Error Prevention
One of the original 10 Usability Heuristics for User Interface Design by Jakob Nielsen, error prevention is probably the most important design principle for everyday interactive systems. Better than tutorials or awesome error messages, your system should make it very unlikely that the user will ever commit an “error”.
Further reading
- Here’s a recent article on Preventing User Errors from the Nielsen Norman Group.
- “I hate blackcurrant” — a relevant design example
