Vitaly loves beautiful content and does not give up easily.
Born in Minsk, Belarus, he studied computer science and mathematics in Germany. While writing algebra proofs and preparing for software engineering at nights in the kitchen, at the same time he discovered passion for typography, interface design and writing. After working as a freelance designer and developer for 6 years, he co-founded Smashing Magazine back in 2006, a leading online magazine for designers and developers. His curiosity drove him from interface design to front-end to performance optimization to accessibility and back to user experience over all the years.
Vitaly is the author, co-author and editor of all Smashing books, and a curator of all Smashing Conferences. He currently works as creative lead of Smashing Magazine and UX designer and front-end developer in Europe and abroad, working with European Parliament, Haufe-Lexware, Axel-Springer and a few other companies.
Not much can surprise us when it comes to interface challenges. We can design a decent data table, a solid onboarding flow and an exquisite hamburger navigation. But what if there are slightly more complicated challenges ahead of us?
In this workshop with Vitaly Friedman, a UX consultant with European Parliament and creative lead and editor-in-chief of Smashing Magazine, we will dive into advanced complex challenges, common for large mega-sites, and enterprise applications. We’ll explore 100s of practical examples of intricate tables, filtering, search, navigation and forms, with focus on common pain points, slowdowns, and solutions for designing complex UIs.
We’ll take a look at:
Accessibility of complex interfaces, with technical considerations, focus traps, navigation, announcements of notifications, keyboard support,
Complex mega-dropdowns with 4+ levels of navigation, layout, interaction design, sideways navigation, breadcrumbs, top task analysis, mobile/desktop (e.g. large university websites),
Enterprise-grade tables, complex use-cases with inline editing, filtering, tagging, sorting and search — on mobile and on desktop (insurance, loss prevention),
Complex modals and overlays, confirm vs. undo behavior, right timing, intraction design, with guidelines and best practices to improve click-through rates and decrease mistakes (e.g. enterprise software),
Complex enterprise forms, focusing on form components, one-column vs. multi-column layout, error recovery, inline validation, routing, conditional reveal, disabled buttons, input buffering (e.g. complex multi-column multi-page forms with dozens of steps),
Complex filtering, layout, auto-apply vs. manual apply, filtering overlays, filtering and sorting intervals, best practices and guidelines, on mobile and on desktop (public archives, media library, large catalogs of products),
Autocomplete UX, with layout and interaction design, when to show/hide suggestions, search query iteration, autocomplete blindness, faceted search, smart suggestions, type-ahead pattern, keyboard navigation, on mobile and on desktop (e.g. in eCommerce),
Dashboards and spreadsheets, with complex layouts, data editing, inline filtering, infinite scroll UX, “load more” vs. pagination, access to footer and access to the current state, mobile optimizations,
Privacy UX, and how to gather accurate data while avoiding legal battles and respecting user’s data,
100s of real-life examples, government and university websites, trip planners, financial services, eCommerce, feature comparison tables, online banking, configurators, insurance and mortgage calculators, data grids and enterprise products.
Checklist for complex UIs with guidelines and decisions to consider when designing any component in a complex setting.
By the end of the session, you’ll gain a packed toolbox with practical techniques and strategies for approaching complex UI challenges and tackling them well — plus a collection of real-life examples to apply to your application immediately. You’ll also have time to ask all your questions and have them answered live.