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Creating a simple and usable interface
What is simplicity? That is the quality of being natural, plain and understandable. It is not unexpected then that simplicity is commonly worshiped in GUI design. People naturally dislike confusion in devices and software. Of course, some people like figuring out how stuff works, but for most of us, being unable to operate an interface causes wasted time and frustration, and that's not what we are to achieve.
If you are able to take a complex device or a piece of software and somehow [rearrange, reorganize and redesign] the interface to make it simple and intuitive to use, then you're right on the path to delivering a better user satisfaction.
One of the techniques you can use in your interface design is Context based controls.
There are several of attitudes you can take towards GUI design that relate to context and consistency. One dictates that you should keep key elements similar throughout your software or web portal to be sure that people know where everything is and don't get lost. The second approach is to modify key elements or navigation according to the content of each screen or window. The content based option is one where you show only the items the individual needs to complete the process they've approached in that particular context.
A good illustration of the two approaches can be found in the revision of the Microsoft Office interface. Office 2003, along with all the previous versions, followed the design principle of keeping things consistent. There was a bunch of buttons displayed on the screen at all times, and these didn't change no matter if you were working with columns, charts, text or images. Microsoft remodeled this interface in the release of Office 2007 using a context related approach. At the top you now see a ribbon - or a set of tabs. When clicked upon, each tab displays a set of controls relevant to any specific task, be it spell checking, processing images, or just writing.
The content related approach allows you to show fewer interface elements at any given time, but at the same time, more controls that are critical to the task at hand. I wouldn't advice choosing a context-heavy approach for general web design because for most webpages users expect to see consistent site-wide navigation. This is because every website is different, and it would make the browsing experience much harder if all the individual pages on a particular site were different too.
Having said this, this can be utilized for web applications because they're not just simple websites - they're pieces of software that live in the cloud. People are likely to spend a lot of time on a web app and will have more opportunity to learn how it works. The complexity of some web apps means that you really need to utilize the context based approach, because if you don't, there will be too much on the screen at any given time for anyone to process. By showing only a few relevant controls for a given task, your users can figure out what to do in much less time.
 Standard Toolbar Icons
Science Toolbar Icons
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ArtIcons Pro can find, extract, edit and create Windows icons in color depths up to 16 million colors. Import and export icon images, create and handle icon libraries. It supports the new icon format introduced in Windows XP (8-bit transparency). Download it
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