A great example from Google Docs of how errors should be handled. I want to add tags to a document, but I’ve forgotten to select one. Rather than let me go through the process of choosing tags and then telling me something’s wrong, Google puts the problem right up front. And because this is modeless feedback there’s no dialog box to decode or buttons to press so I can get on with putting it right straight away. To err is human; to help you recover as quickly and smoothly as possible is humane, and as interface designers that’s where we want to be.
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