Alright all you Articulate Online users. .. Here is the Articulate Online that never was.

This is one of the original, prototype designs for Articulate Online and it was what Articulate Online almost looked like.

This is actually the second design of Articulate Online, the first one was so ugly that it will never see the light of day.

Things that really stick out about this design:

1. Has a real alien feel (alien as in UFO and little green men)
2. Articulate Online logo is really, really small
3. Very dark and drab
4. Bad use of screen real estate

We tried really hard to make the screen width be viewable without horizontal scrolling at desktop resolutions of 800x600 with this design, so this design is really narrow. This is a common mistake of many websites, they design for 800x600 and very few people still run resolutions that small, and the people that do, probably are not going to be buying our software.

We also use a considerable amount of real estate for the notes on the right, when this stuff is likely never going to be read, and adds nothing to the value of the program.

Initially we went with a design approach where each page was dedicated to a different function. The page above was all about access, controlling who could and who couldn't access your content. We had a separate page for inviting users, setting permissions, and another page for collecting guestbook information. It is not apparent in this design how you get to those other features.

Compare the design above, with the design to the left. Notice how clean, and easy this feels?

The colors are much brighter, and don't make you feel as though you are watching an episode of the X-files.

We also consolidated everything you would want to do on a single page. Everything you would want to do with this content is right there. You can quickly and easily run reports, assign permissions, setup the guestbook, and invite users. Everything that you had to do in several busy pages in the old design were put on a single clean page. We fit more in on a single page, but made it a lot easier.

The old design was hard and dark, and the new design is light and "cheery". The initial design was done in February, and the later design was done in summer, maybe that influenced the designers.

It is pretty interesting looking back at this and seeing how the design changed so much.

Labels: Articulate Online