search user interface design

A FRAMEWORK FORTHINKING ABOUT SEARCH FEATURES

• Input – features that allow the searcher to express what they are looking for.
• Control – features that help searchers to modify, refine, restrict, or expand their Input.
• Informational – features that provide results or information about results.
• Personalisable – features that relate specifically to searchers and their previous interactions.

USER INTERFACE DESIGN PRINCIPLES

1. Visibility – Keeping the user informed about what is happening at any one time. Google, for
example, maintains the current search terms in the query box (#1 in Figure 1.1). Further, if
the SERP is not showing results directly linked to the submitted query, then it states clearly
what corrected query it is using (#11).

2. Language – There are many technical things that computer software can do, but it is important
to prioritise and describe what is happening in language that the user expects. Google, for
example, stays away from the word ‘query’and describes the query suggestions in a user-friendly
way (#9) as ‘searches related to [your search];’ search professionals call these interactive query
expansions or refinements.

3. Control and Freedom – It is important not to block users into a hole or fixed pathway, but UIs
should instead provide users with the ability to easily recover from mistakes, or to change their
plans. Many SUIs are good at noticing likely errors, such as spelling mistakes, but not forcing
these corrections upon users.

4. Consistency – It is a good idea to follow conventions in design and consistently describe things
in the same way. It would be a bad idea, for example, to call a query ‘a query’ in some places
and a ‘keyword search’ in another place. Users may assume there must be a difference.

5. Error Prevention – Designers can help users by making it hard to do unproductive things. This
is related to Control and Freedom except that UIs should try to help users avoid needing to
undo their actions in the first place. This is perhaps why Google corrects a spelling mistake
by default in many cases, so that the user only has to act when they did want to search for the
unusual terms (#11).

6. Support Recognition – It is helpful for users not to have to remember what they have done or
need to do. This is another reason why Google maintains the current query in the query box
(#1). Similarly, suggestions are another way of allowing searchers to search using recognition.

7. Flexibility and Efficiency – Although many user interfaces are designed to be intuitive for first
time users, it is also important to make sure expert users can do things more efficiently when
they do not need the help. This is the reason many systems have shortcut combinations to
print and save, for example, and why Google lets searchers navigate their search results with
the up and down keys on a keyboard and use the return key to select a result (#1).

8. Aesthetics and Minimalism – Google has always maintained a very clean and minimalist design.
Nielsen’s principle recommends clever use of white space, to balance the amount of information
being shown. Google’s clean and clear design makes it easy to see exactly what to do next. For
a brief period in 2010, Google choose to hide even the small amount of information that was
visible on the front page, aside from the logo and search box, until the user moved the mouse.

9. Clear error messages – Many systems have error messages and these should be clear and informative
to make sure the user knows what to do next.When users do reach a point of no results
in Google, Google is quick to explain why and suggest alternatives. Errors that say ‘there was
an error’ do not help the user to solve the problem.

10. Help and documentation – Providing clear help is important, even Google provides a page on
‘Search Help,’ as can be seen at the bottom of Figure 1.1.


One approach to choosing an evaluation approach, provided by the HCI community, is the
DECIDE process [154]. There are six parts to this process:

• D – Determine the goals of the evaluation.What do you want to prove or examine?

• E – Explore the specific questions to be answered.Which element of the framework is being
effected?Which disciplines are involved?

• C – Choose an evaluation paradigm, such as systematic IR or empirical user studies.

• I – Identify the practical issues in performing such an evaluation, such as structured tasks and
appropriate datasets.

• D – Decide how to deal with any ethical issues. Ethical issues are especially important when
working with humans.

• E – Evaluate, Interpret, and present the data.


SUMMARYOFDESIGN RECOMMENDATIONS

1. Keep the search box and the current query clearly visible for the searcher at all times.

2. Help searchers to create useful queries whenever possible.

3. Make it clear how results relate to metadata in your system, to help searchers to judge the results and make sense of the whole collection.

4. Carefully curated metadata is better than automatically generated, but both are better than no metadata at all.

5. If appropriate, support searchers in reviewing their decisions and their options quickly and easily.

6. Always return results based on the first interaction, as subsequent interactions may never be needed.

7. Never let searchers reach a dead end, where they have to go back or start over.

8. Help searchers avoid mistakes wherever possible, but do not force that help upon them.

9. Give searchers control over the way results are ordered.

10. Make sure it is obvious exactly howresults are ordered and which,therefore, are most important.

11. Avoid unnecessary information, which can be distracting during search.

12. Searchers rarely scroll, so get ‘important’ information above the first-scroll point.

13. Provide actionable features in the SERP results directly so that searchers do not have to interrupt their search.

14. Images and Previews can help searchers make better browsing decisions.

15. Make sure the dimensions and layout of a visualisation are clear and intuitive to the searcher.

16. Guiding numbers help searchers to make better browsing decisions

17. Animation should be used carefully and purposefully to convey a message, such as change.

18. Track and reuse information about the behaviour of a system’s searchers.

19. Help searchers to return to previously viewed SERPs and results.

20. Help searchers to recover their previous search sessions, as they may be back to finish a task.