse to make selections, etc. Of course, there are those users that don't know where the TAB key is...
Trying to fill out forms on the Web? Only about one half of the web pages I encounter can even set focus to the first fillable field - let alone navigate the entire page efficiently. (bank login pages...)
But, we mostly just put up with what we are given.
I also find that Web forms are often laid out badly. They can not count on a screen size so they go with the one-per-line model: Data Item 1: _____ Data Item 2: _________________________ Data Item 3: __________________________________________________ Data Item 4: _____ Data Item 5: __________ even if it would be clearer to have more than one item on a line (such as with addresses). This often overflows off the bottom the screen. My desktop app does not have this problem.
I saw one page that I greatly regret not having saved the URL for. It was made very "pretty". As a result, each data item (one per line) took about triple the vertical space it needed. Worse, there were no cues as to how long the input could be. I filled in a reference of about 35-40 characters and when I submitted the form, only then was I told that input was limited to 12 characters.
I very much dislike Web forms.
Sincerely,
Gene Wirchenko