Projects/Usability/HIG/Wording

Purpose

Every word displayed in an application is part of a conversation with users. This conversation is an opportunity to provide clarity and to help people feel comfortable in the system.

Guidelines

• Use a terminology that is familiar and easy to understand for the target audience (i.e. Persona) of your application.
• Put the most important thing first.
• Short words, active verbs and common nouns.
• Avoid contractions such as Don't and Won't etc.
• Avoid abbreviations (including ampersand instead of 'and'), acronyms, and tech-babble.
• Use a tone that’s informal and friendly, but not too informal; avoid popular, but transient, words and phrases.
• Keep information short and consistent; avoid redundancy or unnecessary words. e.g. Do not repeat the dialog title in the dialog text.
• Don't abuse capitalization because it draws people’s attention.
• For date and time information, consider that your app may potentially be used for several years; do not use immutable date references like this year unless it is algorithmically determined.
• Follow system-wide wording conventions for basic functions to keep wording consistent.