IE7 : too much of a UI surprise to force on users?

October 11, 2006 | Posted by stuartchurch | Filed under Psychology, Software, Technology, Usability  

The much anticipated release of IE7 is imminent. It could be tomorrow. It could be in two weeks. But it’s going to be this month. I’ve no doubt that IE7 will be a huge improvement over IE6 in terms of both functionality (tabbed browsing at last!) and better support for web standards (although it may not go far enough). However, I’m surprised to see that it will be made available via Microsoft’s Automatic Updates as a High Priority update. Microsoft says that this is “To help our customers become more secure and up-to-date”. Since most PC users apparently live in fear of net crime in the UK, and most people blindly install High Priority updates because of the perceived security benefits (myself included), I think it’s fair to say that an awful lot of people will suddenly end up with IE7 as their primary browser.

And that’s where I think the trouble could start. IE6 is virtually ubiquitous unless you are a Mac owner. Pretty much everyone uses it, and has been using it in its current incarnation for several years. While a significant, enlightened minority have migrated to Firefox or Opera, the vast majority of web users have shown little desire to try another browser. Except now they’ll have to. And there’s every chance that it will be a shock. Although it’s better, IE7 just doesn’t feel the same. Everything has moved around. There’s no menu bar by default. Tabbed browsing, a search box and RSS feeds have appeared. All the buttons are in different places. This means that all the actions that users have learned and have become muscle memory over the past few years will no longer be relevant.

Out with the old…
Internet Explorer 6 interface

And in with the new…
Internet Explorer 7 interface

This is like waking up one morning only to find that your right-hand drive car has suddenly become a left-hand drive car (or vice versa if you are in the US). No warning. No expectation. It’s just there and you have to deal with it and still manage to find your way to work in one piece. It’s still a car. It’s still drivable. But it’s bloody hard work. Instead of being in a blissful, dreamy world of unconscious competence, you may find yourself suddenly dropped from a great height into an icy vat of conscious incompetence.

I genuinely think this is a problem that a lot of people will initially have with IE7. And any negative perceptions may be exacerbated by the fact that it will be a sudden imposition of a new user interface, rather than a polite invitation to try it out. Ultimately, the success of this forced method of introduction of IE7 may depend not only on how learnable the new interface is, but how unlearnable old habits are.

19-Oct-06 Update 1. So much for being secure and up-to-date! The first security vulnerability for IE7 has already been found.

19-Oct-06 Update 2. Some initial signs of discontent with the change to the new IE interface.

Comments

Leave a Reply




About

I'm Stuart Church, a user experience consultant with Pure Usability in Bristol, UK. Sensorydrive is my personal blog and covers user experience design, information architecture, product design, psychology, research methods, perception and pretty much anything else that takes my fancy! You can find out a bit more about me if you want...