Re: HTML: scrolling versus jumping

["Huber, Mike" <mrhuber -at- SOFTWARE -dot- ROCKWELL -dot- COM>]

I have always thought that a moderate (as in 2-3 screens worth) of
scrolling is reasonable. But a couple of weeks ago I got a phone call
from a user of an intranet site I maintain, asking me to add some
information that was already there. He didn't realize that it was there,
because he hadn't scrolled the page.

The page in question was a list of documents that could be downloaded as
Word DOCs or viewed as HTML. The page was divided horizontally, with the
links to the HTML versions on top, and the DOC versions at the bottom.
Not a layout that I would have used, but when I took over the site I
didn't see it as a serious problem. This user, though, had his browser
window set to a size that made the first section look complete. The
divider just happened to hit the bottom of his screen.

Another problem was that the site uses frames. He might have pressed the
down button, or the page-down button, but not clicked the main frame
first. Yet another reason why frames are "expensive."  When you type a
URL in the target field and bring up a framed document, you have to move
your hand to the mouse (or trackball or whatever) in order to select a
frame to scroll.

The moral: Sometimes scrolling is a problem.

mike -dot- huber -at- software -dot- rockwell -dot- com

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