eWeek is one of those publications that used to be relevant, but isn’t so much anymore. The office got it’s September 17, 2007 copy today and when I was flipping through it, Jim Rapoza’s article listing the top web development mistakes caught my eye. Here is the abridged version.

  • Go click crazy – the shorter number of clicks to do whatever it is your site does, the better
  • Hide behind graphics – don’t hide things behind unintuitive graphics / icons
  • Get overly graphics intensive – it slows things down
  • Stick to the script – if plain old html works, use it, not some js cleverness just because you can
  • Go all richy-rich – too many flashy things and popups might as well mean ‘go away!’
  • Use graphics when text would do just fine – text always shows up
  • Colour your site trippy – the colour scheme should fit the context
  • Provide directionless navigation – good navigation means content is actually found
  • Set table for one – tables look yucky more often than not, use them sparingly or test the heck out of them in different browsers and screen sizes
  • Get sloppy with text – spleling and grammer count (yes, I did that intentionally
  • Put up a velvet rope – treat all browsers as first class citizens and let users see content without having to register first
  • Take the web out of web site – don’t go crazy linking to .doc’s or .pdf’s
  • Overcrowd your site – too much stuff on your site makes things hard to find

Take a look at your site, does it commit any of these mistakes? If so, go log a bug. Go ahead and use this list as your oracle.