Yahoo Mail UI Design

However, one flaw that has caused much inconvenience is the incredibly tiny “Empty” link that deletes spam from the Bulk folder. Almost half of the time, when I go to click the “Empty” link, I end up clicking the area that surrounds it, and wind up viewing the Bulk folder instead of emptying it. This is exceedingly frustrating. Here’s how Yahoo’s interface currently looks:

[The Yahoo Mail interface with the bulk folder link highlighted.]

Yahoo should at the very least add some padding to the “Empty” link. It may be desirable to have it small to avoid accidental clicking, but their confirmation message serves to prevent that, so there is no need to keep the link smaller. My suggestion would be to take the Bulk folder’s link and cut its width in half, and use the other half of the space that the Bulk folder’s link normally consumes for the “Empty” link, so the two links would be alongside each other and both would be easy to click.

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In Web, Usability, Design, Thought on March 18th, 2006 | 4 Remarks

4 Remarks to “Yahoo Mail UI Design”

  1. David Harrison remarks:

    If it annoys you so much, just write your own style sheet and apply it with the webdev extension.

  2. Jona remarks:

    That’s a good idea, but the point of my article wasn’t to discover a solution; I’m pointing out a flaw that not everyone is tech-savvy enough to solve themselves. What if John Doe, who has trouble using computers, has the same problem?

  3. Fabian De Rango remarks:

    computers wern’t created for idiots :p

  4. Jona remarks:

    But perhaps Yahoo Mail was. ;)

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