From the moment I was first introduced to photo-sharing site Flickr, I was smitten. I loved it - loved the interaction it offered, loved the ease with which I was able to upload and share photos, loved the fact that storage and bandwidth allowance was so high (beyond what I’d be able to upload on any given month, at least on the paid-for service). In short, I became a total Flickr advocate. But something still bothered me …
The old navigation - confusing!
Some of the navigation was, prior to yesterday’s updates, confusing to say the least. For example, let’s say I wanted to find the recent activity (stuff that people have commented on/added notes on) or check out other people’s photos that I’ve commented on (to see if any other comments/conversation has ensued). For the former, I could find the link in the footer. For me, this was not ‘footer material’ - it’s one of the most important pages on Flickr. What’s it doing there at the bottom? Anyway, that’s a side issue. The confusion for me is that this page and the ‘photos you’ve commented on’ page are, essentially, two sides of the same coin. Yet I could only easily find the first of those pages. To get to the other page I needed to first pick a photo, one of my own actually (which, depending on where I am in Flickr at the time, might involve 2 or 3 clicks to get there), then scroll down underneath the photo where I’d find a link to both those pages. This is just one example where I’ve found the placement of navigation confusing and inconsistent, and that required me to be familiar with the site and remember the route to these pages. There were other issues, but I’ll not harp on about that. I have other things to harp on about …
The all-new Gamma version
Flickr have gone from ‘Beta’ to ‘Gamma’ stage in the last 24 hours. I think it’s the first time I’ve seen that badge applied to any web site! The changes are mostly navigational ones (thankfully), although there are general UI tidy-ups and a re-working of the Organizr (which really needed it - I cannot count the number of times I got script time-out errors when using it). I’ve yet to really get to grips with the changes, so there may be a follow-on to this post, but my initial thought is:
How are Flickr getting away with it?
And by that I mean, how is it that a site that is loved so much by the tech-savvy, blogging and web standards community (read nerds, pedants etc - I can say this, ‘cos I’m in that group!) seems to escape criticism of its make-up/build? At least, it seems to me that it does. We’ll criticize the smallest validation error in sites that otherwise do an excellent job of sticking to standards, but Flickr, well … it looks so nice and all that, who wants to say bad things? Well, I do, for one.
Little mistakes that should not be there
Where are the alt attributes for these images below, folks?
And these fancy drop-down navigation items? They are not keyboard-navigable.
Oops. And, as an aside, they do not even work with a mouse when I try to use the site at work - the company firewall actively blocks JavaScript that appears that it might be doing something nasty, which it has done in this case. I tried to disable scripting (using the Firefox Web Developer Toolbar), but there is not a noscript alternative for this navigation. To get to any of these sub items, I now have to disable style sheets to reveal the links and then re-enable CSS when I get where I want to be:
Do people still do this? Apparently so. Spacers, yeah!
View profile? How about ‘view luxuryluke’s profile’ as an alt attribute? Simple enough to do - not sure why this kind of thing gets missed off:
And again, some more prudent alt work wouldn’t go amiss. How about simply using ‘See all public photos tagged with SitePoint’? The ‘Click this icon to …’ part is somewhat superfluous.
Don’t mind me, I’m just a pedant
This may seem like another example of pedantry, but I believe simple things like those I’ve noted above are easily avoided. There are bigger issues that I could address (such as the keyboard accessibility of the site as a whole, the overuse of tables for layout that could be solved with relatively simple CSS), but I’ve said enough for one day. I’m off to throw stones at some kittens now, grumpy old git that I am.
ok, i understand all this, but come on … keyboard navigaton? blocked javascript? chill man, we live in the age of `better browsers`. and you probably shouldn’t be using flickr at work anyway :)
You got script timeouts while using the old Organizr made with Flash?
Not to mention the use of table. Sadly enough a lot of people who ’seem to’ understand the use of good (X)/HTML and use of CSS, Web Standards and Accessiblity hold flickr to the edge of their seat!
@NR - I have a better browser. It’s perfectly up to the job, but the JS-driven navigation is getting blocked by a firewall (no problem accessing from home). However, it reveals the fact that there should be a non-JS alternative for key navigation such as this - it is a valid accessibility issue, as is the keyboard navigation issue (try telling someone who has appalling MS - Multiple Sclerosis, not Microsoft! - or similar condition that affects movement but perfect eyesight that they will have to struggle pushing their mouse to the spot when a few tabs on the keyboard would have been preferable/easier). As for the last point, yeah. Bang to rights there - I’m still a huge Flickr fan!
@flynn - yes, I got script timeouts using the Flash organizr. So many times I wanted to use a simple HTML-based version rather than the flashy interface, but maybe that’s more to do with the number of photos I would try to manipulate at once!
Have you considered making a post in FlickrIdeas about this?
lloydi, one other problem I had with the first read-through was that I got to that first screenshot and stopped reading. Probably just my lack of attention-span, but it did sort of stop things in their tracks for me. I like the align attribute to keep the text flowing. Just a thought. :-)
Nah, it’s not pedantry. The faults you’re highlighting illustrate either a laissez-faire attitude to accessibility or a lack of attention to detail. Given that it’s Flickr we’re talking about, my money’s on the former - I find it hard to believe that they’re ignorant of accessibility as an issue.
The Spacers should be called “spacr”, just to go with the theme. Good rant, it needs attention. I think the new look is an improvement aesthetically, but yeah, it needs work in usability and accessibility.
Well, I’m flattered, Ian.
If you’d like to see my profile, here it is:
http://flickr.com/people/luxuryluke/
Also, perhaps we ought to do a rewrite of a simple page into WStandard writieup.
Care to see what I’ve done?
Also, for a site that would be a massive candidate for proper XHTML/CSS and some unobtrusive DOM Scripting, It’s suprising Yahoo! doesn’t just give Clearleft a call! A few hours of consulting or even a few days would do the trick?!
Perhaps it’s that same ol’ problem. People pretending to know what they are doing, and proving to management that they can get by, but at the cost of nettraffic, usability, semantics, pedantics, etc.
btw, are pedantics the funny things people do on the sidewalk?
Good post, Ian.
pedantry, that’s my new word for the day!
The beta version was subject to two years worth of tweaks, hacks and updates, the gamma version is two days old, so I expect things will get better. I do also find it funny how there isn’t much critique about validation, but I’m of the opinion that Flickr know it’s invalid and don’t need the whole standards thing explaining to them.
You can still get everywhere, it just takes an extra page load. I prefer that to hitting tab a trillion times.
nteresting comments, none the less.
[...] What’s Wrong With Flickr? [...]
Since we’re being pedantic and all, the complaints you had about the old navigation were due to an oversight on your part.
The ‘recent activity’ and ‘things you’ve said’ links were and are right on the home page when you’re logged in, directly above where it shows the photos you’ve put up.
@jordan. I actually knew that those links were on the home page, but that page rarely got seen because I leave myself permanently logged in. As such, I considered the home page to be ‘my photos’, where I had access to most things I needed. So while I new that those two links were there, on other pages they weren’t (just the recent activity was) and on other pages (individual photo pages of mine) they both were, while looking at other people’s photos only the recent activity link was available (in the footer). In short, there was a lack of consistency which, thankfully, seems to have been addressed.
But that’s not what this post is about, to be honest - I’m concentrating on the things that they *should* have got right with this make-over, the small things that make a big difference. And, knowing Flickr, that they will put right before too long.
Can my mother get her head around how Flickr works? Not up til now. Maybe these changes will help on that front.
Flickr has never been keyboard navigable. There may be more drop down menus than I personally care for, but the new organization makes a lot of things easier to find.
It’s like buying a new desk and finding out the drawers don’t open. It’s a matter of craft. A ‘web 2.0′ companye owned by Yahoo! has no excuse for such a sloppy implementation.
Mate, there are 3 options:
1. you send me a link to a website that is a better built than Flickr for Photos sharing.
2. I send you a link to better browsers e.g. IE 6
3. You quit your job and look for a workplace which allows Javascript
Cheers
I totally agree with you, anyway we have to consider that the current version is much more usable. Flickr gamma version is much better than the beta one.
@Anu
1. No can do - Flickr is the best one that I know. Just check out my photo stream and my sets and ask yourself whether I sound like I don’t like Flickr
2. Oh dear. IE better than Firefox. I don’t think so. The browser is not the issue - the plain simple fact is that Flickr are guilty of missing out some important accessibility attributes in their coding. The browser it’s viewed on is irrelevant. I mean, if you have a porsche or rickety old cart, it really doesn’t matter if the road you’re driving on had lots of pot-holes; both suffer from it.
3. The JavaScript-blocking issue is something that I can do little about (no, not gonna leave work for that, c’mon!). However, what it points out is that they *DO NOT* have a non-js version of the navigation, and that is an accessibility issue, I’m sorry. Here’s the proof
Hi!
Lloyd - thanks for opening this discussion. You’re right about a few missing alt tags here and there. I’ll definitely add them as you suggest. We will also look at accessibility of the new menus as soon as we have the chance.
Also - not that this is an excuse - but what many people don’t realise is that the front-end design & construction team is basically me and Eric Costello, with 2 or 3 other developers helping as needed. So, there’s a *lot* of ground for us both to cover.
Gamma was a two-fold project from my perspective: 1) Finally taking the opportunity to rationalize how people get around the site *(and what it looks like when you’re first starting out - something that many people will miss if they’re already members), and 2) Taking an opportunity to clean up (unify, “gestaltify”) the site layout generally. I am really pleased with this :)
A comment on standards - it’s not that we are laissez-faire about it. Simply that with such a small dev team, we have always felt that it was more important the Things Work than that they validate sematically. This attitude is seen as sacreligious by some members of the Internet :)
Anyway, now that we’ve done the first major Gamma release, Eric and I are looking forward to making incremental improvements to what has been a huge project for us, based squarely on what our (much loved) members tell us.
Read the Gamma bug forum on Flickr for some real headaches. I’ve got new contacts that are not my contacts. My brother can no longer sign into his account, I can’t find the email icon to email my contacts…And accessibility is every bit as important as ramps and handicapped parking places!
I hope I never see a Gamma version of anything ever again! And don’t get me started about the inconvenience of not being able to export MY photos and MY text…
[...] What’s wrong with Flickr [...]
Flickr has never been keyboard navigable.
but i know you can navigate any page on IE
but this is really weird i got this several times…flickr should make his own keyboard shortcuts!